"To Him be glory forever": Psalm 121

Showing posts with label Psalm 121. Show all posts

Friday, September 21, 2018

Always On Watch

Cats are really, really good at taking naps. Here is an "action" shot of two of the three cats in our home. The one in the foreground is our latest addition, Shiny, whose mom is our outside cat. Shiny is five months old, so more properly a kitten. She is active and playful, but appears to have found a mentor as she moves from being a kitten to an adult cat. I imagine that our indoor cats nap, or sleep, 22-23 hours a day, with the majority of their "waking" hours being used to move from one of their favorite nap locations to another.

In the past few weeks I have found myself reading Psalm 121 during a number of pastoral visits. I initially used it when visiting someone and having the thought during the visit of reminding them, from God's word, where the help they needed in a trying time could be found. Psalm 121:1-2 has the answer:

"I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?

My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth."

Those words were the right ones at that particular time. But the psalm continues to speak of another great truth of God, which in those visits, and also the funeral I preached this week, also needed to be spoken. Verse 3-4 say:

"He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.

Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep."

Hard times come in our lives. We wonder what is going on. We wonder how we will great through a particular moment. We wonder what the next day will bring.

But at the very same time, we who look to Jesus as Savior and Lord can go through those hard times, can live with those wonderings, knowing that God is on watch. He does not slumber or sleep. He doesn't take a nap. He doesn't go for a cup of coffee or check his Facebook.

He does what he always does, which is to hold all things in his hands at all times. He watches over each of his children with the same diligence. He does not slumber or sleep, ever. And in this I believe that his children can take great comfort. We may not understand the difficulties or worries of life at a particular moment, but God does, and he is watching over us at each moment of our lives.

Unlike our cats, the Lord is always on watch, and that is a good thing, one that is not merely comforting to us, but also to his glory. Amen.

Sunday, February 25, 2018

Shoes and Good News

This past week has been a unique one for me in ministry. In addition to the regular activities of an ordinary week, of which preparing to preach on Sunday morning is probably the most important and most time-consuming, I also preached three funerals. Two of those funerals were in our church building and one was a graveside service, and in all three I was at the cemetery for the burial. Three different groups of families and friends, grieving losses that were completely unexpected, plus one group of people gathered together for worship on Sunday. The one thing that joined them all, from my point-of-view, was that they heard the good news of Jesus proclaimed to them.

The picture is one of my "work shoes" this past week. From left to right: Tuesday, preaching from John 20:30-31; Friday, from Luke 15:1-7; Saturday, from Psalm 121; and this morning, from John 1:1-5. The Gospel presentation from those sermons was stronger in some than in others, again, from my viewpoint, but it was there nonetheless. The essence was that we are sinners in the presence of a holy God, and the only hope we have for rescue is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

In Romans 10:14-15 Paul writes:

“How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”

My present calling is to be a pastor on a reservation, and so in Paul's words I have been sent here in order that people may understand the good news of Jesus and call on Him for salvation. Those are the shoes that cover my feet as I do this work.

But the greater truth is that all people who have faith in Jesus should grow as followers of Him, preparing for that moment when in the telling of their faith story they become the means that God uses to open someone's eyes to see the glory of their Savior as they come to faith in Him.

I showed my shoes because, frankly, no one wants to see a picture of my feet. But those shoes cover one pair of feet that are carrying the good news of Jesus to a world that desperately needs it. And by God's grace, be it in your home, your neighborhood, or across the globe, your feet can do the same. Amen.

Wednesday, September 13, 2017

One Percent Of The Square Root…

I have a "gift" for collecting and recalling odd, virtually useless bits of information. Every so often this gift shows itself around the house and Robin will ask how I can know something that would be so obscure. "Beats me!" is my best answer. A fact caught my attention in some way and got filed away in my brain, awaiting that time when it would spring forth, perhaps in a game of Trivial Pursuit, when it may actually be useful.

One of those odd bits was a claim made, I believe, by proponents of Transcendental Meditation, that if one percent of the square root of the world's population would simultaneously meditate, then actual progress would emerge in world peace. If I had to guess I would say I heard that in the late 70's or early 80's. I do know that I was skeptical of the claim then, and would call it outright nonsense now.

Last night we had a community prayer meeting. The needs of our community are great and for a while I have thought it would be good to gather people together and pray for our community. A good idea, but I never got around to doing anything about it. So three weeks ago, while making the church calendar for September, I set a date and time, and then last week I asked Robin to make some signs, which I put up around town.

And last night, eight people gathered together to pray. In a community of 2,743 that may not be a lot of people, just under 0.3% of the population. I was never a whiz at math but if I figured correctly we had 16 times the minimum standard of those seekers of world peace via meditation.

Eight people sitting in chairs arranged in a circle. One of them reading a psalm and then about 30 minutes of people praying, sometimes aloud and sometimes silently. My primary intent in gathering was to pray for our community, but being God's people gathered in prayer other things were lifted up as well.

The psalm, 121, begins like this:

"I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?
My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep."

Are the prayers of eight people enough to make a difference? This side of heaven that is a question without an answer. One thing we did agree on afterwards was that we are going to do it again. We were a small group, but we pray to a God without limits in power, in strength, in mercy, in love.

He alone is our help, both as individuals and as a community. And we will continue to gather and ask Him to act for the good, and for the healing, of our community. And may He, alone, receive all our praise and glory. Amen.

Sunday, October 16, 2016

Bumping Along

The picture on the right is of the rear wheel of my daughter's scooter. What I tried to show in the picture are the flat spots on the wheel. Kat races down the sidewalk and then jams on the brake, sliding on the concrete. This, of course, makes the wheel a little less round, so that instead of going in smooth circles you can hear it clunk every once and while if she is riding slowly.

That clunking wheel is how my morning felt today. The very first parts of the morning were normal for a Sunday, but once I made my first trip next door to get things ready for church things began to get out of sync. Without getting into the details there were numerous times in getting ready for our breakfast potluck, setting up for worship, and worship itself, where, from my point-of-view, things were just a little off. Like the wheel on the scooter, the morning was moving along but with an occasional bump to remind me that some things just weren't quite as smooth as I would prefer.

And still…God was at work. Not that He takes the morning off just because this or that thing that I'm up to isn't working out. As Psalm 121:3-4 says,

"He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.

Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep."

Those are true and reliable words, and good ones to remember at many points in life.

The working of God became evident to me even as worship was going on, when I closed an extemporaneous prayer, one that I wasn't really sure had been very clear, and I heard a soft "Amen" from one of the people I was praying with. My awkward words were used by God to touch that person.

There was more evidence in the short, quiet conversations I had with several people after worship. And there was still more evidence as I gathered the prayer requests. God had been at work, through me, even though I thought the morning was moving along in a raggedy sort of way.

I would have preferred a morning where things roll along smoothly but I am glad for the gentle reminders this morning that I am but a servant of God, and the results are in His hands.