O Lord God of Heaven’s
Armies, hear my prayer. Listen, O God of
Jacob. (Interlude) O God, look with favor upon the king, our
shield! Show favor to the one you have
anointed. A single day in your courts is
better than a thousand anywhere else! I
would rather be a gatekeeper in the house of my God than live the good life in
the homes of the wicked. For the Lord God is our
sun and our shield. He gives us grace
and glory. The Lord will
withhold no good thing from those who do what is right. O Lord of
Heaven’s Armies, what joy for those who trust in you. Psalm 84:8-12
The enigmatic nature of God’s “plans” for my life, and
your life, and the lives of each person on earth, and all of God’s created universe,
have always intrigued me. The Psalmist
declares God withholds nothing “good” from those who do “right”. That brings to mind two questions….always:
#1. What does He mean by good?
#2.
What does He mean by right?
The second question is (for any theologically-minded
sort) a no-brainer; doing right is simply a matter of obedience to God’s leading; we
must obey, and not act like a jerk.
Right? Well…it’s at least
somewhat like that.
In the narrow focus of my life, and what I think, good comes down to stuff (a new Mustang, enough cash flow to
have someone else do my yard work, and, of course, peanut butter chocolate-chip
cookies, surrounded by Rocky Road ice cream); these are good things…I’ll take a second portion, please.
The rub in “goodness” and “rightness” always comes when
I begin to define the boundaries in which God can move to supply what I think
is good, and how much of the “right” living qualifies me to rake it all
in.
Then, just as certainly as the sun will rise in the
morning, as soon as I begin to imagine all the good stuff I’m due, something terrible happens…a bill I hadn’t expected…a sickness that blows
my plans out of the water…dreaming about playing third base for the Yankees
(and then waking up to the reality that nobody in the eighth-decade of life has
ever played in the major-leagues).
All of this is quite understandable, because we’ve all
experienced some of it, to some degree.
So, how do we understand what’s good, and what’s right? Again, as
surely as I begin to answer that question, God is likely to highlight my
flaws. However, here’s (at least) a
working hypothesis:
Measuring right living is a
matter of how much of you that you’re willing to let go, in order to embrace
Him. It’s a matter of control; who
controls your life? Measuring good things is a
matter of the wider picture, determined by the answer to the first question
about right living. The synergy, or
interaction of living right by surrendering to the will of God, and receiving
good things, is in viewing all things that come your way as God’s good gifts by
faith. That means treasuring your life,
and all the so-called good, bad, or ugly, even if it doesn’t seem so, with the
understanding that God will sort it out in the long run according to His good
plans for your life. In short, measuring how right you
have to live to receive good things at
the hand of God, is a matter of NOT-measuring anything…it’s
a matter of letting go, and trusting God.
For You Today
So, the next time
that TV preacher tells you you’re gonna get a blessing if you send him $100 and
pray a certain prayer with your hand resting on the TV screen, remember what the
Psalmist said about bending your will towards God…then trust Him, and walk
confidently through whatever the day brings!
There
are about 2,000 devotional posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions library. To dig deeper on today’s topic, explore some
of these:
Lenten Walk - Part 13 and Cross Perspectives
[1] Images: Pixabay.com Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
