Ring Out The Warning Bell - Psalm 37

3Trust in the Lord and do good;…4Take delight in the Lord,

and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; 
trust in him and he will do this:

7Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;

do not fret when people succeed in their ways,…
8Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret—it leads only to evil.

16Better the little that the righteous have than the wealth of many wicked;

It really surprises me what this devotional ends up being by the time Saturday rolls around. I start my week with a daily reading starting in the chapter and the following chapter or so [depending how long they are]. I read the same thing every single day through the week and then shift to the next psalm on the following Monday. I start trying to think about it on Monday, you know, like what it will turn out to be. More often than not, things in my week kind of culminate to a place where I need this. This week is no exception. With work, house and relationship stuff looming, it has been really hard to see other people succeed. This morning I literally typed to a friend of mine “I just really need a win….like sometimes.” And really what I meant by it is that I don’t feel like anything really has landed and been a success in a while. It’s really hard for me to admit that I am just not being content because it almost feels like a surrender to those that I feel like are abusive of my relationship or work, or really that I need to be satisfied with the material things that I have. I need to know in my heart that because I feel like I am being taken advantage of, doesn’t mean that I am not. I likely, in the past and present, have/am and those people, systems, and thing really ought to change, because they aren’t right. The thing though is that I, likewise, ought to not be discontented. Though that may read like license and complacency to those people and things to continue to do that to me, I need to grow in my contentment. 

Verse 8 really hits home because I have been responding in anger. Anger, pretty exclusively, is the product of discontentment. It is a tell. My anger rats me out and should be screaming to me that my heart is missing something. Peace of mind and a contented heart is like a table. Everyone’s mind is like this. We all have a table….with 4 legs….that aren’t all the same length. When you put it down in the wrong place, the place it has not been designed to be, it will rock back and forth diagonally. It isn’t settled. I think we have all had the experience of eating at a table where one leg is too short. Someone else leans of the opposite corner and it startles you while you are trying to eat. By the end of a meal you are trying to stiff arm your corner down but are on pins and needles. It is not fun. We were designed to be some place…one would say on a firm foundation. Our solution is usually in our own power. 

“everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.”

We try and level out our table by placing it on sand. Sure it will level easy. It will look good just sitting there but should you attempt to use it for its purpose you will find it sinking. Someone across form you leans on it and down it goes…so you push your side down and it is level again. The problem is before the meal would be done you are lying down on your stomach. It has ceased to be a useful table; it has ceased to do what it was intended to do. Likewise if we place it on the Rock half way or in a place it was not designed to be, it will not be even still. The right orientation to Him, where He has made you to be, will make your table level. Even when I am in the right spot but I have faced away from Him, my table is not level and is uneven again. Do not attempt to level your table in your own power. Seek Jesus, and draw near Him. Be content though those around you abuse, distrust and take you for granted. Let the Lord take care of them.

16Better the little that the righteous have than the wealth of many wicked;

In Christ,

paul



music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

A Better Son/Daughter - Psalm 36

1 I have a message from God in my heart

concerning the sinfulness of the wicked

There is no fear of God before their eyes.

2 In their own eyes they flatter themselves

too much to detect or hate their sin.

3 The words of their mouths are wicked and deceitful;

they fail to act wisely or do good.

4 Even on their beds they plot evil;

they commit themselves to a sinful course

and do not reject what is wrong.

Well ok….it’s nice of David to write about me. This hits a little close to home but usually the psalm discussions of the wicked do that. Ok so all kidding aside, it really is small passages like this that do give me hope. He says that they can’t “detect…their sin.” Though I can honestly say I struggle with hating my sin in the fullest sense of the word but I can say I fuuuuullly doubt most any Christian that says they do. But he says they can’t detect their sin…I can say that the Spirit has done a fantastic job pointing that out in my life. I really hope that what I know of is all of it….who knows…maybe it isn’t but it is, as David says elsewhere in the psalms, “my sin is ever before my eyes.” I’m not going to say verse 3 and 4 are not me, because they totally are, but I do hope that they are reducing and lessening. I do fight it with what meager heart I have but I can say there is just no hope for me in that….so there is this.

