Six times in seven verses the Psalmist uses that piercing
interrogative: WHY?
There aren’t many humans who don’t go there; many live there. We want to know why we must
suffer; the question suggests a tone of intimating God may be at fault for this
injustice…Me? ME? of all people,
ME? It’s like a raging child flinging
an I HATE YOU to the parent because he’s been sent to his
room. It’s odd, isn’t it, being banished
to a cheerfully-decorated suite with tech-toys, computer, personal phone, and
cable-loaded Smart-TV, and imagining you’re a victim of a Siberian death
sentence.
The redeeming turn of the writer’s tone is found in
both the first and last verses. Twice in
this Psalm we hear: I will put my
hope in God. In all Biblical-era
literature, and many modern genres, repetition means it’s important; it means pay
attention – THIS is BIG STUFF!
To put hope in something, or
someone, is to trust. Hoping in God is
the opposite of blaming God. It is
placing your full trust in His wisdom.
It is not a careless abandonment of your free will – rather, it is a
considered choice to lay down the defensive victim-claiming, in favor of
picking up holy hands to praise the One who created you…never doubting, even
when fearing, that you acknowledge He alone is the answer, because He alone, is
truly your redemption.
There are two ways (at least) to read this
Psalm.
·
The first is the
blame game, with that tone that says:
“God, what are you
thinking with all this YOU are letting happen to me?”
·
The second way is with
the explanatory interrogative:
“Father God, some
people are asking why I suffer, and I want them all to know, I’m placing every egg
I’ve got, my whole future, in Your basket, God, no matter what may come.”
For You Today
It’s easy to go for the woe, despair, and agony on me choice #1 of blaming God.
Being a victim is so easy and acceptable in today’s culture. Make your pain sound grotesque enough, and
you’ll get a settlement in somebody’s court.
For a believer, that’s nonsense. We
are not victims, no matter what the world may label us, do to us, or what any
of the world’s big shots say about us.
We are, as Paul declared more than conquerors, held securely in the love and favor of the Father’s hands.[1] We are never abandoned!
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:
Afraid to Die and An Okra Kind of Christmas
Images: Title Pixabay.com Images without citation are either personal
property of the author, or in public domain.
Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
[1] See Romans 8:35-39
