What is there to love about God? I began blogging about this question five weeks ago and am finding it hard to stop. I hope what I’m finding in the Psalms is as encouraging and reassuring to you as it has been for me; the psalms are an inexhaustible mine if riches about our Lord. So, let’s keep digging.
Today we are looking at some verses in Psalm 37. This is a place I sometimes go when life is difficult and the world seems to have gone over the edge into insanity. I don’t know about you but I believe we have been living in a world of insanity for some time now. Perhaps insanity is the wrong word to describe the state of our nation.
I am in my eightieth year and cannot recall any period of time when I have seen the kinds of crookedness, lawlessness, disrespect for authority, hatred of our country, and thirst for power that we are experiencing today. Recently another elderly man asked me, “What do you think is behind what is going on in our country?” My immediate reply, “Evil.” By saying this I mean there is a deliberate, organized attempt to destroy the rights and freedoms God has given us by undermining our constitution, the founding document of our great nation. I believe Satan is orchestrating much of what we see by using a mix of ignorant, power-hungry, and evil-intentioned human puppets to do his wicked work.
Evil has been around for a long time but we seem to be getting a big dose of it right now. Psalm 37 gives us help and hope for living faithfully in our chaotic world.
“Don’t get bent out of shape because of evildoers. Don’t be envious of wrongdoers. For they will dry up quickly like grass and fade out like a green herb. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and live faithfully. Make the Lord your delight and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord and trust in Him and He will make it happen. He will make your righteousness shine in the darkness and your good judgment as the noonday sun. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him to act and don’t despair when you see the wicked doing well while carrying out his evil schemes. Don’t allow yourself to respond angrily or become vengeful. This can lead you to do evil things yourself. Remember, evildoers will be cut off but those who wait for the Lord will receive God’s bless and win in the end.” (My paraphrase of Psalm 37:1-9)
What is there to love about God? Here are some things about God that I find very helpful and hopeful in times like we are living in today.
God instructs us how we are to think and act when evil is at work. He hasn’t left us to fend for ourselves against the devil. We are not to “fret”, which I have paraphrased as “don’t get bent out of shape.” While what we are seeing may concern us to the point of disgust and disbelief, we are to remain anchored to our belief in God and act as people of the light in a dark world.
We are to recognize the evil for what it is and fight against it by the power of God that lives within us. We are to ” Trust in the Lord and do good.” This is our call to duty against the workers of evil. We are not to be passive observers while the world around us goes to hell. We are to live in the power of the Spirit and allow God to deal directly with the forces of evil. We need to speak up and stand up for good, but only God can defeat the devil and his minions. We are not to fight evil with evil.
One of our greatest instruments of battle is prayer. Bible teacher, Kristi McClelland says,” Prayer is a subversive activity in the kingdom of this world.” Yes, prayer is a strong way to be a warrior for good in our battle against the evil forces at work in our country and our personal lives. Jesus teaches us to pray “Thy kingdom, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
While those who do evil take delight in the harm they do, we are told to “Make the Lord your delight.” Evil and good are enemies and we are to choose God’s side and “Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him to act.”
Concluding thoughts. Evil is at work to destroy us personally, as well as the country we love and whose great benefits we have enjoyed for years. There is help and hope during these trying times. God is on the side of those who seek to do good. In His time He will deal with those who perpetrate evil and they will disappear. He is in ultimate control and good will prevail; light will overcome darkness, good will defeat evil.
At the beginning of this blog I referenced a conversation with another elderly gentleman about what’s going on in our country. As that conversation continued I made the remark, “We know how the story ends don’t we?” “Yes,” he said, “But I’m concerned about what happens between now and the end.”
What happens between now and the end of the story concerns me too. All I know to do is to take the words of this psalm seriously, rest in the Lord and His sovereignty, and do my part every day to live faithfully and purposefully to bring about God’s kingdom on earth.