Psalm 20

Psalm 20:7

Some boast in chariots and some in horses,
But we will boast in the name of the LORD, our God.

Many people are proud of their accomplishments.  They are important because of what they have done, or what they know, or what they can do.  Some are important because of what they have.  Armies are considered important based on how big the army is, and especially what technology they have.  Today, this would be saying that some boast because of their tanks and humvees.

However, all this is meaningless against the power of God.  He has the power to wipe out anything we could ever do in a second.  All of human history combined, with all the terrible weapons we've made, would not even make him notice the tap.  That power is on our side, and it is the only thing that we can be proud of.  But that pride must be mixed with submission and reverence, we are on its side, not it on ours.

Psalm 19

Psalm 19:1

The heavens are telling of the glory of God;
And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

The fancy term for this is "natural revelation."  It means that the universe itself is telling of how great God is, and how He has created all things.  The idea is that everything is so beautiful, so detailed, so precise, and so well balanced, that it is evidence that God exists, and that He made everything.

Personally, I've always found this argument gets stretched a little too far in some Christian circles.  I've heard it said that just by studying nature, one will arrive at the existence of Jehovah.  While I can follow to the point of some sort of supernatural that created everything, getting from there to Jehovah specifically takes a lot more stretching than I can picture.  If that view were true, then the deep dark tribes of Africa or Indonesia would have been worshiping Jehovah instead of spirits.

Psalm 18

Psalm 18:26

With the pure You show Yourself pure,
And with the crooked You show Yourself astute.

God isn't someone who has a physical body, or presence.  He can't been seen by someone.  You can't physically hang out with Him, to learn what He's like.  You only learn about Him based upon your own actions.  Therefore, those who are upright and holy will see Him respond to their actions with matching holiness.

But those who do wrong won't see Him doing wrong.  That would be impossible.  Instead, they find someone who can see straight through their deceptions.  He brushes aside their best fakery, blows past their tricks, and nudges aside their masks to reveal the truth.  In Him, there is no deception, and no one can deceive Him.

Psalm 17

Psalm 17:6

I have called upon You, for You will answer me, O God;
Incline your ear to me, hear my speech.

Everyone talks about prayer, even many nonbelievers.  Prayer is seen as a means of communicating with the supernatural.  For most, that communication is one-way, merely sending one's thoughts out.  Maybe someone listens, maybe not.  For believers, there is the guarantee that someone is listening.

However, I have to admit, that I've always struggled with the answer part.  You hear about the people who got a direct answer back from God, and "audible voice" types of things.  I can only point to one time that happened with me, maybe.  You hear about the physical answers to prayer, and those I can deal with better.  But the idea that prayer is a conversation, that's never sat well with me.  I can point to times where I was forming a thought or question or doubt in my head, and an answer immediately popped in, but I don't know if that's the Spirit responding, or just my ADD-full brain racing ahead.  It's certainly never been any sort of conversation, of more than a couple words.

Psalm 16

Psalm 16:2

I said of the LORD, "You are my Lord;
I have no good besides You."

We are fallen creatures.  As such, everything we do is flawed.  Even when we set out with the best intentions, and do everything right that we're able, it's still never enough.  The weight pushing down upon the bad side of the scale cannot be countered fast enough.

Therefore, our only hope is to surrender to God.  He has the ability to remove the scales.  Not to just counter the balance, but to make it meaningless.  Only through faith in Christ can we be made acceptable in His sight, and be able to really do God's will and serve Him.

Psalm 15

Psalm 15:4

In whose eyes a reprobate is despised,
But who honors those who fear the LORD;
He swears to his own hurt and does not change;

David is describing the kind of person who God finds acceptable.  I had to look up the definition of "reprobate," to make sure I understood this right.  Basically, it means an disreputable person, someone with no principles.  So in essence, someone who finds the unethical opportunist despicable is someone who might find God's favor.

Rather than liking the unprincipled person, someone who honors God is instead preferred.  Someone who will make a promise, and keep it, even if it will cost him.  Someone who will take the hit, because his word is really his bond.  However, today even these people are not guaranteed acceptance by God, since it is only by Christ's blood that we are redeemed.

Psalms 14

Psalms 14:3

They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt;
There is no one who does good, not even one.

I'm not quite sure if David was intending to refer to the entire human race.  However, if he was, he certainly got it right.  We are a fallen people, and because of that, all our actions are corrupted.  Even when we try to do "good things," they are tainted by our sinful nature.  We all have chosen, to some extent or another, to turn aside from God's path.

