Tag: hard circumstances

Praise and Prayer (Psalm 86:11-17)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment

Teach me your way, Lord,
        so that I can walk in your truth.
    Make my heart focused
        only on honoring your name.
I give thanks to you, my Lord, my God,
    with all my heart,
    and I will glorify your name forever,
    because your faithful love toward me is awesome
    and because you’ve rescued my life
        from the lowest part of hell.

The arrogant rise up against me, God.
    A gang of violent people want me dead.
    They don’t give a thought for you.
But you, my Lord,
    are a God of compassion and mercy;
    you are very patient and full of faithful love.
Come back to me! Have mercy on me!
    Give your servant your strength;
    save this child of your servant!
Show me a sign of your goodness
    so that those who hate me will see it and be put to shame—
        show a sign that you, Lord,
        have helped me and comforted me. (Common English Bible)

Psalms are prayers. And today’s prayer is from David, a guy who knew what it was like to have evil men hate him and pursue taking his life, through no fault of his own. 

I don’t know about you, but, although I have never faced adversity to such a degree as David, I do know something about people who, to put it bluntly, just flat-out hate my guts. It is not a good feeling, and it can be terribly draining emotionally and even spiritually. 

Having disrespectful and rude people who talk behind your back (and sometimes even to your face) is in direct contrast to who God is.

Who is God? What is God’s character?

God is described by David as merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Whereas insolent people objectify others and do not seek their best interests, God always acts in accord with a basic divine character of love and grace. 

Based upon the nature of God, we can choose to cry out, just like David did, to show us a sign of God’s favor. We can pray for God to provide us with some tangible communication of divine love, given on our level, so that we can grasp and understand it.

For we all, at various points in our life, need help and comfort through hardship and adversity.

Be assured that God hears the cries of the godly. The Lord notices ungodliness and injustice, and will do something about it. 

At the same time we are receiving divine guidance and help, we can trust God to address the insolence that exists around us and toward us.

Why can we trust God? What is the basis of such faith?

Seven times in the psalm, David refers to Yahweh as my Lord. And three times David refers to himself as your servant. This is a relationship – Lord to servant, Creator to creature – and it means the servant can cry out to his Lord and can confidently expect a positive response to his cry.

It is the nature and character of God to be attentive and answer God’s people.

The Lord is merciful and gracious,
    slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

Psalm 103:8, NRSV

Because of the divine/human relationship, David can call boldly to God, confident of God’s will and of God’s power to help. The gang of violent people who had it out for David also have no regard for God. So, David is emboldened to pray for divine favor, while at the same time, praying against those that despise him.

Yahweh, the God of David, can deliver us from the lowest parts of hell itself, because God is the expert on deliverance from the worst places that humanity finds themselves in. And so, the Lord is the One who is worthy of praise. Eventually, this reality will ultimately be recognized by all nations.

“Great and amazing are your deeds,
    Lord God the Almighty!
Just and true are your ways,
    King of the nations!
Lord, who will not fear
    and glorify your name?
For you alone are holy.
    All nations will come
    and worship before you,
for your judgments have been revealed.” (Revelation 15:3-4, NRSV)

Praise and petition go together like a hand in a glove. David freely praises God with thanksgiving for the divine character and saving actions – while at the same time, he offers fervent prayer, based upon the understanding that God is good.

David’s impassioned petition is this: Teach me your way, Lord, so that I will walk in truth; and give me an undivided heart to keep on honoring and praising your name. David longed for a completely focused heart on God and God’s will for his life.

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5, NRSV)

In those times when we feel as if we are between a rock and a hard place, wanting to remain positive, yet also acknowledging life’s crud, we can come to Psalm 86 and adopt it as our own prayer for the day…

Train me, God, to walk straight;
    then I’ll follow your true path.
Put me together, one heart and mind;
    then, undivided, I’ll worship in joyful fear.
From the bottom of my heart I thank you, dear Lord;
    I’ve never kept secret what you’re up to.
You’ve always been great toward me—what love!
    You snatched me from the brink of disaster!
God, these bullies have reared their heads!
    A gang of thugs is after me—
    and they don’t care a thing about you.
But you, O God, are both tender and kind,
    not easily angered, immense in love,
    and you never, never quit.
So look me in the eye and show kindness,
    give your servant the strength to go on,
    save your dear, dear child!
Make a show of how much you love me
    so the bullies who hate me will stand there slack-jawed,
As you, God, gently and powerfully
    put me back on my feet. (The Message)

What Is Your View of God? (Psalm 86:1-10)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
God’s Love… by Hope G. Smith

Incline your ear, O Lord, and answer me,
    for I am poor and needy.
Preserve my life, for I am devoted to you;
    save your servant who trusts in you.
You are my God; be gracious to me, O Lord,
    for to you do I cry all day long.
Gladden the soul of your servant,
    for to you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.
For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving,
    abounding in steadfast love to all who call on you.
Give ear, O Lord, to my prayer;
    listen to my cry of supplication.
In the day of my trouble I call on you,
    for you will answer me.

