Psalm 4 An Evening Prayer

This Sunday we sang a new hymn for us, “O Love That Will Not Let Me Go,” written by George Matheson on the evening of sister’s marriage as his whole family went to her wedding and had left him alone. Years earlier Matheson had been engaged until his fiancé learned that he was going blind and there was nothing the doctors could do. She told him that she could not go through life with a blind man. Indeed Matheson did go blind while studying for the ministry, and his sister had been the one who took care of him for years, but now she was getting married and would be leaving her brother in order to establish her own home.

Amidst fears of who would care for him in his blindness, mixed with the fresh reminder of his own heartbreak brought about by his sister’s marriage – in the midst of intense sadness – the Lord gave Matheson this hymn – written, he says, in 5 minutes!

Looking back over his life, he once wrote that his was “an obstructed life, a circumscribed life… but a life of quenchless hopefulness, a life which has beaten persistently against the cage of circumstance, and which even at the time of abandoned work has said not “Good night” but “Good morning.” How could he maintain quenchless hopefulness in the midst of such circumstances and trials? His hymn gives us a clue: “I trace the rainbow in the rain, and feel the promise is not vain.” The rainbow image is not for him, the quintessential, silver lining whenever clouds appear in the blue,” but it is a picture of the Lord’s commitment and promise, which appears when the skies are darkening and threaten to open up and flood the world again in judgment.

This is also David’s experience in Psalm 4. In his distress he calls out to God (v. 1). He is forsaken and shamed by the people of the world who are asking, “Who will show us any good?” (v.6). There are many faithless people who, even when they look into religion, seek not God, but what they can get out of it. There is a seductive lure of a religion built upon such pragmatism. Such a religion becomes a means of manipulating the gods to fulfill my needs, as the foundational purpose of God’s covenant – to know God – gets lost in the rush for personal satisfaction. Like George Matheson, David, and before him Job held on to God, not because of any benefit they received – in Job’s case, he lost everything! They find in God their delight and joy, simply because He is God and He has chosen to enter into a covenant with them (v.3).

As all of the politicians, the media, commercials, athletics and even much of the church bombard your senses with the ideology that you are at the center of your universe, may you as the Psalmist take your eyes off of yourself and your benefits (your corn and wine v. 7) and place them knowing Christ. Doing so will not change your pain into pleasure, nor will it fill your rumbling stomach. Knowing Christ does not mean that all that is wrong in your life will go away, nor does it, as the quaint but trivial saying goes, make your lemons into lemonade. But knowing Christ brings about a gladness and a rightness about your life that will not be eradicated by pain or want or trial or tribulation. Ours in not some kind or warped, masochistic faith that rejoices over pain and suffering, but one that faces the reality of pain with a steadfast confidence that, “though He slay me, yet I will trust in Him” (Job 13:15).

As I lay me down to sleep,
My soul, I trust the Lord to keep,
Though pain await me when I wake,
I know my suffering He will take.

Galatians 5:1-6 Fallen From Grace

Up to this point in Paul’s epistle to the churches of Galatia, his emphasis and essence of His message has been freedom from the curse of the law. When one turns to Christ, he turns away from the Law of Moses as a means of salvation and begins living under the dominion of Christ and the Holy Spirit whom the Father has sent into his heart. Paul argues that those who are in Christ are then free from the law. But what we need to understand is that often our view of freedom and Paul’s are very different. While many think of freedom as being left alone, Paul’s understanding of freedom involves slavery to God and His will. Many believe freedom to be the liberty of will to determine one’s goals and direction in life; but for Paul freedom meant interdependence, not independence. The unredeemed understanding of freedom is in fact bondage to the powers of the world, the flesh and the devil, while true freedom involves gladly accepting the bond of slavery to the Father. True freedom then is liberation from the bondage of self-will and self-living, and involves the capacity to live for God and neighbor. So the irony is that you are truly free when you become a bond-slave to God; you become free to be whom God wants you to be. God’s bond-slaves have been set free to serve God, to follow Jesus, and to walk by faith in the spirit. This is the freedom for which Christ has set you free. The person who is truly free is a person who trusts, loves, and obeys God through Christ and in the Spirit loves and serves others. The child of God who has this freedom lives before God with a clear and free conscience, as he or she grows before God in holiness and love. This is the freedom that the father has for His children. God has made us free indeed, so that all can see the His glory, and also, so we are capable to relate to God and others authentically and clearly. You are to know this freedom; you are to enjoy this freedom, and you are to experience this freedom.

This week memorize Galatians 2:19,20 and stand fast in the liberty by which Christ has made us free.

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Psalm 3 Though this World with Devils Filled

A Psalm of David when he fled from Absalom his son.

The title of Psalm 3 tells us of the context in which it was written. This, the first prayer of the Psalter, was offered as David fled his own palace in the dead of night, in order to run from an army of thousands that had been horrifically gathered together by his son, Absalom. Detailed in 2 Samuel 15:13-16, David’s own son had rebelled and stolen the hearts of the men of Israel from David. Prayer originates in the midst of trouble, in the midst of humanity recognizing that his only hope is in His God. Psalm 3 is a prayer of faith, offered with expectation and confidence, not worried about how it might appear or sound; it is a prayer filled with passion and truth.

In verse 1, David first expresses a sense of being overwhelmed with his present circumstances. It is one thing should trouble come from outside, but when it comes from within, from someone close, the hurt becomes nearly unbearable. However, at the end of verse 2, his mood changes with the little word Selah.

