Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:
21The praise of the LORD my mouth
will speak and all of flesh will bless the name of His holiness to ages and
always.
And so, as seems always the case, I come sadly to the end of
this Psalm. What a ride this has been! As I study, I leave each psalm, each
book and turn expectantly to the next Scripture portion, hoping the Lord will
teach me, change me, show me Himself in new lights. I’m of course never
disappointed and this Psalm has certainly been no exception.
Wow. What a God He is! What a Savior, King, Friend! As I
related earlier, I’ve never seen Him so close. This verse 21 is such a fitting
conclusion! What else can we say?
I want to come back to that thought, but, since this is my
blog, I want to record some personal experiences I’m having. I related earlier
that I have never seen Him so close. I’m suddenly keenly aware of the totality
of His presence, right here with me. It’s not just that He’s available to help
me, while He’s busy running the rest of the universe. He’s actually, totally
present here with me. He’s so great that in His infinity, He can be the
complete, personal God to every single living thing He has created, whether a
people or a sparrow or an amoeba – or me!
First of all, I observed that this amazing truth took a
sinister twist in my heart. Being suddenly so aware of His immediate presence,
I was also aware of all my prayers He’s not answering. Suddenly I am keenly
aware that I am here suffering, here I am with what I think are significant
questions, and, though He’s so present
with me, He isn’t answering my prayers to do anything about it! Suddenly, in my
heart there was a resentment I’ve never ever felt toward Him before. I’ve said
for years I’m thankful it hasn’t been hard for me to accept His love, to simply
trust Him – and there is no question in my mind that comes from having
wonderful parents who loved me and whom I could always trust completely. I’ve
known a lot of people for whom that wasn’t the case, and had to sit back and
watch them struggle with these very issues. For me, the Lord has always been
someone who was easy to love and trust. Then suddenly there is this resentment
toward Him and, though I know better, I couldn’t seem to shake it.
It made prayer difficult because suddenly I felt like, “What’s
the use? He’s right here and yet again and again not answering my prayers.” I
knew faith should conquer such ugly thoughts but it just didn’t seem to be
working. Then a couple of nights ago, I was talking to Him and told Him I
wished He could just be here and audibly answer my questions. Even as the words
left my mouth I realized that is exactly what Job kept saying, “O that the
Almighty might come down and I would question Him…” – and he had to put his
hand over his mouth and repent in dust and ashes! The Lord of course did come
down but what He said to Job was, “Who is this that darkens counsel without
knowledge? Brace yourself like a man, and I will question you!” I
definitely realized in that moment I needed Him to somehow help me.
Then as I was praying over my disappointments, it occurred
to me the reason why I was having a problem was because I don’t want my world
to be like this. In a sense, I’m trying to order my kingdom and He isn’t
cooperating. Once again, even as those thoughts formed in my mind, I am
realizing that is the problem – I think it’s my kingdom. Even as I think those thoughts, this is of course an
issue I’ve already settled in my heart – Jesus is Lord. He is the King. I want
Him to be King. I want Him to be my King. I want Him to rule over me. I don’t
want Him to give me “what I want.” I want Him to wisely, lovingly give me only
what He knows is best.
And in that split second, the resentment melted away and I’m
back to simply loving and trusting him. Whooosh. That was awful. That was a
very dark, ugly little corner of my heart!
Now, still, I’m having trouble adjusting to His very present
presence. Nothing negative – I just feel strange. It is strange to me to know
just how present He is, yet I can’t physically see Him, feel Him, or hear Him.
Hmmmm. It just feels strange to have Him so present and yet so silent. This is
all okay – it’s just some kind of transition for me. Probably back to my
parents, I long to actually see Him, to actually hear Him speak to me, to crawl
in His lap and snuggle with Him – yet there is just this big blank. It feels
like something is “missing,” but I don’t know what to do with it. Then again, I
do know – I just tell Him about it and wait to see what He will do.
Sure is fun!
My last thought I want to record comes back to this verse,
v.21, “My mouth shall speak the praise of the LORD; and let all flesh bless His
holy name for ever and ever.” This, I find, is the end conclusion of life with
Him – not asking or crying or wanting, but simply praising. It seems like, and
I think this is true of everyone, the longer I live, the more I know Him, the
more I find I just want to praise Him. It’s interesting this is where this psalm
ends and, in fact, we find that the entire book of Psalms ends with several
Psalms of just completely unbroken praise. We can’t necessarily say that the
order of the Psalms is itself inspired, and yet, if you take a big overview of
the book of Psalms, its order does seem to mirror human experience. The book
starts with a simple statement of faith that a good man “delights himself in
the law of the Lord,” then progresses through all sorts of Psalms mixing asking
and crying and praising to various degrees, with some expressing delight and
others deep darkness. Yet the book closes in Psalms of unbroken praise.
I would suggest this order is reflective of life itself and
ultimately even of eternity. The courts of Heaven ring with praise.
May our hearts and mouths and minds ring more and more with
the music of Heaven – unbroken praise for our wonderful God and Savior and
King!
No comments:
Post a Comment