In the Footsteps of David

As I was reading Psalm 17 this morning, my mind kept turning to David. This was a song that grew out of David's experiences. This is poetry that spoke from David's circumstances. This psalm contains the hope that sustained him during those long years as a fugitive from King Saul.

I can't say that I am particularly in need of deliverance this morning. My allergies or bronchial infection or whatever it is that I have right now are hardly a thing to compare to living rough while on the run for your life. I think that is why I thought more of David this morning as I read. I wonder where he was when he wrote this. I wonder what experiences fueled this song. Was he about to be betrayed by the people of Keliah after he had delivered them from the Philistines? (1 Samuel 23:1-14) Was he in the wilderness of Ziph? Betrayed by the Ziphites to Saul? (1 Samuel 23:19) Was he watching men with no particular righteousness of their own prosper and have families while he, David, the anointed king-in-waiting, was sleeping in hard places?

As I think of the trials that David endured, I hear the anxiety in Psalm 17.

. . . My enemies who surround me.
They have closed their unfeeling heart,
With their mouth they speak proudly.
They have now surrounded us in our steps;
They set their eyes to cast us down to the ground.

But in the face of such anxiety, I see such an inspiring trust in God.

Wondrously show Your lovingkindness
O Savior of those who take refuge at Your right hand
From those who rise up against them.
Keep me as the apple of the eye;
Hide me in the shadow of Your wings.

I pray that we might find comfort, peace, and strength today in the presence of our Almighty God who gives to us such grace. May God wondrously show us His lovingkindness today. And may we faithfully reflect that mercy to others.

Keeping Your Word

This morning I was reading Psalm 15 - and I hope you are too. It is a relatively short psalm, so having read it once, I was reading it again - savoring each of the phrases. And as I did so, I asked myself, "Which one jumps out at me? Which one draws my attention?"

There are several weighty thoughts and powerful images throughout Psalm 15. So much seemed to be jumping out and arresting my attention I had a hard time deciding.

So I took a break. I refilled the bird feeder and hung it out, and I was soon joined by five adolescent cardinals, a lesser goldfinch, and a female painted bunting. The bird feeder gets a lot of use in the early morning!

As I was watching the birds and thinking about an upcoming breakfast meeting, I finally received my answer. What jumped out at me from Psalm 15? It was the last phrase of verse 4. Here was the phrase that kept coming back to me. Here was a phrase I couldn't drive from my mind.

He swears to his own hurt and does not change;

It is awkwardly phrased in the New American Standard. The New Living Translation renders it:

and keep their promises even when it hurts.

The Holman Christian Standard Bible says:

who keeps his word whatever the cost. 

This is a passage about integrity. About trustworthiness. About keeping promises. About being a man or woman of your word.

And this descriptive phrase is used to describe the kind of person who may dwell in the presence of the Lord (see verse 1). God desires that we all be people who keep our promises. God desires that we all be people whose word can be trusted and relied upon. God desires that we all be people of integrity and courage when it comes to our interactions with others.

But the sad fact is that this quality is not truly valued in our society these days. Promises are lightly made and lightly held. We trust more in the power of legal contracts and lawyers than we do in each other's integrity - even our own. We certainly never mean to promise anything that might actually cost us something!

But as the people of God, we have been called into an alternate community with a different set of values. We have been drawn into a different kingdom from any kingdom or nation on this earth. Our values are not bound to our selfish desires or our national desires. Our values are revealed to us from God. Chief among these is love, and one of the marks of love is dealing fairly and honestly and respectfully with others. We are not to affirm bad choices, but we are not to manipulate and mislead others for our own gain either. Psalm 15 is a guideline for our behavior. And catching us near the end of this psalm is the challenge to be people who do what they say they will do - even if the keeping of our word is costly to us.

I pray that I will be such a person.

Will you pray that you will be such a person too?

Living Upside Down

As we start a new week, our focus is on Psalms 13 through 16.

As I read all four chapters this morning, verse one of Psalm 14 jumped out at me. I think it is because of the sheer bluntness of the statement and the harshness of the word "fool." And while this was what caught my attention first, it was the overall description of "the fool," "the corrupt," and "the reprobate" that had the deeper impact on me.

The image of "eating up my people as they eat bread" is a powerful image. I think of predatory lenders and businesses who impoverish their own workers to turn a greater profit. Any activity that dehumanizes and abuses people for whom Christ died, people made in the image of God, this is wickedness.

And Psalm 15! Can there be a more pointed contrast between our own society and the image God has for human flourishing? As I read verse 4 I thought of Philippians 3:19 where the Apostle Paul describes those who are enemies of the cross of Christ:

whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.

Too often, I fear, we honor the reprobates and despise those who fear the Lord. We are living life upside down! We glory in the shameful things of life, and we seek to shame the beautiful. We applaud lies and untruth, and we despise truth. We deconstruct morality and we call it good.