5 Your love, Lord, reaches to the heavens,

your faithfulness to the skies.

6 Your righteousness is like the highest mountains,

your justice like the great deep.

You, Lord, preserve both people and animals.

7 How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!

People take refuge in the shadow of your wings.

This is the only hope I have. I think that, since I see my sin and I fail (and we really all will by ourselves), that I will cling to the love of the Lord. Not to the justice, not to the glory of God but His love. I can say that His love is priceless because He has shown me how broken I am but then has poured out His grace and love to me. I can’t hold onto anything else but the truth of His unfailing love. My favorite Spurgeon quote is

“The justice [and wrath] of God is sheathed in the jewel encrusted scabbard of His love.”

Though my reformed brothers and sisters love and exalt many other aspects of God’s nature, all I can say is that those things, in my experience, push us to fall on our knees before Him for His love. There is nothing that so endears me to Him like His love. There is nothing but His love that makes me sing so loud, and transforms my life. There is nothing more precious, glorious, or amazing than His love. I really think His love is the comfort that Paul speaks of in 2 Corinthians 1:3-7. I find no hope for change or a future outside that. I can ever grow to be better or like Him outside of His love. It is my main motivation. Yet I still pray with David

10 Continue your love to those who know you, your righteousness to the[m].

Lord please continue your love and uphold me in Your righteousness because I do not have in me. Make me better and more like You because I can't do it...I do not have it in me. Make my evil and sin good as only You can, because I do not have it in me. All I have in me is rotten. Please make me clean. Make me a better son in Your household, because the only thing good in me....is You....Amen.

In Christ,

paul

music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most - Psalm 34

So, I'm sorry that I have be absent from this but December is a crazy time for me. I usually run an Advent reading schedule/mailing list, etc. Now that we are on the other side of Advent, I have time to keep going with this.

There are a lot of things going on with this Psalm but I don't think there is a better summery of the whole book of Psalms than these first eight verses.

1 I will extol the Lord at all times;
his praise will always be on my lips.

2 I will glory in the Lord;

let the afflicted hear and rejoice.

3 Glorify the Lord with me;

let us exalt his name together.

4 I sought the Lord, and he answered me;

he delivered me from all my fears.

5 Those who look to him are radiant;

their faces are never covered with shame.

6 This poor man called, and the Lord heard him;

he saved him out of all his troubles.

7 The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him,

and he delivers them.

8 Taste and see that the Lord is good;

blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.

The true and right praise of the Lord always originates like that of one in love. The true motivation is in verse 4. “I sought the Lord and He answered me.” That is amazing but the more amazing part is the second half of verse 4 “He delivered me from all my fears.” The Lord delivers us from fear by a different way. Jesus said in John 14:27” Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” I think when David speaks about physical prosperity and his enemies being dead and judged that, that might be the best peace he could imagine. I think that is the best kind of peace “the world gives,” but Jesus goes further. John Piper said in one of his advent devotionals about Hebrews 2:14-15 “If we do not need to fear our last and greatest enemy, death, then we do not need to fear anything. We can be free: free for joy, free for others.” I think that is true. That is the best peace that we could even imagine. The peace of God is a peace out from under our natural inheritance, death. Death: the payment we deserve for sin has been removed. The best news is not just that because that is what we were saved out of but what we have been saved to is God Himself. The peace, the freedom we have is out of the grip of death and hell itself into the loving arms of the Father. So out of that David sings. His father in heaven has heard him. But don’t we have much more to sing about? Something David couldn’t fully understand came and brought ultimate deliverance. That being said, verse 8 has much more contained in it than a quick glance would give. David is commanding us to do, much as he does else ware, to entreat us to experience God ourselves, and the implication is to then join him. C.S. Lewis in Reflections On The Psalms says this on the “command” to worship “It is not out of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they are; the delight is incomplete till it is expressed.” David is entreating us to the Lord, not commanding, but it is for good reason…because he knows how good He is and how good it is to be the recipient of God’s peace. David has not read a static thing and placidly understood it. He has experienced God himself. An experience of God Himself is not something that is static. Truth be told I am always worried by worship leaders, and pastors for that matter, that are static and unmoved by the God of the scriptures, of Jesus. How can we be silent? How can we be calm when we glorify a God that came to our world, as Lewis says “Shakespeare…make himself appear as Author within [Hamlet]”, but not just to appear but die in our place. He is the great author that has visited Himself upon His own creation to save us. Again, how can we be silent?