The precise meaning of Selah varies depending on who you hear teaching on it, most seem to think that it is a musical pause – to rest and observe and meditate carefully before you move on. Some theologians believe that Selah means ‘lift up the mood, sing more loudly, pitch the tune to a higher key, re-tune your instruments.’ How wonderful, whether it be a silent pause in meditation or a verbal expression praise, that it is after theSelah, we find David with a new found confidence that God is his shield – his protection (v. 3). And again after crying out to God (v. 4), a second Selah leads David into a sweep sleep (the peace of God), for he trusts in the Lord; he is confident that the hand of the Lord is upon him. Anxiety would certainly have kept him up all night keeping watch for his enemies, but even in this place, far his palace in the dead of night, he knew that God was with him and would protect him.

Read Romans 5:1-5. Do you have peace? What is your peace dependent upon? Are you glorying in tribulation? Realize that it is with tribulation that the authenticity of your faith is tested. In Matthew 13:20-21 the one, who, though he received the word with joy, was tested by tribulation, immediately stumbled. What trial are you facing today? Has it driven you to Christ through prayer or to stumbling in anxiety and stress? Though this world may be filled with devils who threaten to undo you, can you lie down and sleep and awake, knowing the Lord has sustained you (v. 5-6)? Do not fear for,salvation belongs to the Lord (v. 8). Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (Rom 5:1-2). Selah. Pause, lift up your heart and meditate upon this doctrine. Do you know this experimentally?

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Psalm 2 King Messiah

The first two Psalms serve as a preface of the entire book and were even considered by some ancient scribes to be a single psalm. However Paul refers to this psalm in Acts 13:33 as the second psalm. The first two psalms are related however. Whereas the first Psalm brought out a contrast between the happy man and the sinner, the second Psalm, which is also a prefatory Psalm of David, sets the tumultuous rebellion of the ungodly against sure exaltation of the Son of God, the Messiah. The ungodly who are driven away as chaff in Psalm 1 are here in Psalm 2 smashed into pieces (v. 9). What Psalm 2 reveals, that Psalm 1 only implies, is the person of the Messiah. While Christ is well characterized in the description of the happy man of Psalm 1, His name is not overtly stated; however, in Psalm 2, His persona is clearly revealed. Few deny the display of the Messiah in Psalm 2. There is overwhelming evidence that the ancient Jewish sages have long considered this Psalm as pointing to the Messiah of Israel. In the 11^th century the Rabbi Rashi wrote: “Our teachers interpreted the subject of this Psalm with reference to King Messiah, but according to its plain meaning it will be right to expound it of David himself…” While it is important to understand its immediate and historical setting, the Messianic implication of Psalm 2 are hard to deny for even the very name “Mashiach” (Hebrew for Messiah and translated as “Anointed”) appears in verse 2 of the Psalm. In addition, the second Psalm is often quoted in the New Testament to provide Scriptural confirmation of Jesus’ Messianic office and expected glorious and royal return. Jesus, whose “sonship” was confirmed by the Father at His baptism, was first clearly revealed as the Son, here in Psalm 2. The first century church understood the crucifixion of Christ by the nations and rulers of the world in light of the raging of the nations described in verse 1. John in his Revelation describes Christ as the one “who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron,” not unlike the description of His rule in Psalm 2:9.

The Messianic hope that Psalm 2 raises is that the anointed king Messiah will rule by God’s appointment; that although this dark world would foolishly seek to drive God out of existence, that in the end He will subdue all nations under His feet. In light of this, the only wise response on the part of humanity is that of repentance and worship.

Kiss the Son, lest He be angry,

And you perish in the way,

When His wrath is kindled but a little.

Blessed are all those who put their trust in Him.

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Galatians 4:21-31 The Great Contrast

Remember that the way that one becomes acceptable to God and enters heaven, is not by the law, nor by the works of goodness, but by the promise of God. Paul illustrates this point by considering the two sons of Abraham to prove this point.

Abraham had two sons. But only one son had been promised by God to Abraham through his wife Sarah. However after many years passed without Sarah having a child, it seemed as though she was incapable of conceiving. Discouraged, Sarah asked for her slave girl, Hagar, to bear them a child.  Abraham listened to his wife and went in to Hagar and she bore him a son, Ishmael. God had promised Abraham and Sarah that they would bear a son, but they were both well beyond the years of child bearing. Sometime later however, God kept His promise and the impossible happened – Sarah, well beyond childbearing years, bore a son and named him Isaac. Isaac was a miracle child, wonderfully born by the working of God, all because God had promised Abraham a son.  Isaac was therefore, a promised child. 

Ishmael was born after the order and process of nature, and as such, he was born into slavery, being born of a slave girl; born because of the work, effort, human reason and will of Sarah. He was born because of fleshly impulses, urges, and attraction of Abraham. Isaac however, was born as a freeman, born of a free woman, Sarah, born by the promise of God alone. 

The point for you to meditate upon this week is: Abraham had two sons – Ishmael was the child born by human ingenuity, energy, and effort and he was born into slavery; but Isaac, the child promised by God, was born miraculously by the promise of God, by His electing love and power alone, because He alone had made the promise and He alone was faithful to fulfill it. 

This week study Genesis chapters 16, 17, and 21 and discover whether you are you a child of the flesh or a child of promise!

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