There is none like you among the gods, O Lord,
    nor are there any works like yours.
All the nations you have made shall come
    and bow down before you, O Lord,
    and shall glorify your name.
For you are great and do wondrous things;
    you alone are God. (New Revised Standard Version)

What is your view of God? 

For some, God is up there, somewhere, like some white-bearded old guy who is aloof to what is going on down here – there is neither anything personal nor personable about him, at all. If he gets involved, at all, it’s just to get out his divine BB gun and shoot a few sinners in the backside.

For others, God is a force which binds all things together; God is there, but you’re never quite sure how to get in touch with him – it’s like a crap shoot trying to connect with God. So, you might do all sorts of things to get God’s attention, like be especially good – and if that doesn’t work, maybe you’ll go the other way and be especially bad, just to get any sort of attention.

For yet others, God is perpetually perturbed about something; he’s got a bee in his divine bonnet and it’s our job to figure out what he’s sullen and upset about all the time, that we might appease God in some way. So, you might double-down on being self-sacrificial, try not to swear in front of the Pastor, and help others so that God will, in turn, help you.

The psalmist David, however, sees God in a very different way than all the aforementioned. God is not aloof and distant, nor angry. Instead, David understands and views God as personal, knowable, and reachable.

What characterizes God?

Reading today’s psalm tells us a great deal of how David thought and felt about God. Notice what we learn about God from David’s description: good and forgiving; abounding in steadfast love; listens and answers; and, does great and wondrous things.

Now this is a God you can sink your teeth into. This God is attentive, engaged, and is anything but upset all the time – which is why David has no problem asking God to listen and answer his prayer.

David put his trust in God to save him and make his heart glad. With this kind of God, David can willingly affirm his devotion. With a God of steadfast love and support, the worshiping and praying person’s heart forever belongs to the Lord.

If your view of God cannot support and bear the weight of your life’s hardest circumstances, then you need a different view of God!

Rather than God being the problem, it could be that your understanding of God is off. And if your understanding of God is off, then it’s likely that your own understanding of yourself is skewed – which is why many persons who have darker views of God are down on themselves and possess little self-worth.

I invite you to see the God of David. This God has both the ability and the willingness to satisfy your life’s greatest needs.

What will you do with your view of God?

In humility and brokenness, we call out in our misery. God responds in steadfast love and abundant mercy. With God, we can move from trouble to confidence.

And sometimes, we discover that our troubles and our circumstances change very little. But we ourselves have changed a great deal. Our compulsions for solid answers to our questions give way to a settled confidence in divine mystery. And our obsessions with a pain-free and problem-free life are replaced with a curiosity for what the hard situations in our lives will teach us.

The poor and needy cry out to God, knowing that grace and mercy characterizes the Lord. Life on this earth may not treat us well, but God gives us much more than we deserve.

The faithful trust in the Lord, fully confident that their preservation and protection are in God’s hands – and not in political leaders or padded bank accounts.

The miserable pray, constantly persevering in prayer, because their hope is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. They have learned to pray expectantly, understanding that sometimes the greatest miracle of all is being delivered from the need to have a miracle.

Those who lift their faces to heaven, looking for the bright sunshine of grace, will know joy, down deep in their soul – and not simply a fleeting happiness from temporary reprieve of trouble.

The ones calling on the name of the Lord, banking their lives on God’s love, discover forgiveness and a good peaceful life of peace – rather than the anxiety of constantly worrying about tomorrow.

The spiritually devoted are confident that God will answer in their day of trouble – and they are patient, knowing full well that God’s sense of timing is much better than their own. So, they learn to hold all things loosely, knowing that God gives and God takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

All those taking the time and effort to find the God who is truly characterized by kindness and compassion know in their gut, without a shadow of a doubt, that there is no one like the Lord – a God who does wondrous things and is attentive to justice and righteousness.

What is your view of God? Listen closely to the psalmist, and he will tell you what the Lord has done for him because of God’s basic nature of love and goodness.

Great God of David, you are above all things and beside all things and with all things. You are uniquely positioned and powerful to walk with me through all the situations of my life. Thank you for sending the Son of David to make your promises real to me. Amen.

