Posted on Monday, September 30, 2024

God Doesn’t Keep Lists

He’s the Great Obliterator

PREVIEW: God doesn’t keep lists. Aren’t you glad for that? Unlike some of us who keep track of the mistakes and offenses of others, our gracious God doesn’t! When we confess our sins and repent of our offenses, the Lord remembers them no more. How amazing is that! God takes the worst sins of the repentant sinner and obliterates them from his record. He wipes them from his memory bank—“as far as the east is from the west”—which, the last time I checked, was a long way. No wonder the psalmist called us to “fear” the Lord in response to God’s unmerited forgiveness. To fear the Lord meant to reverence him and to offer him a heart of gratitude, praise, and love. Obviously, that is the proper response to a God who goes out of his way to forgive people who have gone out of their way to offend him.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 130:3-4

If you, O LORD, kept a record of sins, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness; therefore you are feared.

God doesn’t keep lists. Aren’t you glad for that? Unlike some of us who keep track of the mistakes and offenses of others, our gracious God doesn’t! When we confess our sins and repent of our offenses, the Lord remembers them no more. The Apostle John wrote, “When we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse of from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)

King David, who not only knew a great deal about personal sin, but Divine pardon as well, spoke in Psalm 103:3 & 12 of a God, “who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases…as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” How amazing is that! God takes the worst sins of the repentant sinner and obliterates them from his record. He wipes them from his memory bank—“as far as the east is from the west”—which, the last time I checked, was a long way.

One of the most moving and poignant descriptions of this forgiving God was penned by the prophet Micah. He spoke of God not just in terms of his willingness to forgive, but even more, of his passionate desire and aggressive search for ways to extend forgiveness to sinners. Take a moment to absorb this mind-boggling truth from Micah 7:18-19,

Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy. You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.

No wonder the psalmist called us to “fear” the Lord in response to God’s unmerited forgiveness. To fear the Lord meant to reverence him and to offer him a heart of gratitude, praise, and love. Obviously, that is the proper response to a God who goes out of his way to forgive people who have gone out of their way to offend him.

I am so grateful for a God who forgives my transgressions—and remembers them no more. There is no other god like him, and I will be eternally indebted to his mercy and grace. When I think about his “unfailing love and…full redemption” (Psalm 130:7), I am simply undone. How about you?

What love, what mercy, what grace…what a God!

My Offering of Worship: Have you sinned? Ask God to forgive you. Has God forgiven you? Fear him—that is, reverence him, thank him, praise him, and love him—because he has obliterated your sin from his memory.

Posted on Friday, September 27, 2024

Down But Not Out

You Will Rise Again

PREVIEW: Like Israel of old, you have enemies, too. However, your enemies are usually not physical, flesh and blood adversaries; they are spiritual forces that attack you from within—your moral character, your emotional stability, and your spiritual vitality. They seek to weaken your resolve to trust in God’s sufficiency and obey his commands. They seek to enslave you to a life that is far less than God’s best. Maybe even now they have the upper hand in your life. The psalmist would say to you, “Maintain your hope, don’t surrender your trust, strive to overcome every temptation, and get back up when you stumble. Whatever you do, don’t quit if you’ve failed. It may seem that you are down for the count, but you are not because God will give you the victory over your enemies.”

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 129:1-2

“They have greatly oppressed me from my youth,” let Israel say; “they have greatly oppressed me from my youth, but they have not gained the victory over me.”

Some people don’t like being reminded of their troubles. They think we ought to talk only of the positive things in life and leave out all the pessimistic stuff. They’d rather hear only of the sunshine of God’s grace and not the storm clouds of life’s difficulty. Even considering the reality and nature of Satanic opposition sends them posthaste into the fetal position.

I understand that. I prefer to move past, if not bury, all the difficult and distasteful things life brings my way. But isn’t that to ignore the fact that this thing called the Christian life is all about spiritual warfare—that we do have an Enemy who constantly seeks to destroy our very soul and that we are called to overcome by the blood of the Lamb and our testimony of faithfulness in the fight?

The psalmist understood quite well from the history of Israel’s enemies—literal foreign enemies who sought to defeat and enslave God’s people. These enemies were there from the beginning (“from my youth”) and never went away—Egypt, Edom, Moab, Philistia, Assyria, and Babylonia. These foreign, godless enemies oppressed Israel early and often, but each time, God gave his people victory over them.

You have enemies, too. That’s not being pessimistic; that’s just being real. Unlike Israel, however, your enemies are usually not physical, flesh and blood adversaries; they are spiritual forces that attack you from within—your moral character, your emotional stability, and your spiritual vitality. They seek to weaken your resolve to trust in God’s sufficiency and obey his commands. They seek to enslave you to a life that is far less than God’s best. And perhaps, like Israel, these enemies have “oppressed you from your youth,” or as the Message puts it, “They’ve kicked me around ever since you were young.” In other words, the same doubts, fears, temptations, and weaknesses you had as a young person or as a young Christian are still doing a number on you. Maybe they have had or even now have the upper hand in your life.

