Category: PSALMS

When Good Destroys

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 16 (day two)
Water filling your bathtub… a good thing. Water filling your house… a destructive thing. Fire consuming wood in the fireplace…a good thing. Fire consuming a forest…a destructive thing. Sexual expression between a man and a woman in marriage…a good thing. Sexual expression whenever and with whomever you might desire…a destructive thing. Ambition for excellence guarded by loving my neighbor as myself… a good thing. Ambition for excellence with no thought for my neighbor…a destructive thing.

God’s gift of desire, even the strongest desires, is a good thing. However, every good thing requires a context, an order for it to function properly. A good desire out of order becomes a great evil and destroys lives. What can order my desires? “I have no good besides you,” (Psalm 16:2). When my desire is aimed at God as my only good, all other desires are given their proper order, their appropriate context. Water, fire, sex, ambition; all are proper joys when I am enjoying God as my only good.

Single and safe

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 16 (day one)
“I said to the Lord; I have no good besides you. . .I have set the Lord continually before me. . .I will not be shaken.”  (vs 2, 8)  By single I do not mean unmarried.  I mean single-minded–a heart that has resolved the question of priority, of value.  David discovered this early in life.  He concluded that God existed and deserved all of his attention.  God became his criterion for “good”.  God was the person he continually “set before” himself as an ambition or goal.  The unexpected result?  A deep sense of safety!  Even in danger.  Remember the encounter with Goliath?  Remember the years David was unfairly treated by Saul?  Would the same thing work for us?  If we focused on God and set our hearts on Him as our only goal, would we experience the same sort of protection?  Would we be able to look at the future with hope and not dread? Yes!  Praise God, yes!

He comes to visit

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day seven)
“What is man that thou art mindful of him?and the son of man that thou visitest him?” (vs 4–KJV)  When David calculates human worth,  he does not reference accomplishments or bank accounts.  He considers the “visits” of God.  It is the King James translation of the Hebrew word paqad.  The New American Version uses the word “care”.  (Caring for a person= visiting him in his need.  See James 1:27.)  When Jesus promised ” I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you” (John 14:18), He was continuing a long pattern of God’s love for the human race.  He comes to us!  He visits us!  Can you think back on a time when the Lord came to you in a time of need?  When you experienced the comfort of His guiding presence?  If so, have you reflected on that experience and come to David’s conclusion?  You are loved.  He comes to you in your need.

The heavens declare His glory

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day six).
“When I consider your heavens” (vs 3)  If God is the creator of the material world (as Christians believe) then it is reasonable to expect all things to echo and reflect His character.  A sweet child doesn’t paint an ugly cruel picture.  His “nature” is revealed in what he creates.  So with God.   To be out in nature can, therefore, be  a spiritual experience.  “The heavens declare your glory”  says Psalm 19:1.  “Consider the lilies of the field” counseled Jesus to His disciples.  As Wendell Berry says,  “The best argument for God is to rise at dawn and pick dew-wet red berries in a cup”.  In Romans 1:20, the Bible says , “For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal plan and divine nature have been clearly seen through what has been made“.  Part of the weakness of this present generation is our exile from natural things–our blindness to the creator who made them.

Created to Worship

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day five) I saw this quote again this week. “A person will worship something, have no doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts, but it will out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshipping we are becoming.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson) Creation, nature, and the “work of Your Hands” (Psalm 8: 3, 6) satisfies our nature/need to worship, and brings glory to the Living God who created it all. He has displayed His majesty, strength, and power for us to be in awe of Him. He has met our need and desire to worship (something or someone) with Himself. Our worship of the Living God is both for His Glory (the praise of His creation) and our good (becoming like Him).

Majestic

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day four)
Have you ever stood out in the country, or better yet, on top of a mountain and looked up into the vast night sky?  The stars…the Milky Way…the constellations…the universe… stretched before you from east to west, north to south?  I have.  The pictures are etched into my memory.  I can not only remember most every experience, I can remember the overwhelming feeling of grandeur.  It is Psalm 8 that immediately comes to mind when I have such an experience.  The majesty of the creation is but a small portion of the majesty of the Creator.  As we contemplate the glory of our Creator, the response of the Psalmist wells up inside us…’when I consider all of this, God, what is man that you are mindful of him?’  The focus of our worship must always be on the person of God.  The Psalmist started and ended this psalm in recognition of that…”O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”

Worth

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day three)
“When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place…”  Consider, then:  13.3 billion light-years away, a tiny galaxy (the rather clunkily-named MACS0647-JD) shines its light.  That light travels six trillion miles in one year, and even at that speed, it needs 13.3 billion years to reach earth.  The psalmist didn’t measure space like we do, but he knew: God’s heavens are immense enough that the human race would seem trivial by comparison.  And yet, God is mindful of us.  Jesus knew that our well-being depends on our knowledge of that mindfulness in this vast universe: “Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies?  Yet not one of them is forgotten by God…Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.” (Luke 12:6-7)

A Good Boss

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day two)
If you’ve never had a good boss, it is hard to appreciate the significance of Psalm 8:6. “You made him lord over the works of Your hands; You put everything under his feet.” A good boss makes everyone’s life better. Objectives are clear. Less time is wasted. Conflicts don’t get out of hand. The organization flourishes, and everyone joyfully does their part. When the New Testament authors thought of Jesus, they thought of him as a good boss. Consequently, they referred to this psalm to celebrate Jesus’ reign over their lives and all creation (see Ephesians 1:20-23). When you see an organization well run, a home well-managed, a life well ordered, you are seeing the thumbprint of the perfect boss who “does all things well” (Mark 7:37). His work of restoration is not yet complete, and He invites us to participate in it. Are you a “good boss” of your own life, family and work?

How majestic

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 8 (day one)
“O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”  (vs 1)  Fill in the blanks.   “For purple mountain_________above the fruited plain.” (think song)  “Her ________, the Queen!”  (think England)  When David says that God’s name is majestic, He used a word (addir) which meant, “glorious, mighty, huge or wide”.  It was a word of scope, scale and size.  Name meant “reputation or character”.   It is an insight that came to David as he watched the stillness and beauty of the nighttime sky.  How could the creator of such beauty not be beautiful, Himself?  How could He be small?  There is great benefit for those who gain this perspective.   Whenever we are overwhelmed it is usually because our problems have gotten large and our God has gotten small (in our eyes, at least).  To recover this vision is to experience peace.  “Little ones to Him belong, they are weak, but He is STRONG!”

Not timid

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 2, Psalm 110 (day seven)
“The Lord will extend your mighty scepter from Zion; you will rule in the midst of your enemies.”  (110:2)  It is a strange word to modern ears.  Aggressive.  Assertive.  A God with a back-bone.  Not apologizing to the human race for putting an end to its rebellion, for requiring respect and obedience, for using force.  If people of the 1st century rejected the Messiah because He was not war-like, people of the 21st century do so because He is (or will be).  Perhaps we need this reminder.  The race of men is in active rebellion against God.  His wrath is tempered with mercy (“not wishing any to perish”–2 Peter 3:9) but eventually He will act with great decisiveness to bring the rebellion to an end.  “God has not given us a spirit of timidity” says 2 Timothy 1:7.  It must be because He is not timid, Himself.  I will see you in a few hours, dear friends.