Monthly Archives: September 2019

Psalm 27

What keeps you awake at night? Is it financial worries? Perhaps you are anxious about what the next day holds for your family. Are you uncertain about your relationship with your spouse, your children, your extended family? Perhaps you are worried about whether or not you are adequately prepared for whatever life might bring. Maybe it’s just indigestion?

The psalmist lists several types of circumstances that might keep even the strongest among us awake at night. ‘Evildoers,’ ‘foes and enemies,’ an ‘army,’ ‘war,’ ‘adversity,’ abandonment, ‘adversaries,’ and ‘false witnesses.’ Somewhere on this list all of us can identify something that causes anxiety and stress in our lives.

When we are threatened by any of the circumstances the psalmist mentions we do have a choice. Our instinct is to hide, to run, to avoid the challenge. Since the Fall even when God seeks after humans, their response is to hide!

What if instead of hiding we acted as the psalmist suggests: seek the light of God’s presence – the One who is with us in the valley of the shadow of death? What if we placed our circumstances in God’s hands – the One who is an impenetrable fortress and stronghold? What if we turned our eyes off the problem and onto the source of all solutions – the One who is capable of meeting all our needs according to the riches of His grace in Jesus Christ? What if we looked past the present and saw the ultimate promise of God – a new heaven and a new earth, filled with abundant resources for all of life, a place where God’s presence is not just claimed by faith but evident by sight?

“Wait for the Lord; be strong and courageous. Wait for the Lord.” (Psalm 27:14, HCSB)

Psalm 25

My wife and I just finished watching the PBS series, Downton Abbey (yes, I surrendered my ‘man’ card long ago, and yes, we were very late to the party). Two parallel worlds are portrayed in this series. The Earl of Grantham and his extended family live upstairs in the slowly dissolving world of Edwardian England in the early 20^th century. The butler, housekeeper, valets, footmen, lady’s maids, cooks, and various servants live downstairs and serve at the pleasure of the upstairs family. We see glimpses into both worlds of typical family behavior – sibling rivalry, striving for affirmation and position, gossip, romance, despair, and defeat. One thread seems to tie the two worlds together: the dissolution of the known social order and the birth of a new way of being and doing.

In one way or another, all of us are experiencing the dissolution of one way of life and the birth of another. As believers, we are living in the in-between of Jesus’ announcement that the Kingdom of God is at hand and the full unveiling of the Kingdom at His return. As families, our lives are in constant change as children are born, raised, grow, move on, have children of their own and so on. Our communities change as businesses die, new businesses are born, new leaders emerge and old leaders retire.

In the constant change of life, we can hold on to one unchangeable truth-

“The Lord is good and upright; therefore He shows sinners the way. He leads the humble in what is right and teaches them His way.” (Psalm 25:8–9, HCSB)

God’s unchanging nature, His promise of guiding every step, His abundant forgiveness enable us to live with confidence, with assurance, even as the very world around us constantly changes.

Psalm 24

Years ago I was privileged to hear Henry Blackaby speak to a group of church leaders. After hearing him I led several groups through the material he developed called, Experiencing God.’ A key insight from that study is this: God is already at work. Our responsibility is to discover where He is at work and join Him.

In order to be of the generation of those who seek the Lord (vs 6), a basic requirement is to be aware of God’s presence in general. As I look at the world where I live, I can see God’s presence in the beauty of creation, in the provision, He has made for the needs of the birds of the sky and the flowers of the field (see Matthew 6:25-34).

It is vital that I not only be aware of His presence but I need to be welcoming of His presence (Psalm 24:7-10). Being aware of Him and welcoming Him are not always the same thing. When Jesus entered Jerusalem for His climactic visit the crowds roared their approval. Yet mere hours later the same crowds demanded His crucifixion.

The generation of those who seek the Lord are aware and welcoming of His activity, regardless of where He is at work. Even if it is through another fellowship of believers. Even when He is clearly at work in the lives of other believers, fellow pastors, and even (gasp) other denominations!

Psalm 23

I find well-known Psalms like Psalm 23 hard to process. The familiarity of these words obscures their power. I have quoted the Psalm at funerals and memorial services, shared in the public reading of the Psalm more times that I can remember.

Reading the Psalm daily over the past few days, I see just how important God’s providence is. He alone has the power to restore or renew my soul because He alone exists outside of time, unbound by the seasons of life. His presence in my life is the one constant because of His eternal nature. His power, unlimited by the challenges I face, is the source of the strength I need for those challenges. The promise that His “goodness and mercy” will pursue me till I experience His presence in eternity may be obscured by dark days, but when the darkness lifts I find Him present as always.

“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want” (KJV). Since God is the author of all good things, His providential care reminds us that He already has all that I need.