Psalm 31:
David is reminding himself of the joy he has being forgiven of his sins, even in this time of trouble. His friends, family members, even random people on the street are conspiring to kill him. He feels lonely but realizes that in his heart he has the greatest love that can ever exist - he has a relationship with God. A love that surpasses ALL understanding. Even thought everyone in this world appears to be against David, he knows that God loves him and is able to protect him and rescue him. He takes great joy in that - but still - it would be nice if everyone that he physically sees weren't against him.
He reinforces the love and trust that he has for God by stating it out loud, "You are my God!", he cries. He offers praises to God and guidance to others that are struggling with their belief. Be true to God. Put your trust in Him for He will provide. Do not be like the wicked - the unbelievers - who do not know God or His never ending love. Stay focused on Him.
Psalm 32:
David is sharing his testimony of what it was like when he was not walking with the Lord. We sometime think that God could never love me. That the sins we've committed are too great for the Lord to forgive. We walk outside of God's love because we don't see ourselves as worthy of His attention. David is often referred to as a man after God's own heart - yet murder and adultery were on David's list of sins. These sinners were forgiven through David's repentant heart and his reliance on God. God wants to forgive our sins. He wants us to ask Him to wash our sins away and give us a clean slate. He will not do it until we ask Him to do it. When we ask Him to come into our lives and be our God, our Savior, then He will show Himself to us through His amazing actions.
In this psalm, David makes reference to some people acting like senseless mules, donkeys, or horses that need to have a bit in their mouths in order to control them. Rather than allowing God to guide them step by step, they stubbornly leave guide only one option - guiding by discipline and punishment. God wants to guide with love and wisdom rather than punishment. He wants to use positive reinforcement rather than negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement can only be used on those that are walking in His word. I'm amazed at how often these actions of positive reinforcement occur and how the world refers to them as "being lucky!" Luck has absolutely nothing to do with it - it's 100% ALL GOD!
Thank you, Lord, for coming into my life!!
Psalm 33:
David is restating why He loves God so much by reviewing the actions from Genesis. Genesis was written by Moses and handed down through the generations, so David would have had a scroll of Genesis to read. David proclaims how God frustrates the plans of the non-believers. You can almost picture God, as a parent, looking down at us from His throne and saying, "Now, now, everyone. Let's all play nice together." To Him, even the largest, most advanced army was simply a group plastic toy soldiers. The non-believers have little understanding of the power God has, but to those that know Him - we are in awe of the power. We put our entire trust and love in Him alone.
Psalm 34:
God promises great blessings to His people but many of these blessings can only be realized through active participation. The more involved we are in the work that He has for us the more we see these blessings. He does not call us to sit idly by and watch His blessings. He wants us active. The more active we are the more we see. David has called out numerous actions that he has taken and what the corresponding blessing was from the Lord. This is David's testimony to all generations as to how the Lord has impacted his life. Then David asks us to take these same actions and see for ourselves the overwhelming blessings the Lord has in store for us. Remember, to fear the Lord does not mean to shake and tremble and fear for our lives. It means to have respect and awe for the amazing power that He has. To praise Him and rely on Him in all times; good and bad.
Both the righteous and the wicked face times of trouble, it is their response to those trials that differentiate them. The wicked rely on their own ability, their own knowledge, their relationships with others and not on the power of God. The righteous will be in a relationship with God. They will bring their troubles to God from the very beginning and seek His wisdom and guidance to help them through the troubles. God wants us to come to Him with everything. There is nothing too small to bring to God. It shows how much you trust Him and how little you rely on your own powers. However, He does expect us to take action. He expects us to be involved in many things so He can show His hand at work through us.
There are many ways to get involved. Too many times I hear someone say that they just don't have time to do something. But then later they are talking about this TV show or this book or their hobbies and I think to myself... that has more priority than God's work? Hmmm.... There's always time for the willing.
Psalm 35:
David is calling on God to deal with his enemies. This may seem extremely harsh to us, but we must remember David was God's anointed king over a nation called to annihilate the evil people of the land. He didn't understand why he was forced to flee from men who were wrongly seeking to kill him. Also, David was sincerely calling for justice to be done and to be done by God and not by him. David turned revenge over to God to deal with. He did not take matters into his own hands. He is also trying to motivate others to take a strong stand against evil... any evil... no matter how large or small.
When we do not fight back against evil because we feel it is too small to warrant a response then we have given Satan a foothold in our world. He will slowly build strength on that foothold and use it to gain another foothold. We have seen this happen repeatedly in today's world. When we sit idly by and allow a very tiny, but organized, group of unbelievers to force their way of thinking into the political forefront using threats of law suits to shut us down, we show that we don't believe our God to be strong enough to overcome their anti-Christian, anti-Biblical way of living. It's time to take a stand and give God a stage in which to perform His power.
David is saying that when we stand up FOR God, God will be there to take action. This is also displayed in other areas of the Bible as well.
Please share your thoughts and comments.
The Shepherd
Psalms 36-40
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