April 5, 2014
There's something magical about being awake when all the world is asleep - and being asleep when all the world is awake. Saturday morning and the only things up and singing are the birds it seems. I'd love to sleep in - but somehow seems good to get up and imagine Jason waking up in the cabin with the cool spring air fresh all around him - Ready for a whole day of outside play. Brings back a lot of memories of church camp - High Sierra - camping trips with the family. I miss it - maybe we'll have to go this summer.
Psalm 118
This Psalm is making me think of -------- this morning - How your steadfast love endures forever - about how the author is crying out that he is beset on every side, and yet giving thanks in the midst of that.
"I thank you that you have answered me
and have become my salvation.
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone."
Different in this Psalm from many other Psalms is the statement that You "have become my salvation" - not that You already were or will bring salvation - but that You have become.
I like that it gives that idea of a progression that has both been completed and is ongoing. Sometimes we start with something else as our salvation - or try - and realize the failure in that - then coming to You we find true salvation. And it isn't just at the beginning, but throughout our lives I think that we end up turning to you for salvation - and finding that You are always becoming our salvation:
"It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in man.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in princes."
Father - I thank you that it is a process and that you are both faithful and persistent in that process:
"The steadfast love of the Lord endures forever -
The steadfast love of the Lord endures forever -
The steadfast love of the Lord endures forever."
Engrave that upon our hearts Lord - bring it to remembrance often - that we would cling to that with all our life - especially when we feel besieged spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally.
Lord I thank you that belief in You is a relationship that grows and develops - that it doesn't just happen overnight -
That You ARE our salvation -
and that you have become our salvation -
and that you will bring salvation.
Father I pray for --------- today - that You would become her salvation - that she would be set free:
v. 5 "Out of my distress I called on the Lord;
the Lord answered and set me free.
v. 6 The Lord is on my side; I will not fear.
What can man do to me?
v. 13 I was pushed hard, so that I was falling,
but the Lord helped me."
Father, thank you for your goodness and love. For the sweetness and the serenity of your salvation and that You have become my salvation. I pray that salvation would gently invade the lives of the people I love - that it would rescue them out of anxiety, out of distress, out from the Enemy, out of enslavement and oppression - and set them free - embolden them. Strengthen them. Support them. Love them - so that even in the midst of hardship - even under attack - even besieged - they would find peace and security and freedom as You become their salvation:
v. 23 "This is the Lord's doing;
it is marvelous in our eyes.
v. 24 This is the day that the Lord has made;
let us rejoice and be glad in it!
v. 2 Let Israel say,
"His steadfast love endures forever."
v.3 Let the house of Aaron say,
"His steadfast love endures forever."
v. 4 Let those who fear the Lord say,
"His steadfast love endures forever."
Amen Father - Amen and Amen.
"I thank you that you have answered me
and have become my salvation."