The psalmist would say to you, “Maintain your hope, don’t surrender your trust, strive to overcome every temptation, and get back up when you stumble. Whatever you do, don’t quit if you’ve failed. It may seem that you are down for the count, but you are not because God will give you the victory over your enemies.”

Israel had enemies—and God gave victory over each one. You’ve got enemies, too, but God has already given you victory over each one through Christ’s victory over sin. Think about that: All your adversaries have already been defeated—even if they don’t act like it. So go ahead and remind those enemies—depression, lust, anger, sickness, scarcity—that they are nothing but losers.

And you are anything but!

As the Apostle Paul declared in Romans 8:37, “In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”

Yes, they may have you down for now, but you are not out! Christians never are.

My Offering of Worship: Whatever is tormenting you and keeping you from victory needs to be put on notice. And you need to be the one to do that. So, call it out, then call it defeated by declaring Christ’s victory, and thus your victory, over it!

Posted on Monday, September 23, 2024

Blessed Fear

Consumed With What God Cares About

PREVIEW: What does it mean to fear the Lord? This is by no means a theological definition, but for all intents and purposes, to fear the Lord means to make him and his purposes both the center and the circumference of your life. It is to be consumed with love, fueled by faith, and characterized by obedience in a moment-by-moment walk with God. It is to care more about what God cares about than anything else. That is what it means to fear the Lord, and that is what it takes to be blessed by the Lord.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 128:1-2

Blessed are all who fear the LORD, who walk in his ways. You will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours.

King Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, began his most famous book, Proverbs, by writing, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 1:7). What followed was a collection of wise sayings intended to lead the God-fearing person into a life that the Lord would uniquely bless.

Solomon’s father, King David, who was Israel’s most beloved king, began his most famous book, Psalms, by writing, “Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither— whatever they do prospers.” (Psalm 1:1-3 )What followed was a collection of worship songs that expressed the blessed condition of one who feared the Lord.

Blessed fear—almost seems like an oxymoron. Fearfully blessed—same with that. Yet, for the person who fears God, blessings are guaranteed. And for the person who lives a genuinely God-blessed life, there you will find the fear of the Lord at their core.

What does it mean to fear the Lord? This is not a theological definition, but for all intents and purposes, to fear the Lord means to make him and his purposes both the center and the circumference of your life. It means to be consumed with love, fueled by faith, and characterized by obedience in a moment-by-moment walk with God. It means passionately caring more about what God cares about than anything else.

That is what it means to fear the Lord, and that is what it means to be blessed by the Lord.

You see, blessing in the purest sense is to be consumed by your love for God, to be fueled by your faith in God, and to be characterized by your obedience to God. A person who lives that kind of life knows pure and unassailable joy at the deepest level. Earthly success, material wealth, personal popularity, and all the other attributes the world says are needed for the blessed life are simply pale compared to a life characterized by blessed fear.

When you fear the Lord, you are truly blessed. When you are truly blessed by God, it is because you fear the Lord.

May God grant you holy fear, and may God richly bless you.

My Offering of Worship: Have you made the Lord and his purposes both the center and the circumference of your life—that he is your everything? Can you honestly say you are consumed with love, fueled by faith, and characterized by obedience in a moment-by-moment walk with God? Do you passionately care more about what God cares about than anything else? If not, take some time today to invite God to realign your life so that the measurement of who you are and what you do reveals that you genuinely do fear the Lord.

Posted on Friday, September 20, 2024

Recalibrate

Perfect Alignment with God’s Purposes

PREVIEW: How do we get God on our side? Simple: we get on God’s side! And what is the best way to ensure the Lord’s help? Not just to get the Lord on your side—that can be tricky business, given the exceeding craftiness of our own humanistic motives (“The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out” Jer 17:9). Rather, the only surefire guarantee of the Lord’s help is to get on God’s side—and stay there—by maintaining God-honoring goals, focusing my interest on God’s purposes, setting my family apart for his glory, and exerting all my energies “as unto the Lord” (Col 3:17, 23). If you are like me, achieving that will require a good deal of recalibrating your life so that from the center to the circumference, you are aligned with God’s will.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 127:1-2

Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat—for he grants sleep to those he loves.

During the Civil war, President Lincoln was asked if God was on his side. His reply was, “It is not is God on my side, but am I on God’s side?”

That’s a great question to ask yourself in any of life’s endeavors. Whether it is in pursuing your personal goals (“Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain”), protecting your interests (“Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain”), producing a good living (“In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat”), practicing a life of tranquility (“he grants sleep to those he loves”) or planning for a happy family (“how blessed are you parents, with your quivers full of children” Psalm 127:3), at the end of all your efforts, nothing of lasting value and eternal consequence will have been accomplished if the Lord has not helped.

