Yesterday was a thoroughly lovely day… We slid back into our home church and got to chat with many, many familiar faces & longtime friends.
From the first chords of music and the first notes sung, I was emotional and fought back a few tears … happy tears; tears of God’s goodness to us, no doubt mixed with a dose of nostalgia.
It was honestly a bit taxing… emotionally & socially, but yet it was good for the soul to be in both the morning & evening services (with the ever appreciated Sunday afternoon nap thrown in for good measure).
Here’s this morning’s psalm…
Interested in knowing Why? this series on Psalms…
check out the 1st post.
Psalm 6
1 O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger,
nor discipline me in your wrath.
2 Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing;
heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.
3 My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O Lord—how long?
4 Turn, O Lord, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
5 For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?
6 I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
7 My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.
8 Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.
9 The Lord has heard my plea;
the Lord accepts my prayer.
10 All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled;
they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment.
My 3 Thoughts
- Verses 1-3: It seems as though there has been a lot of that over the past months… the word “languishing” is a great descriptor… our “bones and our souls troubled” also quite appropriate.
- They are appropriate in a societal sense I think… collectively, we have all been troubled and languishing, but it goes deeper…
- We tend to chalk all difficulty / challenge up to Covid these days. While that may have contributed to my personal languishing / trouble over the past months, it’s not the only thing. There has also be a propensity to handle things on my own (partially because I felt I had to) & partially because of an accumulation of hurt that I let fester too long. The Lord would have every right & reason to be angry with me, but I’m glad that we have David’s 6th psalm as an example… It was said of David that he was “a man after God’s own heart”, yet he too had reason for the Lord to approach him in anger & displeasure… instead, he always humbly came back to God and asked him, in this case, to be gracious with him… I can relate.
- v.6 : Weary of moaning: I can relate to this part of David’s psalm as well. On the outside I may not come across as a moaner, on the inside I very much have been and it is indeed tiresome – for me first and foremost, but to those close to me as well. Liz has been most gracious and my kids as well. They see it more than anyone.
- That being said, I have not, as David did, “flood my bed with tears”, in fact, I think I kind of shut my emotions down and the effect was a more or less hardened heart in a number of ways. A reversal of that is necessary, but I don’t expect overnight change. It took a while to stiffen up, and it will take a while to soften as well… but the process is engaged and that’s as good a place as any to begin.
- v.9 Assurance: One of the things that has been most difficult, and one of my biggest beefs over the past few months, is that I don’t feel I’ve been heard by some of the people that matter. We can survive rejection by people that are, relationally, far off or, I suppose, un-related, but when it comes from those closer… it’s more difficult to accept gracefully.
- I’m grateful for the fact that I can rest assured that the Lord hears, and has heard. When no on else fully hears or understands… the Lord does. That’s comforting!
Food for Thought…
The Lord is gracious. When we’re tired of the moaning (others’ or our own), he has a gracious listening ear… you can be sure you’ll be heard.
Thanks for spending a few minutes together!
If you’re not someone who typically spends time reading the Bible…
would you care to join me over the next couple of weeks?
AIM Long 