And so I pray for integrity today - integrity among the people of God. I pray that a love of truth will fill our hearts. I pray that no slander will pass our lips. I pray that we will honor what is honorable and love what is beautiful and follow what is right in the eyes of God. And I pray that the integrity of our hearts will be evident in the way that we treat others.

But I have trusted in Your lovingkindness;My heart shall rejoice in Your salvation.     Psalm 13:5

Deciding to be Thankful

As I was rereading Psalm 9, I got the sense that David is giving himself a "pep talk" here. His circumstances are not great. He still has an abundance of powerful enemies. The wicked are still oppressing the righteous. He is hated by some and afflicted (9:13). But in the face of those difficulties, David decides to give thanks. He makes a choice - a conscious decision to be thankful in spite of the circumstances.

"I will," he says. I will, I will, I will, I will. This is how he starts each of the phrases in the first two verses. I will.

And what will he do?

He will give thanks to the Lord with all his heart.

He will tell of God's wonders.

He will be glad and exult in God.

He will sing praise to God's name.

In good times, and especially in bad times, David is deciding to be thankful. He can't control the events around him, but he can control his personal response to his circumstances. And he chooses thankfulness.

What a challenging word for us! In the face of difficulties, of fear, of opposition, of uncertainty, we can chose our response. Choose thankfulness. Join with David and speak a strong "I will" today.

I will give thanks to the Lord with all my heart;
I will tell of all Your wonders.
I will be glad and exult in You;
I will sing praise to Your name, O Most High!

I will.

Psalm 8 and Preteen Camp

One of the values of a slow reading of Scripture is that it helps to put that Scripture into our memory. It becomes something more than just words on a page. It becomes ideas and images that we carry around with us wherever we go. And sometimes, often unlooked for, God will bring that Scripture to the forefront of our minds.

I'm at Preteen Camp this weekend at Camp Tejas. What a joy and privilege to be able to talk with 3rd through 6th graders about what faith in Jesus Christ looks like. Five times in the course of two full days and two half days preteens from six different churches worship together. We sing. We read Scripture. We pray. And after I preach, all of the church groups divide into smaller groups to talk more specifically about our theme this year.

Needless to say, it is a very focused time of fun, food, activities, and worship.

Little did I expect to encounter Psalm 8 this morning as I awoke and looked out over the portion of a pond that backs up to my cabin. The first words on my mind were the words of Monday and the words of yesterday - Psalm 8:1.

O Lord, our Lord,
How majestic is your name in all the earth,
Who have displayed your splendor above the heavens.

The scene needed some words of praise. The sunshine on the water, the greenery around me, the silence of the early morning, all of them called forth a heartfelt gratitude to God for the day. The words of this week were ready to answer the call!

It is moments like these that I value again the power of Scripture that is taken into our hearts and minds and lives. When we take those words off the page and put them in our heart, we carry them around with us everyplace we go. They go with us to our places of work and our places of play. They are with us on the road and at home. They even go to Preteen Camp! And as they go, they breathe life and understanding and encouragement into me. They truly become living words as I live with them and they shape my understanding of my circumstances.

I pray that you will commit yourself to the slow reading of Scripture so that the words on the pages will bury themselves in your hearts and come alive in you and through you!

Fear, Frustration, and Faith

I can't say that I was feeling particularly fearful or frustrated this morning as I read Psalm 7. Consequently, nothing just jumped out and grabbed me after my first reading of the text. But during my second reading, it occurred to me that these are words of David. King David. And then I thought of David's life and the trials he faced early in his life. These are the words of King David before he was king. As I entered into his
situation, David's faith was a bright encouragement to me.

As you probably remember, David was anointed King of Israel by the Prophet Samuel when he was still a young man. He then earned a reputation as a warrior for his defeat of the giant, Goliath, and for his many courageous feats thereafter. For his trouble, he received the enmity of King Saul who quickly grew jealous of David's fame. The result was that David had to flee from Saul's court. For several years, David lived on the run - always one step ahead of Saul and the pursuit by Saul's men.

Reading Psalm 7, we gain a little insight, I think, into the mind and heart of David during those years. Here was a young man, passionate and faithful, courageous and cunning. He well-remembered his anointing at the hands of Samuel. He had ample testimony of God's favor upon his life. And yet, for all the good that he had done, and for all his faithfulness to God, he was sleeping in caves, living rough, and constantly in fear for his life. No wonder he was frustrated! The wicked seemed to prosper, but he did not. He had done nothing wrong, but he was hunted.