In Christ,
Paul




music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Old College Try - Psalm 33

I know that this might be more shop talk or inside baseball than I've been doing here, but I think that it might help you see where what the Psalms say about how you, I and more specifically what church music leaders have to think about worship. For a long time now...say since the reformation, there has been a war between two camps of worshipers. You might recognize these. One side (started from Martin Luther's heart for worship) emphasizes the idea that anyone can lead worship. No training required, just belt out what's in your heart and you'll do good. This by itself has spawned many a Neil Diamond G/C/D worship singers....and this terrible strum you can hear here. There it sits. It never goes past that. It's a perpetual childhood. The sad part is, from their position, adherents are actually proud of it. Like being a "child of God" or "those who become like a child" in their context means never growing or getting better. They look down on the other side because of their "pure heart." Proponents view their simplicity is far "superior" to the other side because the heart of worship is the most important. They think anything that isn't super simple or doesn't sounds folksy/country is a "production." Aside from the misinterpretation of those texts, the problem is in this Psalm says

3 Sing to him a new song; [trained enough to write]

play skillfully, and shout for joy. [never stop pushing to be better and training on your instrument]

There isn't no real way around it...growth is a fruit and motive of the Spirit. Musicianship and artistic motivations shouldn't be any different.

The other side (started by John Calvin's heart for worship) emphasizes the Lord deserves the purest, most perfect worship. He hired a man to translate the Psalms (and only the Psalms) into a metered french translation. No harmony...all monophonic, but because of the push for purity, specialized musicianship became primary. The demand becomes for more and higher trained musicians, singers, etc. What once began as an attempt for the purest truth, and purest worship, now becomes this garbage, and this apocalypse. I'm sure the idea is that the bigger the production the bigger the Lord looks. That isn't uncommon theme in church history but when it becomes only that, it really dead ends at nothing about the Lord. Adherents to this camp look down at the simplistic and say things like "if you don't have a full stage and don't practice four times a week, you don't really care about the Lord or His people." They act like all that work will manufacture hearts for God and bring more people to the Lord and proves their salvation. Lest we think this Psalm is quiet on the subject, David says later, (I'll filter it for a more modern context)

16 No [Church/leader] is saved by the size of his [production];

no [musician] escapes by his great strength.

17 A [giant screen, dance routine, or band] is a vain hope for deliverance;

despite all its great strength it cannot save.

18 But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,

on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,

19 to deliver them from death

and keep them alive in famine.

Those production aspects become, in church leadership meetings, a matter of manufacturing and maintaining salvation of both the church and it's attendees, but that isn't the reality. The Spirit is the only thing that saves, and nothing or nobody can change or add to that.

You see, one is hiding in a cave or the belly of the ship (ala Jonah), and the other is the Israelites marching forward without the Lord and getting slaughtered (Joshua 7, 1 Samuel 4). The scriptures, and the Spirit both call us out of the safe cave of the easy and known, out into the unknown world where faith and work is required to move forward, but we must stay with Him. We must stay constrained by the word and focused solely on Him and Him being glorified, or we will be lost. We must leave port, but we must be steered by and toward Him.

So I hope this helps think about those things and realize that if those two parts of this chapter are heeded, everything else is preference. What can you and I do sitting with the congregation? We can learn to worship no matter the sound, because the commendation to sing new songs and play skillfully also applies to us in the seats. Don't come with the desire to be entertained and avoid thinking about singing to Him except when it's time to do it together. At my church, I send out the sets the night before in the form of youtube playlists in the hope that at least some will take advantage of it before the service. But you can also buy music your church sings and listen to it during the week. Believe me, worship pastors aren't trying to hid that info from you and I am positive they would be blessed to see you ask about it, and would do their best to facilitate you getting a hold of those bands and songs. You shouldn't be passive, the same as the leaders shouldn't. Put some effort into it outside of Sunday for Him and I'm sure you will see a change in your heart, and hopefully the service. Ok, that's it for now. Till next time...

