When some choices are so many and so desirable...

Psalm 143

Which verse, that is.

So many of them in today’s short reading speak to the need of my heart as I awoke this morning.

I went to bed feeling like so many “things” and people that are important to me are fraying and tearing and coming apart. I awoke with my thoughts seeming to pick up where they left off.

“What is happening to me?! And my family and my church and my school and my mission? We are going down the tubes!”

Then I come to this Psalm and I hardly know which verses to latch onto for the various portions of my meditative and devotional exercises. And to narrow matters down to one verse for this blog seemed almost impossible. So, without further comment, here is my choice (followed by my other choices!).

“Hear my prayer, O LORD, give ear to my supplications: in thy faithfulness answer me, and in thy righteousness” (Psalm 143:1).

“For the enemy hath persecuted my soul; he hath smitten my life down to the ground; he hath made me to dwell in darkness, as those that have been long dead” (Psalm 143:3).

“Therefore is my spirit overwhelmed within me; my heart within me is desolate” (Psalm 143:4).

“I stretch forth my hands unto thee: my soul thirsteth after thee, as a thirsty land” (Psalm 143:6).

“Cause me to hear thy lovingkindness in the morning; for in thee do I trust: cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto thee” (Psalm 143:8).

[Teach me to do thy will...lead me into the land of uprightness (Psalm 143:10)]
from Psalm 143:10

A little bit more from Psalm 143: Deliverance and Refuge

Glory and honor in the right response

Some offenses and wrongs are difficult for me to turn loose.

Oh, I like to think I’ve forgiven. I like to think I’m big enough and strong enough and mature enough to get over it. But sometimes I allow those wrongs and offenses to stick around like the good friends they aren’t.

In Proverbs 20 I read this morning:

“It is an honour for a man to cease from strife: but every fool will be meddling” (3).

That reminded me of a verse I read yesterday:

“The discretion of a man deferreth his anger; and it is his glory to pass over a transgression” (Proverbs 19:11).

Without question, I need a greater supply of (or at least, a greater yielding to) God’s discretion. How else shall I be able to cease from strife and pass over a transgression while deferring my anger?

That is solely the Lord’s work.

“Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?” (Proverbs 20:9).

Not I!

“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10).

Yes!