Psalms
33 – 35
Verse 33:12 stood out to me today:
The nation whose
True God is the Eternal is truly blessed;
fortunate
are all whom He chooses to inherit His legacy.
I thought about our nation today and how
blessed we were in our founding and how far off track we have gotten. Israel
has gone through many cycles of prosperity and failure and it seems today we
are going through the failure cycle in the USA. Unfortunately, because of the
global climate we are no longer the shining light, but rather the torrent seas
that sink all boat. Our economy props up so many third world nations as we
abuse their poverty and sink them back into it as we struggle.
We lost our focus on God and are focused on
the “almighty dollar.” We are not worshipping Baal but rather dead presidents,
aka dollars. Satan has won a major battle, instead of having us worship him or
one of his demons, he has taken away worship of God by distracting us will
stuff. Our definition of blessing in the church today is based on the dollar.
It’s creeping in everywhere and is dangerous. Our government has lost sight of
who is in control and thinks they have the only input.
Verses 34:13 & 14 hit home with me:
13 Take
care with the things you say.
Don’t
lie or spread gossip or talk about improper things.
14 Walk away from the evil things of the
world,
and
always seek peace and pursue it.
There is a whole bunch here that needs to
be considered, much of which James deals with in his book. First is controlling
your BS! Why do we need to lie or gossip when there is so much cool happening?
Also, it says “walk away from the evil things”, I say run! We do not need to be
absorbed in what distracts us from God, no we need to pursue Him whenever we
can.
This makes me think about a story our
pastor, PK, told. It was early on in our church and he was counseling a woman,
who suddenly turned and propositioned him. He just left, ran out of the
building and ran home. No telling anyone what was up. Fortunately for him he
did not have a Joseph moment where she accused him of wrong doing, but he ran
and did not just walk. See I think walking is casual, where running is on
purpose and that is what we should be in fleeing evil.
Verse 35:18 brought an interesting
question:
Then I will praise
You and thank You at the great gathering,
in
the company of the entire congregation.
I wonder why just there? Why not always?
Why not when you are alone in prayer? Also, it sounds like he is “bargaining”
with God when you read the verses before. We don’t need to do that and should
never use something we should do anyway as a “bargaining chip” with God!
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