These two psalms belong to the Hallel sung at Passover, and they move from a congregation to a single voice. Psalm 115 answers a taunt from the nations: 2"Where is their God?" It does not defend itself. It states where God is and what he does: 3"Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases." Then it turns to the gods of the nations and describes them one part at a time. 5"They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." The list continues through ears, noses, hands, and feet, and each part is there and does nothing.
The list builds to the verdict that those who make idols become like them, and so do all who trust in them. Worship shapes the worshiper before it does anything else. What we trust to save us, satisfy us, or make us safe leaves its mark on us. A person who trusts a thing that cannot speak, see, or move has less and less to say, to notice, or to do. For a modern reader the question is whether anything has been quietly trusted to do what only the living God can do, and what resemblance to it has begun to show.
Psalm 116 turns from that warning to a personal testimony. It opens with a confession that comes before any request: 116:1"I love the LORD, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy." Then the psalmist remembers how close it came. 3"The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me." In the middle of that, one prayer: 4"O LORD, I pray, deliver my soul!" The answer is plain. 6"When I was brought low, he saved me." The living God hears and acts, and that is the difference the first psalm was arguing for.
The turning point comes with a question every rescued person eventually faces: 12"What shall I render to the LORD for all his benefits to me?" The answer is small and public. 13"I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the LORD." The psalmist will pay the vow 14"in the presence of all his people," and says so twice. Thanksgiving here is spoken where others can hear it, in the courts of the LORD's house and among his people.
That detail asks something of us. A rescue kept private has not finished its work. Someone near you needs to hear what the LORD has done, in words specific enough to be believed, and the telling is part of the offering. Tell one specific thing, to one person, this week.
Read after Easter, the cup and the vow carry more weight. The snares of death closed on the psalmist, and God loosed them. The Hallel psalms belonged to the Passover meal. The one who ate that meal with his disciples went through the snares for us, and thanksgiving is the fitting answer of a people brought back from them.
Prayer
Father, to your name be the glory, and to us none of it. Search us for whatever we have trusted to do what only you can do, and free us from its likeness. Thank you that you heard our voice and our pleas for mercy, and that the snares of death did not hold. We lift the cup of salvation. Give us courage to tell someone this week what you have done. In Jesus' name, amen.