God of the Living (Ezekiel 39:7-8, 21-29)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment

I will make sure that my people Israel know my holy name, and I will not let my name be disgraced any more. Then the nations will know that I, the Lord, am the holy God of Israel.”

The Sovereign Lord said, “The day I spoke about is certain to come….

The Lord said, “I will let the nations see my glory and show them how I use my power to carry out my just decisions. The Israelites will know from then on that I am the Lord their God. And the nations will know that the Israelites went into exile because of the sins which they committed against me. I turned away from them and let their enemies defeat them and kill them in battle. I gave them what they deserved for their uncleanness and their wickedness, and I turned away from them.”

The Sovereign Lord said, “But now I will be merciful to Jacob’s descendants, the people of Israel, and make them prosperous again. I will protect my holy name. When they are once more living in safety in their own land, with no one to threaten them, they will be able to forget how they were disgraced for having betrayed me. In order to show to the many nations that I am holy, I will bring my people back from all the countries where their enemies live. Then my people will know that I am the Lord their God. They will know this, because I sent them into captivity and now gather them and bring them back into their own land, not leaving even one of them behind. I will pour out my spirit on the people of Israel and never again turn away from them. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken.” (Good News Translation)

“God is trying to sell you something, but you don’t want to buy. This is what your suffering is: Your fantastic haggling, your manic screaming over the price!”

Hafiz, 14th century Persian mystic poet

A lot of folks struggle with their relationship with God in trying to make sense of the hard things they go through. Some interpret their troubles as a punishment from God. Others resign themselves to the difficulty and, at best, believe there must be some purpose to it all; and, at worst, simply state in defeat, “It is what it is.”

God most certainly does allow some awful things to happen. Although the Lord is not the author of the evil, God providentially bends all circumstances for the divine glory and for our benefit.

We may still cry out and insist, “But why must God do it this way? Isn’t there another path than the one I’m on?” It’s not bad to ask those questions. After all, the Lord Jesus himself cried out, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup [of suffering] be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” And, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 26:39, 27:46, NIV)

In many ways, life is about detaching from all that hinders us from attaching to God. If we are mindful of this project, it’s likely we will realize a fulfilling connection with the divine. If, however, we lose sight of this, and become unaware of the vital relationship between God and humanity, then the Lord loves us enough to work on bringing us back into healthy relations.

It takes a lifetime of practice to let go and die to self.

And God will use every circumstance – both good and bad – to help us do that.

The Lord is glorified and shown forth as holy when we detach from all that is unhealthy and attach to everything that is just, right, and good.

God’s own Holy Spirit is the very person we need to guide us through each situation of our lives.

Typically, it is we ourselves who need to change, and not necessarily our circumstances. Yet, we too often fear change. The ego – the false self – hates change because it has bought into the belief that the outward projection of oneself to the world is the real thing (which it is not). Therefore, the ego tends to interpret each negative situation as an attack, rather than discerning that this might be the Lord getting at the inner heart of the person.

We must come to grips with the reality that one must change in order to love, and to love in order to change. Anytime we love someone or something else, we have died on some level; we let go of something so that we can grab hold of something else. The monkey who refuses to let go of the banana is trapped; the one who releases it grabs hold of freedom.

“Sin” is much less about moralistic religion, and much more about mistaking ourselves for someone we aren’t and not knowing to whom we belong. The ancient Israelites, whom the prophet Ezekiel addressed, had lost touch with who they are and whose they are. So, the Lord was determined to clarify it for them.

The realization of our true selves comes through love. And since God is love, knowing God enables us to regain our true essence.

The ego, although the necessary scaffolding for the emerging construction of the soul, must eventually be jettisoned. It would be weird if you erected a building, then kept up the façade. God is alive and deals with the living, and not the dead things around us.

Jesus said, “He’s not the God of the dead but of the living. In God’s sight all people are living.” (Luke 20:38, GW)

O Holy One, we call to you and name you as eternal, ever-present, and boundless in love. Yet there are times, O God, when we fail to recognize you in the dailyness of our lives. Sometimes shame clenches tightly around our hearts, and we hide our true feelings. Sometimes fear makes us small, and we miss the chance to speak from our strength. Sometimes doubt invades our hopefulness, and we degrade our own wisdom.

Holy God, in the daily round from sunrise to sunset, remind us again of your holy presence hovering near us and in us. Free us from shame and self-doubt. Help us to see you in the moment-by-moment possibilities to live honestly, to act courageously, and to speak wisdom. Amen.