However, we now have an advantage that David lacked.  Since Jesus came, we now have the means to be deemed "good" by God again.  We are still imperfect people, but through Jesus' salvation and the Spirit's guidance, we can at least be going in the right direction again.

Psalm 13

Psalm 13:1

How long, O LORD?  Will you forget me forever?
How long will You hide Your face from me?

How often do we feel like God has ignored us?  We're told by many that God will always bless the believer, and if he isn't, it's because we've done something very wrong.  We're told that a Christian's life runs smoothly, and any bumps must be our faults.  Even Jesus' disciples believed this to be the case, given their reaction to the blind beggar.

However, this feeling is a lie to discourage us.  God will not remove all the bumps from our roads.  In fact, He will place some of them there to help improve us.  Troubles along the way do not mean we've done something wrong.  Jesus himself felt this way on the cross, when he obviously hadn't done anything wrong.  Just because we can't see God's face, doesn't mean He's turned it away from us.

Psalm 12

Psalm 12:6

The words of the LORD are pure words;
As silver tried in a furnace on the earth, refined seven times.

Imagine a bunch of silver ore, dropped into the pot and heated to several hundred degrees.  As it turns liquid, the different metals begin to separate, some floating to the top.  Silver is heavier, so the non-silver floats up, and is carefully removed.  When there is nothing left to see, the silver is poured out.  But the smith decides that's not good enough, and sends it through again.  Some additional dross eventually surfaces, and the purer silver is poured out.  Still he's not satisfied.  He sends it through seven times, until not a trace of impurity can be found.

This is what God's words are like. His pronouncements and instructions do not have the slightest impurity in them.  They are completely correct, without shade of any hint of imperfection.  This is the God we server, one who has absolutely no fault.

Psalm 11

Psalm 11:5

The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked,
And the one who loves violence his soul hates.

God tests everyone.  That would mean that all who are wicked, and all who are righteous, get tested.  But we don't all get tested the same way.  God knows where each of us needs improvement the most, and how to test us to bring that improvement about, if we so choose.  For some, that test may involve violence.

That violence can change people.  Some it causes to retreat, to make themselves less likely to be subject, or even around, violence again.  Some accept what has happened, and continue on.  Some become champions of anti-violence campaigns, trying to rid the world of what did them harm. But some learn to like the violence, to seek to do it more because it brings them power, or pleasure, or advancement.  Violence is at times a necessary tool, but it should never be sought.  I think these are the ones who God is opposed to in this passage.

Psalm 10

Psalm 10:11

He says to himself, "God has forgotten;
He has hidden His face; He will never see it."

The evildoer may or may not acknowledge God's existence.  If he does, he may or may not acknowledge God's power.  If he does, then he's denying God's omniscience.  He thinks that God is limited in some way, that He can't see the evil that's being done, or He'd surely do something.  Therefore, since He hasn't done something, it means He can't.

This is, of course, wrong.  He does see everything, and knows everything.  The fact that evil even exists is a sign of how much God loves us.  He is willing to let us do wrong, because the alternatives are to either destroy us, or to force us to do right.  If He destroyed us, we could no longer have any knowledge of Him.  If he forced us, we would no longer have the ability to choose to love Him.  So He lets us go on our way, even though it hurts Him.

Psalm 9

Psalm 9:12

For He who requires blood remembers them;
He does not forget the cry of the afflicted.

God pays attention to those who have been harmed.  He knows everything, and doesn't just ignore most of it to focus on the "big picture."  He sees every slight, every small wound, every unintentional hurt.  But He also sees every derision, every single insult, every "accidental" injury, as well as every obvious attack.  Nothing escapes His notice.

All these are sins, and there must be a price paid.  That price is blood.  If we have sinned, only our blood can cover that sin.  But we don't have enough blood to cover our sins, so we have to die.  Only by substituting the blood of something else, acceptable to God, can we cover our sins.  In this time, that blood was certain animals, sacrificed a certain way.  Today, Christ's blood covers all, for those who accept it and claim it.

Psalms 8

Psalms 8:4

What is man that You take thought of him,
And the son of man that You care for him?

David is awed by how great God is, and how much He towers over everything in creation.  In fact, compared to Him, mankind is nothing at all.  Yet God gives us attention, and is interested in our doings and well being.  He doesn't want us to suffer, or make mistakes.  And David is wondering why this is.

