198 - "Either Cling to Me as I Am Or Who You Want Me To Be" Psalm 132-138

                             

Remember our hardships endured.
Remember David's mantra:
I will not even sleep until
I find a place for the Lord.
Until I find a place for my Lord
in all that I do, in all that I am.
Psalm 132:5.

An author once said:
"Either cling to Me as I AM or
reshape Me into who you want Me to be."
Larry Crabb

I've seen a few suns set in this life.  And as I read these psalms, something stirs within.  David was despised by family & friends.  David never knew he would sit on a throne.  David worshipped.  Nothing mattered more to him than God.

The stakes are high to find a place for my Lord and not try to make Him fit into my life, my expectations, my rights.  Here is David, who suffered well, singing in the midst.  His passion for God is all-consuming his throne.  From caves to thrones, He worshipped.  And it didn't matter how hard he fell.  He preached to himself the Gospel of Grace as Tripp called it:  "Today in your private, life-interpreting conversation, will you preach to self the gospel of God's grace?"

PHOTO:  Another sun sets on the Washington Bridge as I worship you and pray for You to move in all of our lives.

"The more you see your own flaws and sins, 

the more precious, electrifying, and amazing 

God's Grace appears to you."  Tim Keller 135 God, you'll never be out-of-date. God, you stand up for your people.  God, you hold my hand through this wedding day.  Psalm 136 Your Love will never quit.  Psalm 137 We cried and cried and cried... Psalm 138 Thank You for what You have done!  Everything in me says "Thank You!"  Angels listen as I sing my thanks.  I kneel in worship this wedding morn.  Thank you for Your Love.  Most Holy is Your Name.  The moment I called out, You stepped in; You made my life large with Strength.  Would you do it again this day for all of us.  Make our lives a little larger.  And where people are attracted to our flesh, reveal to us the way of escape to let You step in.  Finish what you started in me, 

197 - "Quiet My Soul in My Loss of What I Loved" Psalm 120-131

I will lift my eyes to the mountains ~ Psalm 121:1
But there is no help in the power & strength I find there.

My help comes from the LORD.
My transformed soul must quiet itself in my loss of what I loved, 

in my disappointment of what I had hoped for, 

in my sadness in how I am treated,

and in my suffering of what I had trusted. 

 My Help comes from the LORD Who made Heaven and Earth. 

 Be quiet, o my soul. 

 No mountain, no power, no strength, other than My LORD. 

 He Who keeps me will not slumber this night. Psalm 121:3. 
Compose and Quiet my soul!  

I will not involve myself in great matters or in things too difficult for me. Psalm 127:2. 

Psalm 28:2 I will find my help from Your Presence in my life, in my community, in my church. I will look to Your Sanctuary. 

 Come LORD Jesus, be Present here. 

 Make me like these mountains which cannot be moved.

PHOTO:  Eatonville, Washington. I remember what I was thinking when this picture was taken.

196 - "Meaning and Mercy in Suffering" Psalm 119

                                                                    

I am like a wineskin in the smoke, I have not forgotten your Word. Psalm 119:83

Wine-bottles of the East are skins.                                                                                                               The custom was to hang the skin of wine in the smoke of a fire to mellow the wine and bring it to perfection.  

I learned in school you always have to ask: So what's the point?  

The psalmist finds consolation in this metaphor that my afflictions have "meaning" and "mercy."              They have been sent by the Creator to act on me like the smoke does on the wine.  

The Tuck commentary says: Under all these afflictions, may we refuse to part with our faith.  Yet, we falter.  Yet, we don't forget the Word either.  

R. Tuck says: "What seems to be in mind is a long waiting-time, which was also a time of suffering and strain."  Waiting for God.  Watching for God as this world passes away.  

And Tuck says the major question is this:  "What was he doing during this hard waiting-time?" ...     Holding fast to his integrity;                                                                                                                  keeping obedience and trust;                                                                                                                persistently ordering his life according to the Divine statutes.  

Send your Word, O God! And may we throw ourselves on the Divine rhetoric.

The Unfolding of the Word gives Light. 

The entrance illuminates our understanding. 

Doesn't depend on how bright we are or are not. 

It gives understanding even to the simple. 

The word "pentach" signifies an opening. 

Someone said that metaphorically, it really means a "gate." 

And when the Light dispels the darkness, and lights up our minds, 

we enter the porch.