In Christ,
paul



music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Your Surrender - Psalm 32

Ok....so have you ever felt the pressure to repent for something are doing or have done. Like an overwhelming pressure? It keeps you up at night. You really can't seem to get rid of it. I really have come to realize over the years that, that is the Spirit. Jesus in John 16 says about the Spirit

"And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God's righteousness, and of the coming judgment."


One of the primary roles the Spirit fills that of convicting us of our Sin. Kind of sounds like downer but if we remember the actual title for the Spirit that Jesus gives is The Helper. So if He says the three main rolls of the Spirit really function together as a warning to keep short accounts with the Lord and to look to Jesus, I would that qualifies as help. I really live in denial about my sin or just plain ignore it. My flesh wants to live an oblivious life of sinful bliss. The Spirit is in the world to bring us down to the ground and back into reality. In our Psalm, David examples for us what this looks like when the Spirit isn't [inevitably] ignored.

3When I kept silent,

my bones wasted away

through my groaning all day long.

4For day and night

your hand was heavy on me;

my strength was sapped

as in the heat of summer.

5Then I acknowledged my sin to you

and did not cover up my iniquity.

I said, “I will confess

my transgressions to the Lord.”

And you forgave

the guilt of my sin.

So I'm sure you are thinking "ok so what's the big deal and what does this have to do with worship?" I really get the feeling looking at all of that and it's like looking or talking about being happy about the nurse for pouring the painful hydrogen peroxide on your scrap. But it isn't some disinterested  nurse who doesn't know you, inflicting pain for your "good." It is really more actually like your mom doing it. Those two people are doing the exact same thing. What is different is the motivation, and the care that is informed by the motivation. Hebrews 12:6 says:

because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.

The Lord does it all because He loves us. All that He is and all He does for us is by and for His love. C.H.Spurgeon says that even the "sword of Gods justice is sheathed in the jewel encrusted scabbard of His love." When I look at it that way I can't help but want to sing His praises...even for His conviction. Let us welcome that pressure with glee and sing of His good work. Lord help this inform our praises this Sunday and every day.

In Christ,
paul




music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

This Is A Fire Door Never Leave Open - Psalm 31

Honesty and transparency is hard some come by. We can really hardly ever find it in others much less ourselves. We are so unwilling to open up and say we are at a deficit and are hurting; that we are struggling to move on forward. I even stutter when I know I need to be and reluctantly relent to the truth. David says:

9 Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am in distress;
my eyes grow weak with sorrow,
my soul and body with grief.
10 My life is consumed by anguish
and my years by groaning;
my strength fails because of my affliction,
and my bones grow weak.

Prayer is powerful. It helps us to understand ourselves in relation to God and pushes us to be honest. I find it harder to lie to myself when I'm praying than any other time. I really think it isn't possible to worship the Lord, to reach to grasp the master, until we have let go of ourselves. Pain and struggles have a tendency to show us ourselves. It shakes our foundations of self confidence. I believe it is there to wake us to conscientiousness, to wake us from our selfish slumber, in order for us to seek out something (really someONE) that is trustworthy to hold onto. Unfortunately in a society of defiant self-reliance, we are told to scream our uniqueness and toughness over the proverbial affliction. We wear shirts that say "I beat cancer" or post things about "proudly being an introvert" that subtly (or not so subtly) imply "I will gladly sacrifice my brothers and sisters in Christ on the alter of my self comfort." Is it awesome that you have recovered from a disease? Yes! Did you really beat it? Is it cool that you know something about yourself? I think it is. But is it really something to be celebrated? No. It has a set of strengths and a set of weaknesses that need to be overcome same as being an extrovert. When we celebrate impediments, or suffering we've "overcome" we really defeat the Divine purpose of it. I want to admit my failings and my need, thereby freeing my hands of myself to grasp on to Him. Think about this line of thinking looking at the concluding verses of this psalm.

