Psalm 34

The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their cry. 16The face of the Lord is against evildoers, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. 17When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears, and rescues them from all their troubles. 18The Lord is near to the broken-hearted, and saves the crushed in spirit.
19Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord rescues them from them all. 20He keeps all their bones; not one of them will be broken. 21Evil brings death to the wicked, and those who hate the righteous will be condemned. 22The Lord redeems the life of his servants; none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.
Lord,
Today I am grateful for the release of the journalists from North Korea. Your “rescue”, as promised by the Poet, is a remarkable thing to see. Of course it helps to have a former President, Vice President and First Lady who is now Secretary of State, involved. Regardless, I am grateful.

Lord, I pray that the poet’s vision is true, that the righteous will indeed be rescued and that Evil will be eradicated. I pray that those who do good and who are good will be blessed and those who do evil will be cut off from all of the resources that make evil possible.

I pray for your blessings. Grant me every grace for the living of my days. And bless those I love.

Lord, just when I am tempted to scream out against “hyper-optimism”, the poet injects a firm dose of reality into his hymn. “Many are the afflictions of the righteous”, he writes. The poet knows that the blessings of the righteous are sometimes delayed. Righteousness does not guarantee that the journey will be problem-free. “But the Lord rescues them from them all.”

As the poet sees it, or so it seems to me, we are not so much protected from difficulty and sometimes disaster as we are met in the midst of disaster by the rescuing and healing power of God. God meet us there, sees us through and sees us out.

Now for my personal experience Lord; sometimes the rescue comes on the other side. In death, we are made whole. In death, we experience eternal life in all of its fullness.

Here I confess my frustration and anger. Too many pandering preachers are promising more than you have promised to deliver. They seem to be promising inoculation against difficulty. “Say your prayers and send your money and you’ll never have another problem”, so they say. I am strongly tempted to use a scatological metaphor here but that would be a disservice to bulls. The truth is that cow manure has more nutritional value than the preaching of these false-prophets. Forgive me if I’m wrong – but I don’t think that I am.

PERSONAL PRAYERS:
Seek God’s blessing and, if needed, ask for God’s rescue as you wrestle with the problems that are afflicting you.
Name 5 things for which you are grateful and say “thank you” to God.
In Christ’s name,
Amen.