What happens when we enter in the house? 

May we be so taken with the Word of God to delight, meditate, study, and marvel at it over and over and over. 

Huram-abi knew how to work with iron, stone, gold, silver, bronze, wood.  He could do it all---engravings.  But all I can think of this day is that I want some iron in my soul.  I'm far too flappable, malleable, slippery, flacid.  The Holy Spirit knows how to put that iron in my soul.  And so, we pray. 
Psalm 119: 175 
Invigorate my soul , O God, 
so I can praise You well, 
use Your Decrees to put iron in my soul. 

PHOTO:  Because the beginning is understanding for all of us. Light coming through an opening in the sky. A gate of wisdom for us this day.

195 - "Send The Word To Me" Psalm 108-114

Psalm 108 - Am I really awake or just trying to live an encouraging positive life?  Listen to your life!  Am I ready to raise a God-song?  If so, my soul must be awake or it's empty notes.  For the sake of the one you love so much, reach down and help me---answer me! Human help is pedestrian. 

2 Thoughts Linger from Today's Reading:

Psalm 108 - AWAKENED TO LISTEN.   Listen to your life.   Listen to your world.

Psalm 109 - GOD'S HAND IS IN THIS.  Does my world recognize Your Hand is in this...

and if yes, then how do I respond to that?  My God, don't turn a deaf ear to my hallelujah prayer. 

I'm at the end of my rope, my life in ruins.  Save me through your Wonderful Love.  Then they'll know that your hand is in this.  I so believe you wrote this psalm for me.  In some ways, I am at my wit's end but I believe your hand is in this.   It would be really good for me, I think, if others knew Your Hand was in this.

PHOTO:  In a bevy of people and no one knows how you feel. I need to walk up. Listen. 

194 - "His Words Are Incarnate Words Fleshed Out In Us" Psalm 106-107

Psalm 107 speaks of our sin-sick souls.

About God Who sends a personal Word.

They cried to the Lord in their trouble...

and He saved them from their distress.

"He sent out His Word & healed them."

Psalm 107:20.

And, He stilled their storm to a whisper;
the waves of their sea were hushed.
Psalm 107:29.

We are healed by the word that comes
out of the mouth of God.
A Word does it.
Rescues.
That Word comes
from human messengers,
comes from angels unheard of,
comes from the very Word Itself,
maybe even a thought placed in our mind.
Stills my current storms to a whisper.
Hushes the present waves of my sea.

This word is like oxygen.
Send Your Word.
And He did:  "God knows your form."

Ezekiel, Ezri, Bristol, Mira, Tracer ...                                                                                                          Keep your eyes open for God, watch for his works; be alert for signs of His presence. 

God speaks.
It may be in the humdrum of life or it may be in hurts that pierce our hearts and make our blood run cold.
God speaks.
"And the reason that His Words are Impossible to Capture in Human Language is of course that they are ultimately always Incarnate Words. They are words fleshed out in the everydayness, no less than in the crises of our own experience." (Buechner). Whether you heard him in the humdrum or hurts of this day, keep your eyes open for Him.  What sign was His Presence to you this day?

PHOTO: A good book and 4 grandkids listening for a word.

193 - “When Will You Come to Me, O God?” Psalm 101-105

                         

"When will you come to me?" Psalm 101:2
Such an intriguing question.
Some commentaries think David penned this psalm
when he finally took the throne after waiting 25 years.
The psalm fits a "good magistrate" and a "good master."
When, God?
This is the householder's psalm. For all the places we lead.
No matter what our outward condition is---joy or sorrow.
Keep these words in your mind.  On repeat.  
We must sing this psalm in our world. 
This is how David would walk in his own house,
for he was still under the watchful Eye of God.

Our greatest goal in living in our homes is this.
That God may dwell there all our days.
We invited Him from the day we moved in.
Sometimes I feigned soul amnesia and forgot He was there.
Most days I knew it, breathed it, lived it.
It's over.  The last child flipped over the calendar.
I've thought much about what we left there in that home.
Thought much about what God did there.
I can't take it back and I wish I could in ways.
But we gave the best we had from where we sat and walked.
And all I can do is ask today:
When will you come to me, God? And a tear falls.

All those days brought me to this tear.  I want Him so.
So, what's the point:  Walk circumspectly under the
Hand of Providence, under the Watchful Eye of God. There are beautiful souls still living in my house. All are worthy of utmost respect.