A (Needed) Perspective on the Christian Life (Acts 27:39-44)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
Paul’s Shipwreck, by Ludolf Backhuysen (1630–1708)

When daylight came, they did not recognize the land, but they saw a bay with a sandy beach, where they decided to run the ship aground if they could. Cutting loose the anchors, they left them in the sea and at the same time untied the ropes that held the rudders. Then they hoisted the foresail to the wind and made for the beach. But the ship struck a sandbar and ran aground. The bow stuck fast and would not move, and the stern was broken to pieces by the pounding of the surf.

The soldiers planned to kill the prisoners to prevent any of them from swimming away and escaping. But the centurion wanted to spare Paul’s life and kept them from carrying out their plan. He ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and get to land. The rest were to get there on planks or on other pieces of the ship. In this way everyone reached land safely. (New International Version)

Saul was an up and rising star among the Jewish Pharisees. He was committed to his religion to the point of approving the death of the first Christian martyr, Stephen. Saul saw followers of Jesus as an aberration to Judaism, and did whatever he could to stamp out the sect.

During one of his travels to do just that, he was confronted by a vision of Christ himself, who said to Saul, “Why do you persecute me?” (Acts 9:4-5) For days Saul was blind, mimicking his spiritual blindness. Both his physical and spiritual eyesight were restored when he came to faith in Christ and began following the words and ways of Jesus. His name changed from Saul to Paul the Apostle.

Paul’s conversion was a complete transformation of life. Yet, this in no way meant that the rest of his life was all rainbows and butterflies. Just the opposite. Saul the Persecutor ended up becoming Paul the Persecuted One.

With the same drive and desire that he once had to do away with Christians altogether, so now the Apostle Paul put all that energy into proclaiming the good news of grace and forgiveness in Jesus Christ his Savior and Lord. And, as one might expect, this put Paul in the crosshairs of his former partners, the Jewish Pharisaical leadership. They now despised Paul.

The Jewish religious authorities hated Paul so much that they made sure to stir up trouble for him everywhere he went, even when it was way out in the Gentile sticks of Galatia and the Gentile strongholds of Greece. And that is essentially why Paul landed in prison. He was portrayed as a rebel and a troublemaker, an enemy of the social order (even though Paul himself was actually a citizen of Rome).

As a Roman citizen, Paul invoked his right to appeal to Caesar. And so, he was put on a Roman prison ship, bound from Palestine to Italy. And that is where we pick up today’s New Testament lesson.

Paul had been through an awful lot of adversity, hardship, and persecution. His faith had become so robust that a terrible storm and a shipwreck could not at all wreck his commitment to Christ. In fact, it only strengthened it.

It’s not always easy to see, but Paul’s words to the Roman Christians are true, even for us today:

And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.

The Apostle Paul (Romans 8:28, NLT)

This is an understanding of God, a deep theological perspective, which is informed by years of walking with Jesus in the crucible of suffering and difficulty. It discerns the Lord as caring and loving, even when it appears on the surface that God is mean and capricious.

Many Christians today tend to believe that the redemption which Christ secured is a mere life insurance policy for heaven. And, if it has anything to do with the here-and-now, it means we ought to have all our desires met for earthly peace and abundance. If that were true, both Jesus and Paul were miserable failures as godly people.

God, however, cares about our salvation, our wholeness and integrity as people on this earth. Yes, we have eternal life, yet that life has already begun, and we are to live into it now.

Christianity is a paradoxical faith. The way to gain your life is to lose it. The path to glory is through suffering.

This, my friends, means that we do not gain a good and blessed life by attempting to make everything in life go our way, without any difficulty. Instead, the good life comes by acknowledging the grit and grist of life. It is in the full acceptance of suffering, persecution, illness, death, and our own psychological infirmities that leads us into becoming who God wants us to be – and thus more open to what joy really is.

On the practical level, this means that our failures, our missed expectations, and our dashed hopes are very important pieces to our faith and it’s development. All of this is what awakens us to compassion – both for others and ourselves.

So then, Paul’s perspective on all the difficulties in his life is that they are significant spiritual incubators of faith for him. Paul accepted his sufferings and hardships – and more than that – he valued them for the ways they developed his faith in God and ability to minister to others.

As one old Rabbi once put it:

“There are many rooms in God’s castle. There is, however, one key that opens every room, and that key is a broken heart.”

Ba’al Shem Tov (1698-1760)

Sovereign God, let our love be genuine; help us to hate what is evil, and to hold on to what is good; and empower us to love one another with mutual affection. Strengthen our spirits so that we might serve our Lord Jesus. With you as our faith, we choose to rejoice in hope; be patient in affliction; and persevere in prayer, by means of your blessed Holy Spirit. Amen.