The End

Scripture Reading: Psalm 150; Hosea 8-12; Revelation 8

Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!

Praise the LORD!

Psalm 150:6

While the Psalms are a collection of songs, they are not a random collection, gathered up and placed without purpose on pages of parchment. They are not randomized. Once in a class on biblical interpretation, my professor said something that stuck with me. He said that if you are trying to understand the overall purpose of a book of the Bible, you can read the first chapter and the last chapter and often come up with a clear idea of what the author’s intent was.

The Psalms begins with God blessing man. It ends with man blessing God. There is a lot of up and down in between. It is full of highs and lows, great moments of joy and victory and days of tragic sorrow. It shows man in strong faith and also full of doubt and wavering. It deals with life and death, triumph and trouble. And this is what life is like here.

So, why end this way?

Because, for the saints, this is how life ends. It will not conclude in a whimper of despair, but in a shout of joy. There will be a lot of ups and downs along the way, but it ends in glorious, happy praise.

If you have followed along on the reading plan I have used this year, you have now finished reading through the Psalms twice in 2025. Congratulations.

It is a few days before the end of the year. We still have a lot of propheting to do, but we have almost accomplished the goal or reading through the Bible in a year.

As I mentioned a while back, my plan for next year – as far as the devotional writing goes – is to focus more on individual books. Right now, my intention is to spend January in the first half of Proverbs. But I want to encourage you to continue what you have started and continue reading through the Bible every year.

There are a lot of great Bible reading plans. You can use the same one over or change it up. It doesn’t matter which plan you use, but have a plan ready before January 1 and hit the ground running. In the next few days I will publish and extra article with a list of Bible reading plans and links to help you get started.

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!