One of the most unbelievable experiences I have had was when II Corinthians 1:8-10 happened to me.  I was burdened excessively, beyond my strength, so that I despaired even of life.  A troubled childhood, violence, gang rape, addictions, miscarriages, and then it happened---burdened excessively.  January 13, 2006.  "Indeed [I] had the sentence of death within so that I would not trust in [myself] but in God Who raises the dead."  II Cor. 1:8-9,  He did! He raised me up from the dead.  I didn't think I was going to make it through.  Oh! Make no mistake, He raised me up to life that I've never known.  More alive than I've ever been.  More aware of the sin within than ever.  It's called "The Great Divide." [Oswald Chambers] I have set my hope on God, not on this world.  And He will YET deliver me even more. 

"God produces a providential crisis where we have to decide---FOR or AGAINST, and from that point the "Great Divide" begins.  If the crisis has come to you on any line, surrender your will to Him absolutely and irrevocably."  Oswald Chambers My Utmost for His Highest January 1.

PHOTO: The Quarries Lake where I often ask "When will you come to me, O God?"

192 - "My Busy Thoughts Are Multiplying" Psalm 92-100

When my anxious thoughts multiply within me, 

Your Consolations will delight my soul. Psalm 94:19

My heart was filled with various and perplexing busy thoughts.

I was, I am tormented with the cares and fears about my future state.

Reach for the Consolations when the branchings of the heart hit hard.

I had to go back to subbing at the public schools in Austin---a challenge.

When you get older, it's a different ballgame in life or maybe it's that I just still

have not found my niche of contribution.  Trusting God in the midst of the emptiness.

The comforts that delight our soul are at our fingertips—

*the promises of God in His Word 

*the Word of God set home by the Holy Spirit on our souls, 

*and all those memories of His Care and Kindness to each of us in days gone by. 

The word for thoughts is used to describe branches of trees, 

thick and entwined, showing just how perplexed and distressing our thoughts really are. 

Praying for you and for me that God will open His Promises, His Word, and apply it to our souls.

Thank you, God.  This means so much that you would do this for us.

Can I let go and leave my hurts in His Hands?
 Psalm 96 - God is coming to set everything right on earth.  (God said this 4 times.).  So, I can let go any insults, any harm done to me for my King will set it straight someday.   

 

Am I arrogant in how I talk about other people?

 Psalm 97:8 - Am I proud of my ragamuffin gods?  I hope not.

What's my password?

 Psalm 100:1-4 - On your feet now—applaud God.  Sing yourselves into his presence. Enter with the password: "Thank you!"

PHOTO:  At a monastery in Budapest.  A sacred place of long ago where I step this day and feel the energy of the Spirit of God moving in my life.  Couldn't be more grateful juxtaposed to feeling such aloneness and lack of purpose.

191 - "Doing Math In The Wilderness and The Five-Fold Arms of God" Psalm 88-91

 

Bend an ear, God; answer me. I'm one miserable wretch! ...

Psalm 88 - God, you're my last chance of the day. I spend the night on my knees before you ...
Take notes on the trouble I'm in ... 
You turned my friends against me ...
Blinded by tears of pain and frustration ...
My only friend left is Darkness ...
Pain.
Frustration.
What do I do with that?

You put the arrogant ocean in its place 
You put your arrogant child in moments like today
that I may see into my heart.

I've thought a whole lot this year about the story of the Prodigal Son.  In his book about the prodigal, Henri Nouwen writes:  "Can I let the younger and older son grow in me to the maturity of the compassionate father?"  The father is who I must become, he writes.  As the father deals with his own anger and loneliness, his anger turns to solitude and his loneliness turns to gratitude.  I am that younger and older brother.  Frustration.  Anger.  Pain.   Can you grow both of my sides into a compassion that moves into the lives of others in the midst of my own mess?

Teach us to number our daysthat we may present a heart of wisdom. Psalm 90:12

One commentary says it this way:  

In this wilderness world of ours, 

may our lives be "a sanctified use of the sad dispensation."

Let the arithmetic find us Divine Guidance.

And may the counting result in much goodness every day.

Oh God! Cause us to come to you for wisdom. 

That we may allot our time by by what You know. 

That we may set store by time.