But in the midst of his frustration and fear, he did not forsake his faith in the justice and the power of God. "Vindicate me, O Lord," (vs. 8) he cries. And in the next breath, he expresses his trust, "My shield is with God, who saves the upright in heart." (vs. 10) He closes his song with these words:

I will give thanks to the Lord according to His righteousness
And will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High. (vs. 17)

David's thanksgiving in the face of opposition and frustration is encouraging to me. His faith is a shining example. And knowing how God worked to establish David as the most beloved King Israel, God encourages me to be steadfast in my hope and in my faith.

I pray you receive the strength of such encouragement today.

Deliverance

It is an interesting experience reading Psalms 5 through 8 in one sitting, isn't it?

Psalms 5, 6, and 7 are marked by cries for the Lord's deliverance. There is a feeling of immediate danger. Fear and anxiety were motivating factors in the writing. Enemies were real, and David (the author of all four of these psalms) is looking for the Lord's hand in the midst of the ugliness and violence and deceit of life. I found the emotions of Psalm 5 to 7 to be nearly the same as the emotions of reading the headline news this morning. Violence, deceit, and injustice, play a major role in both places.

As David looks at the ugliness of his world through the lens of God's righteousness, he notes the contrast between the way things are and the way God desires them to be.

The boastful shall not stand before your eyes;
You hate all who do iniquity.
You destroy those who speak falsehood;
The Lord abhors the man of bloodshed and deceit. (Psalm 5:4-6)

Harsh words. Direct words. They leave no question about how God feels about pride and lies and violence toward others. Can there be any question about how God views the activities of our own society at this moment?

If we contemplate this, we may come to ask with David: "how long?" (Psalm 6:3) How long, O Lord, will you allow this to continue? How long before you return to rescue the righteous and judge the wicked? How long?

In the meantime, we who seek the glory and the goodness of God take refuge in God's strength (Psalm 7:1), do the works of justice, and pray for the intervention of God. "Arise, O Lord!" (Psalm 7:6).

And if our soul is still troubled, if we are still anxious and fearful and upset about the state of our nation, our culture, and our world, then Psalm 8 comes like a breath of fresh air. It is a contemplation, not of the troubles of the world, but of the greatness of God.

O Lord, our Lord,
How majestic is Your name in all the earth,
Who have displayed Your splendor above the heavens! (Psalm 8:1)

In the greatness of God there is peace. In the power of God there is deliverance. In the presence of God there is hope.

Psalm 4

I started this morning with a careful reading of Psalm 4. As always, I was reading attentively, looking for that word or phrase that would jump out at me. But this morning, it seemed as if every phrase was glimmering. So I read the Psalm again - savoring every line - turning it over in my mind. Five times I did this. I would encourage you to do the same.

And in the end, I kept coming back to three phrases. The first was in verse 2: "How long will you love what is worthless and aim at deception?" It is a verse of conviction. It calls for self-examination. Forget the worrying trends in our nation - our love for lies - our devaluation of the truth. Focus on yourself. What do you love that is worthless? Upon what lies are you building your life? This verse calls for a close look at one's self.

The second phrase the had staying power was verse 7: "You have put gladness in my heart." It follows a question by the "many" who wonder why God will not show them more good and even greater blessings. I wondered whether those "many" were the same ones who loved what is worthless and aimed at deception.

Whether they are or not, the godly man testifies that God has put gladness in his heart. Here is a joy that is not dependent upon the circumstances of life. Here is a gladness that is not earned. Here is a gladness that comes directly from God. It is the gladness of those who trust in God's power and live by his hope. It is a gladness of life, of a new day. It is the gladness for cardinals at my bird feeder. It is the gladness of simple things like flowers and sunshine and rain. It is the gladness of morning and evening and noontime. It is a gladness that touches our faces and strengthens our hearts, and I pray that I might share in the testimony of the psalmist that God has put such gladness in my heart.

Finally, after I had closed my Bible, it was verse 4 that came back to me as I cooked breakfast. "Tremble, and do not sin; meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still." It was this verse, in the middle of the Psalm, that seemed to pull everything together for me. Which of us will not tremble when we contemplate the true greatness of our God? This is where our meditation must begin. On him. In him. And when I reorient my life and my thoughts around him - when I seek after those things that are worthy rather than worthless, when I seek after truth rather than lies, when I rejoice in the joy and gladness God gives me - then I find my feet, my hands, my head, my day on the right path.

"Tremble and do not sin."

Altered Perspective

It never ceases to amaze me how God takes various strands of thought or objects of interest and weaves them together into a coherent appreciation for eternal truth. Things that may at first seem completely unrelated, or they may be separated by some time or distance, but at the right moment God brings them together around his Word.


Last night, as I was thinking of the upcoming July 4th Holiday, I read several of the speeches from various Founding Fathers. Among them, I read Benjamin Franklin's final address to the Constitutional Convention. It was an address that he wrote but did not deliver in person due to fatigue and poor health. The entirety of the speech is well worth a read. It is short, and you can find the text here along with some commentary about the occasion.

