Year 2, Day 189: Psalm 43

Psalm 43

This psalm begins with a psalmist in a dark place.  The psalmist is feeling a bit of persecution.  He is feeling like he is the victim of deceit and unjustness.  He is feeling like he needs to come to the Lord and place his case before God.

This is actually a really good response.  We will all feel persecution at some point.  Whether it is from deceit, greed, anger, or just flat-out evil – we will all feel persecution.  If it is going to happen, we need to prepare ourselves so that we can respond to this reality appropriately.  That is what is so good about this psalm.  The psalmist is facing difficulty and he turns to the Lord.

This is a fairly good spiritual discipline to talk about today.  We cannot always control the things that come in and influence our life.  However, we can certainly control the way we respond to the things that do come into our life.  We are responsible for our reactions.

How can we react?  Well, almost all of us have the immediate response.  This is the fight vs. flight response.  Unfortunately, in most human beings the “fight” side of that equation is strong so long as actual physical harm isn’t present.  We are quick to argue.  Our tongue is one of our sharpest weapons are we are unafraid to use it!  We are quick to respond in the same manner as we are being treated.  We often act in a “do as you’ve been done unto” manner instead of a “do as you would have others do unto you” manner.

The problem with this reality is that most of us don’t have the world’s best immediate reactions.  Most of us spend a fair amount of time apologizing for our knee-jerk reactions {Or if we don’t apologize, we should!}.  The pattern of behavior that the psalmist is giving to us is far superior.  The psalmist turns to God and focuses on God.

Look at the place that the psalmist finds himself by the end of the psalm.  “Send out you light and truth and let them lead me.”  “Let them bring me to Your holy hill.”  “Hope in God; for I shall again praise Him, my salvation and my God.”  Do you hear the change in the psalmist?

The psalmist begins focused on his trouble.  Then He begins to realize that he’s not in a healthy place.  He confesses that he needs to be led back to God by God’s truth.  As the meditations of his thoughts are focused back upon God, he remembers that his hope and salvation are in God, not in his own ability to solve his own problems.

Now, that’s a really healthy reaction.  There’s absolutely nothing knee-jerk about that reaction.  The psalmist turns to God and focuses upon God instead of responding to his troubles in a less-than-profitable reaction.  The psalmist allows perspective and patience to color his thoughts instead of pure human reaction.

As I said in the beginning, all of us will know the place of persecution.  We’ll all have people coming before us to try and tear us down.  What we can control is our reaction.  But in order to react well, we’re going to need to prepare and make ourselves ready.  We need examples like this psalm in our life.

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