And what is the best way to ensure the Lord’s help? Not just to get the Lord on your side—that can be tricky business, given the exceeding craftiness of our own humanistic motives (“The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out” Jeremiah 17:9). Rather, the only surefire guarantee of the Lord’s help is to get on God’s side—and stay there.

Perhaps Lincoln’s question is a good one to ask yourself today: “Am I on God’s side?” Are my goals God-honoring? Are my interests dedicated to his purpose? Is my work his work? Is my family set apart for his glory? Are all my efforts done “as unto the Lord” (Colossians 3:17, 23)?

If you are nervous about answering those questions as if you were giving account to God himself, then wouldn’t you say it is time to recalibrate your life so that from the center to the circumference, you are aligned with God’s purposes?

I hope you will join me today for a little recalibration. If we can pull that off, we will be in good standing to get the Lord’s help. And, like the Apostle Paul, the testimony of our life will be, “But I have had God’s help to this very day, and so I stand here and testify to small and great alike.” (Acts 26:22)

My Offering of Worship: A powerful and penetrating chapter on what a recalibrated life should look like is Colossians 3. Read that entire chapter, perhaps several times, and pray through each piece of evidence of a life that is fully recalibrated to God’s purposes.

Posted on Monday, September 16, 2024

For Desert Dwellers

Your Armload of Blessing is Coming

PREVIEW: As is true for every Christian, you, too, will get a season in what seems to be a wasteland, what we might call a desert experience. It is a barren place that is bordering your life physically, emotionally, financially, relationally, or spiritually, seemingly preventing you from moving into the place of fruitfulness that God intends for you. But don’t forget: God specializes in creating streams in the desert, turning bareness into fruitfulness, and birthing life from death. So, dear desert dweller, get ready to laugh. God is about to end your stream of tears and send you a stream of restoration.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 126:4

Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like streams in the Negev.

You’ve got a Negev; so do I. Everybody gets a Negev at some point in their life. Spending time there just seems to be core curriculum for Christians.

So, what’s a Negev? The Negev was the desert that sat on Israel’s southern border, and it was an inhospitable, intimidating, and impossible place. It was a borderline of barrenness. Israel had a physical Negev, but your Negev is not geographical; you may very well be living with a barren place that is bordering your life physically, emotionally, financially, relationally, or spiritually. And your desert experience is likely preventing, or so you think, from moving into your Promised Land, a land flowing with milk and honey, a place of fruitfulness that God intends for you.

And here’s the deal with deserts: To the natural eye, there is no quick way out or easy way through. To the natural mind, there is nothing but barrenness, with no hope for life, and no prospects for change. The desert represents death—the end of a dream, the end of the line, the end of the story.

But God specializes in creating streams in the desert, turning bareness into fruitfulness, and birthing life from death. God brought the Israelites through the desert to the Promised Land, David out of the wilderness into the palace, Israel back from Babylonian exile to rebuild Jerusalem, and Jesus from death’s tomb to eternal glory. As you can see, deserts—physical, emotional, financial, relational, spiritual—are no big deal to God; some of his best work is done there.

Your Negev may look like the end of the road for you but don’t lose hope. Though you may weep tears of sorrow or tears of repentance or tears of intercession over your desert (“those who planted their crops in despair will shout “Yes!” at the harvest,” Psalm 126:5). You see, God will water your Negev with those tears and in the proper time, bring forth so much abundance (“And now, God, do it again—bring rains to our drought-stricken lives,” Psalm 126:6). And when, not if, but when that happens, you will have to pinch yourself to make sure it is not a dream (“those who went off with heavy hearts will come home laughing, with armloads of blessing,” Psalm 126:1).

So, dear desert dweller, get ready to laugh. God is about to end your stream of tears and send you a stream of restoration.

My Offering of Worship: Select two or three different Bible translations and read slowly, carefully, and prayerfully the six verses of Psalm 126. Pour out your heart to God, claim his promises from this song for your own life, and offer a sacrifice of gratitude in advance for your coming stream of restoration.

Posted on Friday, September 13, 2024

Do Good

O God, Keep Me Pure and Keep Me Prosperous

PREVIEW: God sometimes uses difficult trials to purify our faith and evil times to bring a better kind of prosperity than mere temporal stuff to our lives. But in a sense, when the psalmist prays, “Do good, O Lord,” he is foreshadowing the very prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray in Matthew 6:13, “Lead us not into temptation.” The Message captures the psalmist thoughts when it translates that line in the Lord’s Prayer, “Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.” That’s not a bad prayer to pray, I’d say. Given the choice between tough times and good times, I will pray for the latter, following both the psalmist’s and the Lord’s examples.