The phrase from his address that lingered in my mind was from the second paragraph:

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution, with all its faults - if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of government but what may be a blessing to the people, if well administered; and I believe, farther, that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other. 

This was one strand of thought. Last night.

A second strand of thought began this morning as I thought about the day - July 4th - American Independence Day. I thought of the activities of the day - fireworks and BBQ and parades. I am hoping for ice cream, too.

Somewhere in the midst of planning the day, I thought of the meaning of the day - independence from tyrannical forms of government, freedoms shared with fellow citizens to craft a society in which God-given human rights can exist and flourish. Our freedoms are a blessing. Our independence is worthy to be celebrated.

But I found that even as I was thankful, I was thinking about the struggles our democracy is facing right now. I thought of the incivility that is present in our political discourse. I thought of the anger and the anxiety that so many people carry these days. I thought of our disagreements about issues large and small. I worried about the devaluation of truth and the still unreaped consequences of our past (and present!) injustices.

It was then that I wondered about the prophetic quality of Franklin's words in 1787, and I wondered about the depth of our corruption.

And then I opened my Bible and read Psalm 2. These words collided with my political thinking and helped to rearrange my perspective this July 4th. It is at once a sobering perspective and a hopeful one. Why are the nations in an uproar? And why is mine, in particular? Could it be that I worry too much about vain things? Could it be that I am too interested in the council of kings and not attentive enough to the true KING?

The true KING is not worried. He is not anxious. On the contrary, "He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at [the rulers of the nations]." (vs. 4) In his appointed time, he will judge the nations. He shall break them with a rod of iron and shatter them like earthenware. (vs. 9) Not one will stand the test of eternal significance, and nothing is out of his ultimate control. While earthly freedoms and independence are indeed a blessing, they are small things compared to the freedoms available to a citizen of the Eternal Kingdom.

So what can reorient my loyalty and allegiance toward the true KING? What can draw my attention to a larger reality and alter my perspective of just policies and right action? What can lead me to the deeper, lasting truths and the foundations of true justice? What can keep me focused on the Fount from which true freedom and all human rights flow?

The answer is in verses 11 and 12:

Worship the Lord with reverence
And rejoice with trembling
Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way,
For His wrath may soon be kindled.
How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!

 Worship. Homage. Rejoicing. These are the pathway to blessing.

Fruit in Its Season

We are transitioning today from a slow reading of the Gospel of Mark to an equally slow reading of the first 16 Psalms. Four chapters a week. Plan to read all four chapters on the first day of the week, and then re-read one chapter a day for the next four days.

This morning as I read Psalm 1, my mind went immediately to the young fig tree in my yard. I planted it as a six-inch cutting three years ago. It lived on my deck for a year-and-a-half where it grew quickly in response to regular watering. When it was about three-and-a-half feet tall, I planted it in my yard. And there, for the last year-and-a-half, it has slowly matured. It has grown a foot or two, and has significantly widened at the trunk. I keep it fenced because the deer who wander through my yard assume everything I plant is for their benefit. It is as if they feel obligated to taste everything I put in the ground. They discovered they liked fig leaves, so I protected my tree with its own personal fence.

This year, the tree produced its first figs. Two of them. I was undeservedly proud.

Then the weather turned hot and dry in May. Really hot. Those of you who live close by know what I am talking about. After a mild spring, we suddenly jumped into the upper nineties and low hundreds (Fahrenheit) for the afternoon highs. And we hadn't even reached June yet!

Well, I faithfully watered my little fig tree - dragging a hundred foot hose out to it every night; rolling the hose up when I was done. But then my schedule interfered with my daily watering. I had a lot of meetings that went late, and several that started early, and the tree went unwatered. I watched as my precious little figs stopped growing. Stunted. My irregular watering was not enough. The tree worked valiantly - kicking off some of its leaves to preserve resources. But lacking what they needed to thrive, the fruit could not mature.

Then one disappeared. I suspect the raccoons.

Then the last one simply fell off the tree - shriveled. Dead.

Psalm 1 tells us that a person who delights in the law of the Lord and meditates on it day and night will be like a tree planted by streams of water. The life-giving water is plentiful. It is abundant. It is regular. And with such resources, the tree produces fruit in its season. The leaves do not wither, and, we must assume, the fruit grows to maturity - sweet and ready to eat.

I fear that I am far too often like my own fig tree than I am the tree of Psalm 1. I take in the life-giving waters of God's word infrequently - and this is true despite my experiential knowledge that close and regular association with God's word brings a great fruit of God's blessing in me and through me.

My prayer today is that I may be firmly planted by the life-giving streams of God's Spirit.

I hope you will join me in that prayer.