Psalms of Ascents – Psalm 128
Sep 07 in Steps of Ascent
Psalm 128 (part 1)
the UK government was working on a National Survey to measure happiness in the country and the ten factors that were most likely to cause it. The first verse of this Psalm gives us the answer: ‘Happy is every one that fears the Lord and walks in His ways’ … The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, as part of the Church we have lost the fear of God, we compartmentalize God and take segments of the Bible we like and dismiss others because it does not fit in with OUR ways and after all God is meant to be a God of love, so He is alright with it!
When I was growing up, I was told of all the things that as a Christian I could and could not do and so I slowly pushed down every boundary that did not fit in with my idea of what I was and wasn’t allowed to do … making me a ‘cool’ Christian. It wasn’t until I came face to face with God’s love for me that I suddenly realized what my sin had done to Him and how much it cost Him. I looked back on my life and was so utterly sorry, I could see that I had gone my own way and that much of what had happened to me was a consequence of me doing things my way.
God was a Father that had a perfect plan for my life and His purposes for me would fulfil my greatest heart desires. ‘For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them’. My relationship with God from that day changed, for it was no longer a sacrifice to live His way but it opened up a whole new world of ‘Godincidences’ where He was given access to intervene in my life and it was exciting, it was a life of new discoveries. I then no longer wanted to get it wrong for I didn’t want to miss out on any of His great plans for my life, I wanted to get it right and please His heart. It was a harder path but one that I relished, it far outweighed anything I had ever experienced before, I had God as a part of it and it was truly exciting and unpredictable and still is.
He is an Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Omniscient God that teaches us that sin always comes at a cost (and not only to us) not because He longs to punish us but because it spirals a course of events that are built into the very nature of the laws that govern the world we live in. Many people say; ‘If there is a God, why are there wars, death, disasters…?’ the answer is simple: ‘because sin has consequences’… like a stone that is thrown into a lake, it produces ripples that intensify and affect the area surrounding it. You tell your child to not play with matches, he might play with them and think that he got away with it, that its ok! but his younger brother might copy him and burn himself instead, or worse still set the house alight!…. so much that we fail to see because our vision is limited only to our surroundings and what we see. God sees the greater picture and it really is not ok!
‘Forgive them Father for they do not know what they do’ we really don’t! ‘There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to destruction’. We find that man sooner or later is at the root of everything that goes wrong in this world, thankfully He is a God who is in the business of redeeming!