Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Year 2, Day 199: Psalm 54

Psalm 54

Psalm 54 is a neat psalm to follow Psalm 53.  In this psalm we open with a genuine confession.  David needs to be saved.  He is in a position of desperately needing a way out of the pursuit of King Saul.

Where the pursuit comes from is irrelevant.  Are we not all in a place of needing salvation?  In Psalm 53 did we not see and hear that nobody is good?  Whether the persecution is external or from our own internal failings, are we not all in need of salvation?  Do we not all need God to hear our prayer?

The prevailing truth of the Bible is that God is able to help us.  Time and time again God is there to help and save His servants.  He saved Abraham and Lot.  He saved Jacob and his sons.  He saved the descendants of Abraham in Egypt.  He saved the Hebrew people in the time of the judges.  He saved David.  He saved Elijah and Elisha.  He saved Judah under the time of Josiah and even under Hezekiah.  When things got really rough under the Babylonians and Assyrians, He saved a remnant of faithful even there!  Certainly the list of Christian disciples that God has saved from the time of Christ to now is not exactly small either!  The Bible tells us that God is a God of salvation.  God loves His creation and He does save.

What a wonderful thought coming immediately after Psalm 53.  Nobody is good without God {Message of Psalm 53}.  God is a God who desires to save us in spite of our condition {Message of Psalm 54}.  Those messages go so perfectly well together.

God is indeed our helper.  He alone is the one who upholds our life.  He is the only one who can fairly judge and repay the evil ones for their ways in a righteous manner.

Of course, this realization should lead us right to where it leads David.  If God is the only genuine source of salvation to which we have access, does He not deserve our praise?  Should we not come to God with thanksgiving in our hearts?  Should we not desire to give God a freewill offering of our time, talents, and treasures and avail ourselves to the accomplishing of His will?  Of course we should.

As we saw with Psalm 53, all of this is rooted in our ability to put ourselves aside and understand our true nature.  We are in need of salvation; God saves.  We are in need of deliverance; God delivers.  We are in need of righteousness; God is righteous.

He deserves our praise and thanksgiving because of who we are and what He desires to do for us in spite of who we are.


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