Category: PSALMS

Re: Verse reading–Psalm 40 (day seven)
“I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry.”  (vs 1)  Both of these assignments come to the believer from God.  We are to be patient!  “Those who WAIT on the Lord will renew their strength”  (Isaiah 40:30)  We are to pray!  “There was a widow in that city, and she KEPT COMING TO HIM, saying, ‘Give me legal protection from my opponent.’ ” (Luke 18:3)  Even David, as he waited on God, did not stop crying out to God.  It is an important and difficult balance to find.  Waiting on God is not stoic, silent or sullen resignation.  As believers, we bear up under the difficulties of life, but we never cease to cry out to God for His help.  We are His children, asking our Father for His help.  We are His adult sons and daughters, facing hardships with confidence and hope.  Patience and prayer.  We do both.

Re: Verse reading–Psalm 40 (day six)
“then He said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will.’  He takes away the first in order to do the second.  By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”  (Hebrews 10:9-10)  In Psalm 40, David ponders the emptiness of Jewish religion.  He concludes  “sacrifice and offering you have not desired.”  (vs 5)  Everyone already knew it.   People were faithfully going to church, observing the rituals commanded by God’s word, but missing power!   It was a real problem for the man who would build the temple and establish this ceremonial/sacrificial form.  In a prophetic moment, David hears Christ speak.  He will do the Father’s new will.  He will be the needed sacrifice.   Perfect in obedience, perfect in effect, perfect in example.  We must never go back to a system of religion.  Only Christ has the power to cleanse our hearts.  He is the new chapter.

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 34 (day four)
The Psalmist gives us a contrast between the righteous and the wicked…the just and the unjust…those who seek Him and those who are proud…His servants and the evildoers.  His promises to protect, to sustain, to hear, to provide for, and to deliver the righteous give great comfort and strength to His saints.  The result in our lives when we live for God is praise; (v. 1) “I will bless the Lord, at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth.” Does His praise rest continually in your mouth?  When we live in continual praise of God and walk in a righteous fear of Him, our lives reflect the difference to the world around us.  Our speech is pure and there is no deceit on our lips.  We are not afraid and we are delivered when we are crushed in spirit.  May our lives communicate the hope of His promises to a lost and dying world.

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 34 (day three)
“…To blot out their name from the earth.”  Some things will last forever.  Some will not.  In the purifying renewal of all things, that which has no place under God’s reign will burn like impurities in a refiner’s fire.  When God makes all things new, the earth will be full of the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.  Those who do evil will not even be remembered.  The only way out of doing evil is to become an apprentice of Jesus Christ.  The modern mind shrinks from this thought, but it’s the truth.  How might we see people if we view them in light of this reality?  Who do you know who needs to know this?

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 34 (day two)
“Taste and see that the LORD is good” (34:8). It was a taste that got us into this mess. “She took some of its fruit and ate it…” (Genesis 3:6). Our first parents, Adam and Eve, had tastes that were designed to be satisfied by God Himself but willfully turned their tastes in another direction. They ate it, and like a deadly poison it worked death in them. Now, taste can turn into addiction so quickly that a person can be all but choked to death and not even know it. Food, social media, popularity, alcohol, authority, sex, influence, leisure…how often does taste lead to addiction, and addiction lead to death, relationally, emotionally and even physically? It was taste that got us into this mess, and it will be taste that gets us out. “I am the bread of life…if anyone eats this bread he will live forever” (John 6:35, 51). Willfully turning our taste to Jesus redeems not only our sense of taste but also our eternal soul.

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 34 (day one)
“Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him.”  (vs 8)  There are some things we must learn for ourselves.  Like marriage.  Listening to other people talk about marriage, attending weddings–nothing substitutes for the experience of living with/loving a spouse in covenant commitment to God.  It is an experience! Living faith is similar.  In today’s song, David urges all of us to “taste and see (for ourselves) that God is good.”  Without personal experience a powerfully real relationship will be for us only superficial words.  As Jesus told Nicodemus, “YOU (singular) must be born again”  (John 3:7)  None of us can be satisfied, or should, with the experience of others.  We are to learn for ourselves what it means to take refuge in God.  We are individuals.  This by His sovereign choice.   He, therefore, wants a relationship with us that is unique and real.   He wants us to taste His goodness for ourselves.

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 32 (day seven)
“How blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and in whom there is no deceit.”  (vs 2) ” We are only as sick as our secrets.”  So says the Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book.  A proven truth.  “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  (1 John 1:9)  When we hide (from God, from ourselves, from others) our sins control us.  They rule our inner lives, expressing themselves in anxiety, regret and shame.  When we bring them into the light, they lose their power.  Painful?  Yes.  Life-giving?  Yes.  One of God’s great blessings in the life of His children is this lesson that we are to be open and honest in our communication–even about the things we are ashamed of.  Especially about the things we are ashamed of!  Forgiveness comes when we are honest, and life with it!

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 32 (day six)
Philip Yancey’s father-in-law was a  lifelong Bible teacher.  In his final years, he experienced deep and prolonged heartbreak (degenerative nerve disease, the death his daughter, financial pressures).  Taken together, these disappointments became a crisis of faith.  He began to wonder what he still believed.  That year, in a Christmas letter he communicated “3 certainties”.  3 undeniables.  “Life is hard.  God is merciful.  Heaven is sure.”( Reaching for the Invisible God–page 95.)  In Psalm 32, David echos this raw/real confession of faith.  “I acknowledged my sin to you. . .you forgave the guilt of my sin”  (vs 5)  Even surrounded by experiences we do not understand, one truth remains clear.  1000 years before the cross of Christ, David experienced (and encouraged us to do the same) the sweet assurance of God’s mercy.  “Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive MERCY and find grace to help in time of need.”  (Hebrews 4:16)

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 32 (day four)
The Psalmist gives us a model for discipleship in this chapter.  Verses 1-4 describe his experience in sin.  God weighs heavily on his soul (conviction) and brings him to repentance.  Verses 5-7 describe his response to the conviction…confession, and the result of the confession…joy.  Finally, in verses 8-11, the Psalmist encourages the reader to trust in the Lord.  With trust, comes loving kindness and joy.  This is the same model that Christ gave Peter…’when you go through a trial and learn from it, share it with others.’  In Luke 22:31-32, it says, “And the Lord said, ‘Simon, Simon!  Indeed, Satan has asked for you (plural), that he may sift you (plural) as wheat.  But I have prayed for you (singular), that your (singular) faith should not fail; and when you (singular) have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.’” As difficult as repentance and confession is, we can still encourage others in their faith and trust in the Lord.  The result is joy…for us and for them.

Re:Verse reading–Psalm 32 (day three)
“Do not be like the horse or the mule…”  A society that has estranged itself from the Bible says God functions as a substitute for thinking.  A society that has estranged itself from the Bible says religion keeps people in an intellectual cave.  A society that has estranged itself from the Bible says no one can really know what’s true. Actually, rote belief and slavish thinking have no place in the life of anyone instructed by God’s word.  Control by bit and bridle is for mules, not for people.  To understand the seriousness of sin, to confess to the Lord, and to learn from God how to live and not die—this is height to which God calls the human mind.  God actually has a higher view of human beings than a society which claims that truth is out of reach for us.