Psalm 66

On Sunday we read the first half of Psalm 66 together. I love the arc of this Psalm. It starts by praising God for his deeds, calling the whole earth to come and see what God has done for his people. Verse 5 (or 6, depending on your translation) is really beautiful—it ties together the division of waters to form land at creation (Gen. 1:9) with the parting of the Red Sea (Ex. 14) and Jordan River (Josh. 3). Look at all the ways that God has been faithful to his creation, and to his people!

But then, in the middle of the Psalm, the tone turns. Bless God, don’t stop praising him. Don’t stop, even though he has tested us. God had us in his net, but he never let our feet slip. He let our enemies run over us, but he also brought us through that trial into a place of plenty.

All of us will run into times when it feels like we’re in that net. Israel faced invasions, droughts, famines, and corrupt leadership. We face grief, loss, anxiety, disease, and a host of other pains. There’s a lot to be said for the ways that God can and does use these trials to refine us like silver, but I think in those moments the most important thing we can cling to is the truth the Psalmist cites at the end: “Blessed be God who has not refused my prayer, nor turned his mercy from me.” The God who made the ground you stand on will not let your feet slip, and he will not let the waters wash you away. Even if those trials wear you down—even if they expose your weakness and faults—God is not turning his mercy from you. He will not reject your prayer. 

Sometimes the abundance on the other side will feel impossibly far away, but we know the truth that the Old Testament saints could only glimpse: Jesus has already passed through the valley of the shadow of death for us, and he is with us in our trials. If that is true, then there is cause for joy even in the darkest place. The Psalmist’s testimony will be ours too—“Come here and listen, all you who fear God, and I will tell you what he has done for me!”

Justin

Song Spotlight

Over the last couple of years I’ve been fascinated by Jesus’ words on the cross: “it is finished” (Jn. 19:30) I’ve become convinced that this is meant to remind us of the end of creation in Gen. 2:2—“And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.” Jesus said these words at the end of the sixth day of the week, as the seventh was beginning. He spent the seventh day resting in the tomb. However, the work he did there wasn’t the old work of creation. It was re-creation! 

In short, Jesus was declaring that on the cross he had undone all the evil and brokenness that wracked creation since Adam and Eve first disobeyed God. The curse of sin that made the ground hard and thorny was undone in the man wearing a crown of thorns. The guilt and shame that made Adam and Eve hide was covered up by the man whose clothes had been taken away. Even death itself was conquered by the one who would rise from the dead, and who offers his resurrection life to us!

There are times when it is certainly appropriate to hear those words and respond somberly, as we do when we read the crucifixion story every Good Friday. But the Bible also tells us that Jesus went to the cross “for the joy that was set before him” (Heb. 12:2). If that is true, then it is also appropriate for us to respond with that same joy! The risen Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection, and in him and through him all will be made new!

We’re going to sing a song on Sunday called “It Was Finished upon That Cross” that does just that. It brings us into all of these themes I mentioned earlier—the curse is broken, we are clothed in Christ’s righteousness, death itself is conquered! We’ll sing and celebrate the words Jesus used to proclaim victory in the middle of the darkest hour.

I especially love this part in verse 3: “Death was once my great opponent / Fear once had a hold on me / But the Son who died to save us / Rose that we would be free indeed.” The victory is won—even though we still have to walk through the brokenness of this life, the end is already fixed. Eternity in God’s presence is given to us in Christ. That’s something to celebrate!

Justin

Scripture Reflections

Chapter 9 is the hinge at the center of Luke. Till now, Jesus has been ministering in Galilee, but a new movement—the movement toward the cross—begins in Luke 9:51. Luke 9 records the climatic moments that cluster around this shift towards Jerusalem and the cross, the final scenes of the Galilean ministry. Jesus sends out the twelve disciples to preach, feeds the 5000, predicts his own death, calls the disciples to follow him to the cross, is transfigured in glory, casts out a demon, predicts his death again, and calls his disciples to follow again! If Luke were a modern movie, Chapter 9 would be the “revelation and crisis scene” in the middle of the film that changes the course of the story.

Throughout this pivotal chapter, a question keeps arising: Who is this Jesus? Herod, the crowds, the disciples—everyone is curious, and there are lots of potential answers. If Luke 9 is the hinge at the center of the Gospel and if this is the question that keeps recurring, we should take notice! Who is this Jesus?

Of course, we know the answer: He is the Christ, the Messiah, God’s Anointed One. But our long familiarity with this answer can blind us to its significance. If Jesus is the Anointed One of God, do we treat him as such? Face-to-face with the Anointed One, we cannot be ambivalent! He is the one—there is only one—whom the Father appointed to be the head of all things; he is the one before whom everyone will one day bow in subjection.

It is easy to forget that the details of our lives are among the “all things” that are being made subject to the Messiah. Read I Cor. 15:20-28, Psalm 2, Phil. 2:5-11, or Psalm 110—all things are being made subject to God’s Anointed. Everything good is tribute for him and destined to serve him; everything evil will be destroyed by him. The moments of our lives are no different; they are meant to be an offering to the Anointed One of God.

Steven+