What Does Psalm 107:1 Mean?
Extend your hands in thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his faithful love reaches to the ages.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
O give thanks unto the LORD, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.THE KEY
Thanks rests on the LORD’s goodness as faithful love that carries through every age.
THE MEANING
The LORD’s goodness is present to you as faithful love that holds through the ages. The verse locates your thanks in that enduring character, even while circumstances change.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A hard season does not prove that the LORD’s goodness has vanished; the verse grounds its claim in love that reaches across ages.
THE ROOT
חֶסֶד
chesed
GROWS FROM
ח־ס־ד
Faithful, loyal kindness expressed within a relationship.
The word translated “mercy” holds more than a moment of pity: its word family describes loyal kindness enacted in relationship. That makes “he is good” concrete as faithful love, joining the reason for thanks to a bond that endures.
ALSO GROWS
ḥasad: To act loyally or show kindness.
חָסַד
This verb makes faithful love an action within a relationship, not merely a tender feeling.
ḥasid: A faithful, loyal, or devout person.
חָסִיד
The same word family describes a person by loyalty, showing how closely this love is tied to lived relationship.
הוֹדוּ
hodu
GROWS FROM
י־ד־ה
To acknowledge, praise, give thanks, or confess.
“extend your hands in thanks” in this verse is hodu. The verb also carries the sense of acknowledgment and praise, so thanks here is a recognition spoken aloud. It responds to what the next clause declares about the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
yadah: To acknowledge, praise, give thanks, or confess.
יָדָה
This verb family links thanksgiving with openly recognizing what is true.
todah: Thanksgiving, thanks, or confession.
תּוֹדָה
The related noun shows thanksgiving as an expressed acknowledgment, not only an inward feeling.
THE PATTERN
The LORD’s goodness is expressed as faithful love that continues beyond the present moment.
And the LORD passed by before his face, and called out, The LORD, The LORD God, compassionate and full of favor, slow to flare, abounding in faithful love and truth,O extend your hands in thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his faithful love reaches to the ages.Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus the Anointed One, our Lord.THE THREAD
But the faithful love of the LORD is from age to age upon those in awe of him, and his alignment is to the children's children.Both verses use the same Hebrew word for faithful love where the KJV says “mercy.” Psalm 103:17 carries that love across the ages and into the lives of children, making its endurance relational and generational.
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