21 Praise be to the Lord,
for he showed me the wonders of his love
when I was in a city under siege.
22 In my alarm I said,
“I am cut off from your sight!”
Yet you heard my cry for mercy
when I called to you for help.
23 Love the Lord, all his faithful people! (the call)
The Lord preserves those who are true to him, (the promise)
but the proud he pays back in full. (the warning)
24 Be strong and take heart (in Him),
all you who hope in the Lord

Let us abandon ourselves and grasp on to Him. Confess, repent and praise Him for He loves us and has forgiven us!

In Christ,
paul



music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Last Call - Psalm 30

I think probably the single greatest praises we have come as a result of answered prayer. And particularly the prayer of helpless surrender brings salvation; starting the road that is narrow. It is almost the easiest time to sing His praise. Often we call back to our conversion to fuel our song.

1I will exalt you, Lord,

for you lifted me out of the depths...

2 Lord my God, I called to you for help,

and you healed me.

3You, Lord, brought me up from the realm of the dead;

you spared me from going down to the pit.

I think that is good but I think that is a bit shallow when it comes to singing to Him. I mean look at it, only singing about things we have received by prayer is the short end of the stick so to speak, because what happens when they aren't answered or they aren't answered with a comfortable response? Our worship subtly becomes about us and it takes more and more just to get us singing. Greater heights, more lights and eventually herecy. Manufacturing gold dust and feathers to be "moves of the Spirit" become the norm and claiming nonsense as our own. To appeal to ourselves is truly the lowest common denominator. It feeds our pride in order to do what we ought. Lewis puts this well in Mere Christianity:

"Teachers, in fact, often appeal to a boy's Pride, or, as they call it, his self-respect, to make him behave decently: many a man has overcome cowardice, or lust, or ill-temper, by learning to think that they are beneath his dignity—that is, by Pride. The devil laughs. He is perfectly content to see you becoming chaste and brave and self-controlled provided, all the time, he is setting up in you the Dictatorship of Pride—just as he would be quite content to see your chilblains cured if he was allowed, in return, to give you cancer. For Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense."

It may be a more satisfying and subtle devil but it is still the devil none the less. I definitely lean more to our freedoms in Christ but knowing how sadistic pride is, even the music of those churches, divorced from their pastor's heretical teaching, still makes me uneasy. I'm not going to say people can't worship the Lord correctly by singing a Bethal or Hillsong song but it definitely makes me weary. My pride loves to be fed no matter where it comes from.

The best way to ensure we sing and we sing rightly is to sing of the works of the Lord. Not what we get, but rather what He has done. Making Him the focus of most of our worship songs fuels and reorients our hearts. So whether what comes is hard or easy, painful or pain relieving, it is all His work. We can get to the point where we can say as Job did, "though You slay me, yet I will praise you." Look for the work of the Lord in the psalms, and the songs we sing.

4Sing the praises of the Lord, you his faithful people;

praise his holy name.

5For his anger lasts only a moment,

but his favor lasts a lifetime;

weeping may stay for the night,

but rejoicing comes in the morning.

In Christ,
paul





music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Deeper Well - Psalm 29

Ascribe to the Lord, you heavenly beings,

Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name;

Worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.

The Lord sits enthroned over the flood;

The Lord is enthroned as King forever.

The Lord gives strength to his people;

The Lord blesses his people with peace.

