Thirsty

As the deer pants for streams of water,

so my soul pants for you, my God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When can I go and meet with God?

Psalm 42:1-2

Psalm 42 begins with an arresting description of the Psalmists longing for God. Imagine a deer that has been fleeing a predator. Imagine how thirsty it must get bounding with such speed through meadows and woodland, darting at the smallest sound, running for its life. If it could speak I imagine it would say "I'm dying of thirst!" It pants and longs for a cool drink of water. Have you ever been there? I know I have. Well, that feeling captures how the psalmist feels about God. His soul cries out, thirsty and desperate for his God. He feels as though he will die if he doesn't enter God's presence soon. 

I've been there before. I can remember actually being excited to go to bed at night because I couldn't wait to get up in the dark of the early morning hours to commune with God, to feel His presence, and to worship Him with no one else around. Yes, I've been there before, but it's been a while. Lately, it's been a struggle just to drag myself out of bed in the morning. Then I have to motivate myself to open God's Word instead of opening my phone. Maybe you can relate. 

If so, join me in praying and asking God to give us the longing, the spiritual thirst that Psalm 42 speaks of. Let the cry of your heart be "Lord, make me thirsty!" And let's commit together to get up early tomorrow and drink deeply from the well of Living Water. And may our souls be refreshed, and may we learn to long for Him above all the cheap imitations this world has to offer

God is Good to All

The Lord is good to all;

 he has compassion on all he has made.

Psalm 145:9

Sometimes people imagine that God is like the little boy sitting over the ant hill with his  magnifying glass grinning maniacally as he burns and tortures the little ants and watches them run helplessly for their lives. But this verse proves that that picture of God is a lie. 

It says that God is good to all and has compassion on all He has made. He isn’t just good to believers. He isn’t just good to the righteous. He is good to all people. And even beyond that. God isn’t just good to people. God shows His goodness and compassion to all His creation. Matthew Henry put it this way, “[God] is good to all…from the highest angel to the lowest worm.”* Or we might say down to the smallest ant.

Jesus speaks of this common grace of God in the New Testament when He says “God causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:45) What this verse teaches us is that God is so good that He’s good to everyone! He’s so full of goodness and compassion that they overflow out of Him in abundance and spill over into our lives. Every single one of us has been touched and blessed by the goodness of God.

Perhaps life has been particularly difficult for you lately. Perhaps it has even been difficult for a very long time. You may be tempted to think of God as that little boy over the anthill. You may be tempted to think He is torturing you for His own pleasure. But that isn’t who God is. No matter how hard life has been on you, I can say with confidence that God has been good to you. I can say with confidence that He has compassion for you, because that is who He is. He doesn’t show you compassion or love because you deserve it but simply because it is who He is.

*Henry, Matthew. Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged. (Hendrickson Publishers) 1991. p948.

Personal Praise

I will exalt you, my God the King;

I will praise your name for ever and ever.

Psalm 145:1

David begins his song by saying, “I will exalt you my God.” For David praise is personal and possessive. Literally, David uses the possessive pronoun “my” to refer to God. He says "He’s my God." God was a treasured possession to David and He ought to be a treasured possession for you as well.

This is a helpful reminder that God isn’t just the God of the universe. He isn’t just the Creator God that lives far off in the heavens somewhere. No, if you choose to follow Him, if you call yourself a Christian, then God, in Christ Jesus, is your personal God. David calls Him, "my God" and you would do well to do the same.

Next David calls God the King. He says, “I will exalt you, my God the King.” The great preacher Charles Spurgeon comments on this verse saying, “David as God’s king adores God as his king.”*  This is the king of Israel, the greatest king in Israel’s history up to this point, willingly acknowledging that there is a greater king whom he must obey.

No matter how high you climb in life, no matter how much authority you wield, there is always someone greater, God, the King of Kings, before whom you must bow. We live in a time in which the church thinks about God and relates to God predominantly as a friend. And it is true that in Jesus God has drawn near to believers and become our friend, but it’s also true that He is still the great king. He is not to be dismissed or disrespected. He is to be obeyed! God must be “the King” in your life.

In just eight words David has established that God is his personal God (He is beloved and treasured and to be worshipped) and that God is his King (He is his authority who is to be obeyed). And now in light of these truths He promises to priase God's name forever and ever. Let us do the same!

*Spurgeon, Charles Haddon. The Treasury of David: Volume 3. (Hendrickson Publishers) p375.

Grass Season (W.o.W. Rewind)

It's lawn mowing season again. It's time for Dads everywhere to bust out their short shorts, dark socks, and white tennis shoes. It's time to do manly stuff in the yard while simultaneously showing the world that our pasty legs haven't seen the sun since last summer. There are a few things we can be certain of this time of year. 1) Our daughters will be mortified by our lack of fashion sense. 2) Our allergies will flare up mercilessly. 3) And the grass will grow endlessly. That means that this is a good time of year to consider what God's Word says about the wicked. Psalm 92:7 says, "Though the wicked sprout like grass and all evildoers flourish, they are doomed to destruction forever." It often appears that those who disobey God's commands are winning in the game of life. Their popularity, fame and riches increase and we're tempted to envy them. But we must remember that they are like the grass which is easily scorched in the heat of the summer. In ancient Palestine dry grass was even used as fuel for fires due to lack of firewood (ESV Footnote on Luke 12:28). So what Jesus says is true. The grass that is alive in the field today is thrown into the oven tomorrow (Luke 12:28). The psalmist uses this image to remind us that God's has already pronounced judgment on the wicked. Though they shoot up quickly, like the grass they will be mowed down in their prime.

Compare this fate of the wicked to what the psalmist has to say about the righteous. Psalm 92:12-14 says, "The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green." The palm tree that the psalmist compares the righteous person to is probably the date palm which has a long life and produces fruit (ESV Footnote on Psalm 92:12-15). These are two things that grass does not do. But why does the psalmist compare the righteous to a cedar of Lebanon? Cedars of Lebanon were widely considered to be the best trees in the world for use in building.

Though the selection of these trees may seem insignificant to you, they allow the psalmist to add a beautiful layer of double meaning for his original readers. I believe this psalm may have been written at a time when Solomon's temple was still standing because the author is drawing on images from that temple. The psalmist speaks of the righteous being "planted in the house of the LORD" and "flourishing in the courts of our God." According to I Kings 5 and 6, both of these trees played a key role in Solomon's temple. The temple itself was constructed out of cedars of Lebanon overlaid with gold while the inside of the temple was covered with carvings of palm trees. The psalmist's ultimate point is that the righteous will enter God's presence, but he uses a powerful image to make that point. In essence, he says the righteous are like the cedars used to make God's house, they are like the palm trees engraved on the walls of the temple. In Heaven they will get to spend every day in God's presence, watching what He is doing. What a beautiful image! How much better is the end of the righteous man than that of the wicked!

So when your progress in this life seems slow, when it appears that the wicked are passing you by, and when you are tempted toward despair or envy- remember the grass. Remember what the wicked man's end will be. They will be cast out of God's presence into outer darkness (Matthew 22:13). And remember the end of the righteous, dwelling in the midst of God's glorious presence forever. May this motivate us all to persevere in the way we should go.