“That God would enable us to form such an estimate of life, 

that we shall be truly wise; 

that we may be able to act 

"as if" we saw the whole of life.” 

Oh the beauty of all the names of Psalm 91:1-2
The Most High
The Almighty
Jehovah
My Refuge
My Fortress.

If there breeds any doubt in the fragile nest of your thoughts,
tbe five-fold more assured of His Love in this verse for you.
Whatever the discussion, the danger, the dilemma, the distress, the difficulty, the dogma.
Whatever.
You have access to the Five-Fold Arms of God today.
Under the Divine Protection.
Under the Same God this day.

PHOTO:  5 Grandkids hiding in the hash tagged sign.  May they live in such a way that they keep an eye on the whole of life.  May they live wise lives.  

The Other PHOTO: The faces of the people in Budapest still haunt me.  So sullen.  So sad.  So striking.  The distrust of Communism still runs through the Danube River.  They are not a free people.  God raise them up to be like the father running for joy to his sons.  

190 - "Open Your Mouth Wide" Psalm 81-87

I have this thought as I read my Bible every day:
"I hear a language I had not known." Psalm 81:4

This Bible I hold in my hand reads my life, reads me.
And I sense things that are not right within. I am visiting Kansas City this week. I love this family so much and want to be a blessing to them, a benefit to them, a beautiful place in their hearts. I long to do them good. 

And I long to change---not me doing the changing.
But Him.

"In distress I called and You delivered me.
You answered me in the secret place of thunder."

I know.

Psalm 81:5

You relieved my shoulder of the burden.

You freed my hands from the basket.

I am the LORD, your God

Who brought you up out of this thing.

Will I listen to His Voice.

Will I submit to this new thing?

Yes, I do come to the Word every single day,

not as a "fix" for my life full of distress,

but as a "flame" white-hot with wonder.

And Crabb's words about Chronicles burn within:

"I invite you to delight in your distress. 
Nothing else provides the same opportunity 

to move strongly and joyfully into life 

on the basis of My Promises Alone,

the Promises of My Presence now and

My Satisfaction forever.  

Seizing that opportunity will free you 

to passionately engage life for My Purposes with no demands."  66LL

I removed the burden from their shoulders; their hands were set free from the basket. Ps-81:7 and I rescued you,you out of a thundercloud; I tested you at the waters of Meribah. Hear me, my people,and I will warn you—-- if you would only listen to me, Israel! I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open wide your mouth and I will fill it. Psalm 81:10 The treasure of His Grace is inexhaustible. We could never open our mouths wide enough for His Hand. 

PHOTO: God's Inexhaustible Grace is all over you! My four kids. I pray constantly that you would experience deeply than you can imagine His Grace multiplied on Grace. That you would care more than anything about what matters most. That Inexhaustible Grace.

189 - "The Dark Days are Displays of His Love and Power" Psalm 78-80

                                                                  

In this uncertain world where we live, there is only One Who is Faithful and True. People will let us down. We will face loss in this world. We will never lose. He has defeated the enemy. He showed John a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne. Rev 22:1. The river of life here on earth is muddied, cursed. There will be no more curse. One Day Soon. So, keep this book open. It will affect your eternity. ToThey forgot what God had done.  Psalm 78:11

He parted raging waters and they crossed the sea
with waters piled up high on either side.
God left no footprints.
The sea closed back in a fury.
And, they forgot.

May mercy come quickly on us all.  Psalm 79

We say it a lot:  I love my people.  It strikes a chord with me.  Cause I feel like it's not my experience.  Don't we all want people to adore us?  So, this next verse catches me off-guard.  I am called to be someone's "people."  His People.  And it is the Only One we can trust. 

"We are His People,
the sheep of His Pasture."
Psalm 79:13

So, when we are in prison, we need remember the bigger picture---the Mighty Display of our God for us that is in the "already happened" stage.  Fall back on "already" not on the "currents." 

"The dark days of His People become the Prelude to unusual displays of the Lord's Love and Power." Charles Spurgeon.  Oh, it must be gonna happen!  Cause this people here are in dire straits. 

DEAR GOD,  PLEASE CHANGE ME IN MY 10,000 MOMENTS THAT seem to be prison-like.  Help me see what is going on.  Help me remember Your Mighty Arm.  Help me ride The Prelude to display Your Love & Power.  Praying that we see a glimpse today.  I think I know how I could! 

PHOTO: The Cross.