This psalm begins with a call to worship and then ends in actual worship. You would think it would be opposite. Paul talks on and on about theological topics, showing the length and breadth of the gospel. He then on occasion breaks into song. Here is the other side of the peak of praise. One side is stating the truth, the other side is singing the truth. We dig into truth, realize that we should praise Him, and then praise Him for/by the truth we have dug into. When I feel it is hard to sing, when I feel the motivation isn't there, I think my instinct like all of us, is to just try harder; that is if you even desire to try if the feeling isn't there. We dig into ourselves and attempt to muster more strength to sing. That is, much like our sanctification, the wrong way to do it. We must dig into the Lord and what He is and what He has done in order to grow in our fuel for praise. When we dig into ourselves for strength, direction, and motivation, we dig into a dead well. There is nothing there. It is the fallacy of Pat Robertson/fundy crowd. It is faulty logic that if I just hid from the world, and do things like "pray the bad spirits out of goodwill sweaters," I will have enough strength to remove all the sin in my life. It will somehow remove all temptation from my life and I can just stop sinning all together. This. Is. Wrong. Thinking. No amount of isolation, and strength of my own will make me sinless. It is again, digging into a poisoned well. We must dig into a deeper well. The well that has no end. 

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life." 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

John 4

Dig into Him and sing.

In Christ,
paul




music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Just Give Up - Psalm 28

I often times think about the Christian life, salvation, and my life, trying to distill it down to it's most basic forms. I do this to try find a pin point; a place of motivation from my beginning to go to my end. It really involves being honest about myself and not trying to b.s. my way into an ever stipulated world where I feel better about myself, but a place where I cut the crap about where I am in order to move on. I think, it is important to strip away our excuses to get us down to the bedrock. We excuse ourselves with every identity label in the book. "I don't do that because I'm an introvert," "I avoid my neighbor because I'm busy," "I don't talk to that person because they have a habit of talking down to me," "I grumble about that person because they always 'look at me that way'," and on and on and on. In a society of ever increasing "identity culture" it's easy to forget our place before Christ and where we are and what we are commanded to do now that we are in Him. Now pretty much anyone who knows me and has had any discussion around this knows I am generally adamant about abandoning self reflection and introspection, but I don't really see this as the same. I look to see where I am excusing myself to elevate how I feel about myself for the express purpose of getting back to ground zero. I am full of pride, that is the root of all my sin, and that made me deserving of death. Others commend me to do that to find out the intricacies of myself; to find out more of myself or with the foolish thought that I have any ability to purge sin from my heart. It really ends, in my opinion, in a place where I am, whether directly or indirectly, feeding the root. That root is the extent of the power in my being, and it really just has the power to make death. Humility and Christian charity (love), is inherently outward focused. Even in 1 Peter 2, Peter even examples this perfectly in verse 21

...Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.

Christ gave up Himself for us. Zacchaeus gave up his pride and status to see the Lord, and so did the blind man in Luke 18. It's quintessentially a letting go of ourselves to cry out for mercy to the Lord of all creation. It is an outright abandonment of ourselves to be near Him. All my excuses for my sin are just impediments to seeing Him. I would say that if we can't let go of ourselves, seeing our real state (our identity which is really that root of pride), to give Him all we have, we will never let go of "the sin that so easily besets us" to seek out others; to love them and serve them as Christ's example has shown us. What do we think "die to yourself daily" and "pick up your cross and follow me" means? The call of the Lord is always to do that. It is really, in my opinion, the distillation of the work of the Spirit: to call us to that by showing us the step above, and then empowering us to do that. It is like a force like gravity and we fight against it like a cartoon person hanging to a root on the side of a cliff. The call of the Lord is let go of the root of sin, and only with the power of the Spirit we can. We don't believe He will take care of us if we do....but the truth is He always does. So I'm left with the psalmists call:

1To you, Lord, I call;
you are my Rock,
do not turn a deaf ear to me.
For if you remain silent,
I will be like those who go down to the pit.
2Hear my cry for mercy
as I call to you for help,
as I lift up my hands
toward your Most Holy Place.

Lord I need your mercy now more than I ever have. Give me the strength to abandon myself on my cross, and to love and serve You, Your people and those who don't know you. Help me by your Spirit, and remind me by the time I spend with your people and by the songs we sing of You.

