Wednesday, October 7, 2015

Year 5, Day 280: Psalm 143

Theological Commentary: Click Here


Discipleship Focus: Father

  • Father: This is the pinnacle of the Covenant Triangle.  God is the Father.  He is the creator.  He is love.  Our relationship with the Father is rooted in His love for us.  We get our identity through Him.  When the Father is in our life, obedience becomes clear.

When I read through Psalm 143, what I hear is a man crying out for relationship with God.  We can see this by looking at the many elements of the psalm, putting them together in a collective whole, and then seeing where it all leads.

We begin in a cry for help and a humble admission.  I believe that this is a great combination through which we can approach God.  It is good for us to understand our need for God as we enter into relationship with Him.  Furthermore, I think it just naturally makes sense that we do this humbly.  We cannot stand righteously before God without His help.

As we go into the middle of the psalm we begin to hear about the psalmist’s reflection upon his relationship with God.  The psalmist thirsts for the presence of God.  The psalmist stretches out to God like a child reaching out for a parent.  The psalmist remembers the past times in which God was present in his life.  The middle of this psalm is all about how much better life is with the presence of God in its midst.

As we get to the end of the psalm, we hear the familiar theme of protection.  This is one of the things that God does best.  He saves us from the evil in this world in a very literal sense.  But He also saves us from death in a very spiritual sense as well.  Our Father is a great protector and preserver of our life.

In the end, when we put all of this together we get a well-rounded perspective on the Father.  He is the one we humbly cry to help.  He is the one who does deliver protection to us.  He is the one who stands by us through thick and thin.  He is the one who celebrates with us and comforts us in our troubles.  This is what it means to have a spiritual Father.

<><

No comments:

Post a Comment