The answer, of course, is that God created mankind in the image of Himself.  He put qualities of Himself into us, and that makes us interesting to Him.  We have the capability to understand Him in ways that nothing else can, and to react to what He has done.  He cares for us because He made us most like Him of everything in all of His creation.

Psalm 7

Psalm 7:10

My shield is with God,
Who saves the upright in heart.

David is putting his trust in God.  He has come under attack, and must rely on God to come through the other side.  Elsewhere in the passage, he calls on God to be his judge and condemn the evil-doers.  But here, he relies on God to be his shield, his defense.

He believe God will defend him, that the shield will hold firm, because God knows the hearts of men.  He knows that David is faultless in this matter, and that the other person is doing evil.  No matter what appearances may be, God knows both men's hearts, and knows who is right.

Psalm 6

Psalm 6:4

Return, O LORD, rescue my soul;
Save me because of Your lovingkindness.

David is pleading for God to save him.  He seems to be in the midst of some long trial, and feels like he is losing.  He cries out to God, for Him to come to his rescue, for he has no other options.  He knows that he will not be able to persevere alone.

He also knows that God has no reason that He needs to save him.  He can only ask that God do it, for lack of a better term, out of the goodness of His heart.  He throws himself upon God's mercy, because he knows he is undeserving.  He cannot earn the right, or claim the privilege, of being saved.  So if God is going to rescue him, He will do it simply because because He chooses to.

Psalm 5

Psalm 5:11

But let all who take refuge in You be glad,
Let them ever sing for joy;
And may You shelter them,
That those who love Your name may exult in You.

Some people try to force their way to God.  They push and push, doing more and more.  But all that effort is for nothing, because God can't be forced.  However, we can hide with Him.  We can ask for sanctuary, and He will grant it.  No matter what happens outside, none of it can touch Him, and we are safe with Him.  For this reason, we should give Him our praise.

God gives us shelter from our (and His) enemies, and He does it for a reason.  He wants our worship.  Not in a vain way, where He needs it or wants something He doesn't deserve.  But He does deserve every bit of it.  He gives us everything, and we owe Him everything in return.

Psalm 4

Psalm 4:4

Tremble, and do not sin;
Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still.
     Selah.

In my previous post, I talked about how we should tremble, because God's power is able to do anything.  But we should worship Him, because of that power and how He does use it.  Here, we see the next thing we should do.  God has called us to do His work.  By sinning, we are saying that His work isn't right, when we know that's not true.  Therefore, if that power is working for His will, and we are doing something against that will, we should tremble, for suddenly God's power is not on our side anymore.

Personally, I find the second half of this verse to be troublesome.  I don't do well doing nothing.  If I'm doing nothing, my ADD kicks in, and my mind goes three directions at once, few of them ever good.  My darkest fantasies happen when I'm lying in bed, yet this is where we're called to meditate, presumably upon God and His will?  This is one that will take a lot of work for me.

Psalms 3

Psalms 3:5

I lay down and slept;
I awoke, for the LORD sustains me.

There's a very simple truth in this, that we overlook frequently.  First, there's the fact that we are able to sleep.  We don't simply go go go go go go, until we burn out and drop dead.  If we did that as babies, especially, we wouldn't last long enough to figure out how to control our limbs, much less anything else.  God has given us the possibility of rest, and we should avail ourselves of it when needed (and even wanted, occasionally).

Second, God allows us to wake again.  He could call any of us home at any time.  Any one of us could die in his sleep any night, with no warning.  But He doesn't do that.  Instead, he allows us to wake for a new day, to do His work.  I know I frequently don't think about what His work might be, and that's to my shame.

Psalms 2

Psalms 2:11

Worship the LORD with reverence
And rejoice with trembling.

At first glance, this seems like an odd set of statements to put together.  Of course one worships with reverence.  To most people, the two words could mean the same thing.  To worship is to give respect and praise, to acknowledge someone's superiority.  To revere is to acknowledge the importance or rarity of someone or something.  So, you can give respect to something important, or acknowledge the rarity of something as being superior.  Makes sense.

However, how does one rejoice with trembling?  To rejoice is to celebrate.  Rejoicing is what you do at a party or festival.  Why would someone tremble at a party?  Why shake when you're celebrating?  Because you understand that God has all power, and can do with it whatever he wishes.  He could wipe you from existence, if He wanted to.  But He won't, because all that power is on your side.  So you respect the power He has, but you also understand what it means.