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Warm sun risingSaturday, February 28, 2009
Psalm 86:11-12
I will praise you, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify your name forever.
David's heart, like mine, is divided. David wants that to change, and he credits God with the power to do it. God can make him a man who praises God in the midst of suffering. Only God can move him to give thanks when he's ill, starving or in danger. God can change David's perspective, turn his eyes so he sees himself the way God sees him. David wants to "fear" his name and glorify his name. Out of the dust David was born. Back to the dust he will go. He has no claim to his life. God has the only claim. Is there any other way to live? We seem to have found many other ways. Is there any better way to live? Now, that's a more important question. Can my life be any more based on truth? Paul wrote, "Think about what is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy." He wrote, "In everything, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." All my sorrows dwindle down when I put these first things first. All my trials will soon be over, and then comes the next sunrise. In the African movie Tsotsi, a gangster boy asks the cripple he has robbed why he still wants to live. "Because I like to feel the warm sun on my back," the old man says. The boy looks at him in wonder. Or maybe ridicule, I don't know. But I loved what he said. That old man will always be giving thanks and praising God, who made the sun and who made his back, and who lets him feel the warm. Praise God, from whom all blessings flow, praise Him all creatures, here below. Praise him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. |
As he writes Psalm 86 David sometimes sounds like Eddie Haskell, the too-slick TV teenager on Leave It to Beaver, who always sounded like he was bribing the grownups with his praise so he could get what he wanted.