Followers

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Psalm 19

Today I will be blogging about Psalm 19. It is one of my favorite Psalms that David wrote.  It comes right after Psalm 18 where David praises God for bringing him out of the persecution of Saul.
In it, he praises God for his beauty and power throughout the universe.  This powerful description that David uses goes on from about verses 1-6 of the Psalm.   He never changes, he always stays the same throughout all of our days.
I first realized that God is this big and works in our life during my sophomore year in high school.  God lead to me this Young Life camp during the summer of my sophomore year.  One Thursday night, God revealed himself to me and helped me realize my sinful nature.  Looking back, it was the first time I recognized God in my life I looked at the sky reveling in who he is and how small we are.  
The verses I will be discussing mainly are Psalm 19:1-3.
Psalm 19 :1-2 says this, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands."Day after day they pour forth speech; night after they display knowledge."
There are a 100 billion galaxies that contain a 100 billion stars in the universe.
God is too big and grand for us to handle.  His glory is too vast for us to comprehend and understand.
Psalm 19:3 3 describes God's depth and knowledge of us.
Psalm 19:3 says this, "There is no speech or knowledge where their voice is not heard."
In the same way when kids try to hide from their parents what they have done something wrong.  We as Christians can't hide from God when we have sinned.
God knows everything about us.  He knows when we fall into sin in life.  He hears our cries for mercy when everything in life is falling apart.
We have to remind ourselves of God's greatness and power in our life.  He works in us when we don't realize it.
In the New American Standard Bible 19:1 says, "The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of his hands."
How will you my readers realize God's greatness and movement in our life this week?

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Psalms 18

Today I will be blogging about a Psalm 18 in the Bible. This has become one of my favorite Psalms so far during this Mighty Men study I have been going through.  Even though it is long, this Psalm is one I shall not forget when I have been delivered through certain struggles in my life.   
 This Psalm takes place right after David was delivered from the hands of Saul. This could also be written when David had been king and facing off against other nations. You can glean this assumption because David talks about how God saved him from his enemies. 
He praises God for blessing him through when David obeying him through this time of persecution as well. David describes his ability to obey God through these hard times he faces in Psalm 18:20.
It says in Psalm 18:20, The Lord has dealt with me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands he has rewarded me."
David also praises God for hearing him in this struggle in his life.  He recognizes in God's greatness that he hears his cries for help though God is so great and powerful.  He lavishes God in how he saved him through hardship.
He describes how God saved him through hardship and heard his pleas for mercy in verse 18:6.  In this verse great imagery and metaphor is given to God.
Psalm 18:6 says,  "In my distress I called upon the Lord; to my God I cried for help.  From his temple heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears."
David acknowledges that God is his rock through this time of persecution and hardship.  In the psalm he also recognizes his trust in God after he gets him through this time in his life.  In Psalm 18:2, David says,                    "The Lord is my rock, my fortress, my deliverer; my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, the horn of my salvation, and my stronghold."
Throughout the middle half of the Psalm David praises God for his ability to take him through this situation.  He using strong metaphors in this Psalm to get his point across of how great and glorious that God is in his life.  God saved him from this hardship because he trusted in God's plans and ways not his own.
This is personified in verse 19 when David praises God saying, "He brought me into a broad place; he rescued me, because he delighted in me."
This opening verse shows David's trust in God's plan to get him through anything in life.  He knows that he can depend in God in any and every situation.  God is our rock upon which our foundation is centered in life.
God brought me through certain hard times in my life and helped me trust him.  The first instance I can think of was the beginning of my senior year of high school after I had gone through a hard time in my life my junior year and the past summer.
Another instance occurred this past year when I was looking for a job in the Broadcast Journalism and God closed those paths in my life.  He lead me to seminary in that situation because he wanted me to get back into ministry because that is where he wanted me to be.   Looking back on the situation I could feel that God was moving in my life for me to go a different path than I wanted to go.
In both situations, God worked in my life helping me trust him more and more.  He reminded me that I can trust him in any and every situation that I may face in my life.
A rock does not move at all.  If we try to move a rock that is in place in the ground then it will stay there for a long period of time.  In the same way,  if we trust God in any and every situation then we can be our rock throughout all our life.               
God is good and he is trustworthy throughout all our life.  He reigns in and through our life though situation that we may face.  Nothing is too big for God to overcome or pull us through in life. 

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