In Christ,
paul




music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

With Your Greatest Fears Realized, You Will Not Be Comforted - Psalm 27

I've had a pretty lame week. Since Monday I've been wreaked with stress because, as I like to put it, my boss likes to pour stress over me like syrup over pancakes. It's a lot of cutting me off mid conversation with the number one technician running one of the departments. A verbal post-it note stapled to my forehead accompanied with an actual post-it note, or a folder, or a file. It really gets under my skin and I lose my cool. It usually is a petty request for detailed information that will take me an hour to track down for an update, and it won't be specific or it'll be wrong, or whatever. It's adding hours to my day for something that won't really bring comfort or really information. I know why he does this. He is getting crazy pressured and the stress is rolling down hill per-se. I'm really no different. I'm a terrible at not dumping on others. I try really hard not to but it happens. My lovely wife talked me off a cliff today. I mean, look at that! A whole week ruined by, if I'm being honest, one day. All the accusing, and lost packages; bad information, and unanswered emails, didn't amount to anything. I actually had a fairly relaxed week, work load wise. What was I afraid of? Losing my job? Being told I'm as worthless as I already think I am? I don't really know. Maybe it's a combination of those and more. I just couldn't hear anything else but that pent up torture. I couldn't declare with confidence that I really trusted the Lord. I wonder sometimes if David didn't declare what he did as a way to talk himself into what he knew. To have faith as C.S. Lewis described it; to hold on with his mind and reason, the things that his fickle heart sometimes gives up on.

1The Lord is my light and my salvation—
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?
2When the wicked advance against me
to devour me,
it is my enemies and my foes
who will stumble and fall.

I don't think this is just brash confidence because he ends the psalm with:

14Wait for the Lord;

be strong and take heart

and wait for the Lord

David, in times of trouble does his fair share of fearing. He also does his fair share of reminding himself and us to turn to the remedy of our fear. A confidence in a sovereign Lord that has our best interest at heart. Many times not the most fun, or effortless times, but the best ones for us. What would happen if all my worst fears were to be realized? What one hope would or could carry me? Everyone and everything in this world can tear me down with failure after every cutting insult. Only my Lord has taken those cutting, tearing and hurt upon Himself....and that, for my sake. Ultimate power, and ultimate love, for me. I turn and remember that love every time I enter His house. When I sing His praise, I am at piece. When I resound a response, only then I am set at peace.

4One thing I ask from the Lord,

this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the Lord

and to seek him in his temple.

in Christ,
paul





music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):

Vindicated - Psalm 26

Vin·di·cate
verb
[past tense: vindicated; past participle: vindicated]
    clear (someone) of blame or suspicion.
    "hospital staff were vindicated by the inquest verdict"
    synonyms:    acquit, clear, absolve, exonerate;

This is probably one of my favorite double meaning words from the psalms that is then filtered by the gospel. David screams to the Lord to vindicate him, because he thinks he has not done anything wrong, and that could be right, often in David when it is concerned with outward actions to Saul. David was upright in his relationship with Saul and his pleas are to the only one who can show him right but we know something else from the new testament authors: no one is right before the Lord. When David says in Psalm 26 "Vindicate me Lord" and we look at the following sentences, they aren't true before the Lord. Like Psalm 130 says "if You Lord kept a record of sins, who could stand?" The answer is no one. So when we look at David's petition "vindicate me Lord" it becomes a plea to be made right. The definition pivots its weight, and to "clear someone of blame" means something totally different. But isn't that what Jesus is? The great vindicator? God remains the only one who can vindicate us but to do so becomes, not totally different, but totally deeper! Jesus is the one who makes us right before the Father. He IS the one who clears us of blame before the holy and just judge: himself. He makes this true in the eyes of the Father.

"1 Vindicate me, Lord [He has by His obedience and sacrifice],
[therefore] I have led a blameless life;
I have trusted in the Lord
and have not faltered.
2 Test me, Lord, and try me,
examine my heart and my mind;
3 for I have always been mindful of your unfailing love
and have lived in reliance on your faithfulness."

Isn't that such wonderful news! Think of that as you sing. God has vindicated you, and not in a temporary way that depends on you but depends on Him. Praise Him!

in Christ,

paul



music for the week (as usual: no claim of being not "offensive" but it is really good):