This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Not a coffee mug verse. A statement made in the middle of a hard chapter — and that's why it works.
The episode in a glance.
- 01The psalm is set in a season of distress, not ease.
- 02'This is the day' — even this hard day — is given by God.
- 03Rejoicing is a choice, not a mood — that's why the psalmist calls everyone to it.
- 04Gladness is grounded in who made the day, not in what the day brings.
Read along.
Psalm 118:24 — 'This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.' You've seen it on coffee mugs. It sounds chipper. The chapter around it is anything but.
Psalm 118 is a song of someone who's been through it. 'Out of my distress I called on the Lord.' 'All nations surrounded me.' 'I was pushed hard, so that I was falling.' That's the context.
And in the middle of that, the psalmist says: this day — this exact day, with all its weight — is a day the Lord made. He didn't sleep through it. He authored it.
Then the call: let us rejoice and be glad in it. Not because the day is easy. Because the maker of the day is good.
Rejoicing isn't a denial of how hard the day is. It's an act of trust in who is over the day.