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 125:4

Do good, O LORD, to those who are good, to those who are upright in heart.

God is good—all the time! That isn’t just modern American “Christianese.” No, that is biblical truth.

The fact is, God is all wise, fundamentally good, and always in charge! That never changes, even in tough times, which is likely the setting for this psalm. Some Bible scholars believe Psalm 125 was written during the time of foreign domination—perhaps at the hands of the uber-wicked Assyrians—or at least during a time when it seemed likely that Jerusalem would be overrun by the godless.

This is yet another Psalm of Assent, and the writer penned the song for people to sing on their way to worship in Jerusalem. It prompted them to call upon God for two things:

First, to keep Jerusalem pure: “The scepter of the wicked will not remain over the land allotted to the righteous, for then the righteous might use their hands to do evil.” (Psalm 125:3)

Second, to keep Jerusalem prosperous: “Lord, do good to those who are good, to those who are upright in heart”. (Psalm 125:4)

The writer recognized that people were seriously tempted to fall away from God when times were tough—either by giving in to the godless culture that had swallowed the land or by abandoning their trust in the God who seemed to withhold much-needed provision.

Of course, we recognize that God sometimes uses trials to purify our faith and tough times to bring a better kind of prosperity to our lives. But in a sense, the psalmist here foreshadows the very prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray in Matthew 6:13, “Lead us not into temptation.” The Message captures the psalmist’s thoughts when it translates that line in the Lord’s Prayer,

“Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.”

That’s not a bad prayer to pray, I’d say. Given the choice between tough times and good times, I will pray for the latter, following both the psalmist’s and the Lord’s examples. Sure, I am willing to embrace trial as a necessary friend (James 1:2, MSG), but my first choice is to hold hands with the goodness of God.

Yes, do good, dear God, and keep me safe from myself and the Devil!

My Offering of Worship: Where in your life are you giving into fear are seeking escape by temporal means? Stop! Go to God. Tell him your need—and be very specific. Then don’t neglect to offer him thanksgiving in advance, which is absolutely the key to his all-surpassing peace ruling in your heart.

Posted on Monday, September 9, 2024

Help Wanted

There is No Better Helper Than God

PREVIEW: Who better to have helping you than the God who created everything and who, by his power, sustains everything he has created. All other helpers will fall short and will ultimately fail, but there is One who never fails. And best of all, he is yours, and you are his. Better yet, he needs no convincing to act on your behalf. By virtue of you being his child, he not only stands at the ready to help you, he actually goes ahead of you and prepares the way before you get there. Yes, the Lord is our helper!

A Journey of Worship // Psalm 124:8

Our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.

Let’s add a bit more context to our verse. The psalmist writes, “If the Lord had not been on our side when people attacked us, they would have swallowed us alive when their anger flared against us; the flood would have engulfed us, the torrent would have swept over us, the raging waters would have swept us away. Praise be to the Lord, who has not let us be torn by their teeth. We have escaped like a bird from the fowler’s snare; the snare has been broken, and we have escaped.”

He is throwing a lot of analogies at us to describe not just the rough spots that we find ourselves in from time to time, but this is a desperate situation that we are not sure we can survive. We find ourselves in deep weeds with no help, no human escape, no remedy. We despair of life, if not physically, then emotionally, relationally, financially, or spiritually.

Then the psalmist declares those words that we depend on for our very life, breath, well-being, meaning in life, and joy: “Our help is in the name of the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.” (v. 8). Or as the Message puts it, “God’s strong name is our help, the same God who made heaven and earth.”

Who better to have helping you than the God who created everything and who, by his power, sustains it? All other helpers will fall short and will ultimately fail, but there is One who never fails. And best of all, he is yours, and you are his.

Better yet, he needs no convincing to act on your behalf. By virtue of being his child, he not only stands at the ready to help you, but he also actually goes ahead of you and prepares the way before you get there. (Isaiah 45:2) He commands you not to fear, for he will lead you and guide you into good success wherever you go. (Joshua 1:3,7-9) He has promised you health and prosperity, joy and purpose, righteousness and wisdom. (Proverbs 3:5-6; 4:11) He says he will stand beside you and walk with you—especially when the going gets rough. (Isaiah 43:2) He will even be your rearguard—he’s got you covered. (Isaiah 58:8).

What an incredible reality—God is on your side, and therefore, as you stay on God’s side, you cannot fail. So many people place their trust in people and institutions, in politicians and political systems, in bankers, coaches, parents, and preachers, which are at best very flawed and quite temporal. But those who trust in the Lord for his help will not be disappointed.

Isaiah 49:23 says of those who find their help in the Lord, “Kings will be your foster fathers, and their queens your nursing mothers. They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground; they will lick the dust at your feet. Then you will know that I am the LORD; those who hope in me will not be disappointed.”

Hallelujah, with God as your God, help wanted is help received!