April 1, 2023
Passage Read: Psalm 79-82
Meditation Verses: 81:10-14
Thought
It is interesting that in the previous psalm, the writer pleads with God to strengthen the king, then the people will follow the Lord, restore them, then they would worship Him. But in this psalm, the Lord says to the people that if they would but listen to Him, obey Him, then He would so quickly cause their enemies to bow down to them. It is because they haven't obeyed Him that He gave them over to their own stubborn hearts, which led them into the hands of their enemies. So which is it? Must God rescue us before we will obey Him or must we stop going astray and start walking in His ways for Him to turn and save us? It's almost like Psalm 81 is an answer to Psalm 80. God is offering us all the love and protection and blessing we can want, if we will but repent and believe in Him and obey His Word and walk in His ways. The reality is that if we are alive, even in our rebellion, then He has already lessened the consequences of our rebellion, He has already been merciful to us, so it is now our responsibility to respond in gratitude and obedience. It's our turn. We need to do what we promised, to walk in His ways, then we will see blessing like we've never seen before.
Application
The sad thing is that God's mercy to us in our sin and rebellion and "pretty good obedience" is still pretty good. So we don't realize how desperate our situation is, and we're not very inclined to change. We don't realize the danger we live in. And we have no concept of what good God can bring in response to real obedience. That is the danger of prosperity that God warned His people about all the way back in Deuteronomy 8. How frustrating it must be to God, who wants to pour out blessing on us, blessing we can't even imagine. But when we begin to enjoy it, our hearts grow cold toward Him and hot toward the blessings; we work all the harder, not to please the Lord, but to multiply the blessing by our own labor! And then we look around at unbelievers to see how they secured their blessing, and we emulate them! All the while forgetting that God was sending blessing because we started out humble and willing to obey Him, trust Him, love our neighbors and do good to each other. But when enough wealth and comfort came our way, we turned our energies toward preserving our wealth and comfort, expanding them, without thought for those around us, eventually even seeing those others as hindrances to our prosperity. We forget that the Lord gladly blesses those who trust, obey and worship Him alone and above all, and see their goods as means to blessing others; but those who live for gathering wealth for their own pleasures, building their own kingdoms may succeed for a while, even for a lifetime, but they will lose their own soul. If I will listen to the Lord, follow His ways, not worry about stuff but concern myself with my neighbors, who knows what kind of blessing He can bring my way. At least I should have no fear of enemies.