In the Meantime
This Morning’s Scripture Readings preview the vision of a grander, kore just, and blissful world in a time when the reign of God is unchallenged, and the vision of God is clear.
In the Meantime, we live in time and in space.
Psalm 20:1 — May the LORD answer you when you are in distress; may the name of the God of Jacob protect you.
In the spirit of blessing and benediction, we come to pray for a friend. Such a prayer blesses the giver, the receiver, and the heart of God. In this case, the intercessor is speaking to God on behalf of another but in doing so openly, is speaking also, to the other on behalf of God. It is a ministry of healing, grace, and love that encourages the head upon which the blessing is laid. It is priestly, and it is sacramental. Protection and deliverance come to the distressed often after the prayer of another. Who can you bless today?
Psalm 20:2 — May he send you help from the sanctuary and grant you support from Zion.
In ministry, the help that we offer does not come from us. It proceeds directly from the presence of God. Our encouraging presence is not a gift of our own resources, but of the Master who fashioned us and sent us forth equipped to serve. We offer support by “being there,” but that support is the Christ within us who comes alongside. He is the Spirit, the Paraclete who lifts the broken and heals the wounded. We can withhold such a blessing to our detriment and that of others, but we cannot manufacture it. Stop withholding.
Psalm 20:3 — May he remember all your sacrifices and accept your burnt offerings. Selah.
This verse, interpreted in the light of the New Covenant lifts up the cross in the presence of God and the person we desire to bless. It is not our sacrifice, but that with which we identify in Christ that makes an offering of our lives acceptable to God. We can have confidence in such a sacramental act as was wrought in the passion of the Lamb of God. Into the malaise of our frail attempts to appease God, He entered with the perfect offering for sin and made this prayer possible.
Psalm 20:4 — May he give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed.
As astounding as it may sound, God desires to give us our desires, but only after He has transformed those desires and brought them into sync with His own. He wants our plans to succeed, but inasmuch as His Spirit has planted those plans in our hearts. The progression of the blessing is the prerequisite experience of the blanket prayer. First there is distress, then divine deliverance and protection, followed by help, support, sacrifice, and offering. The transforming power of these events paves the way for success.
Psalm 20:5 — We will shout for joy when you are victorious and will lift up our banners in the name of our God. May the LORD grant all your requests.
There have been many along the way that have cheered you on to spiritual success and growth. The have applauded God at your salvation, baptism, and first steps in discipleship. They have encouraged you and embraced you along your pilgrimage. It is your turn to do this for another. You are called to be an encourager or a mentor or even a cheerleader. You have the capacity to invest your life and prayers in someone other than yourself and to take great joy in his or her progress. Don’t let the opportunity slip away.
Psalm 20:6 — Now I know that the LORD saves his anointed; he answers him from his holy heaven with the saving power of his right hand.
It is a serendipitous moment when we realize within ourselves that God does indeed save those upon whom His purposes rest. Jesus Christ is God’s anointed and all who are found in Him are heirs of God’s purposes, promises, and privileges. We suddenly discover that we can reinterpret every event in our lives in the newly discerned light of God’s eternal program in which we are included. Live each day in the light of His promises and in the confidence of your secure position in His eternal family.
Psalm 20:7 — Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.
The difference between God’s anointed and the self-appointed is a matter of trust. We don’t need more insight as Brennan Manning has noted in “Ruthless Trust,” but more trust. We need to recklessly abandon our lives to God with such radical displacement of self and fleshly confidence that we will sink, or swim based only upon God’s truth, love, and faithfulness. It is the call of the Christian to climb as far out on a limb with God as possible and then, to live there in an ever-deepening reliance upon Him and Him alone.
Psalm 20:8 — They are brought to their knees and fall, but we rise up and stand firm.
Those who trust in the weapons and schemes of man are ultimately frustrated in every human effort. Often, the contrast is most pronounced in times of crisis, grief, or hardship. The countenance of the worldly falls with the loss of position, strength, prosperity, or self-confidence. The godly, though battered, bruised, broken, and besieged, will rise up and stand firm. Grief and sorrow befall every soul, but “that soul who on Jesus hath leaned for repose …” God “… will never, no never desert to his foes.”
Psalm 20:9 — O LORD, save the king! Answer us when we call!
From the sanctuary of Israel rises up a song of prayer for the man who symbolized their security, well being, and success as a nation. God’s people had the impulse to pray for their nation and leaders in the days of the psalmist. They knew that no people and no potentate could stand apart from the awesome power of the King of the Universe. How seldom we pray for people in power, for decision makers, for the affairs of state and for people of note. How deeply they need our prayers.
Let us commit to pray for the leaders of our government at every level.
We do not always get what we want, but we usually get what we choose or deserve or default to.
We hold them accountable, and we pray for them.
The psalmist next describes a rule who trusts and seeks to honor God:
The king rejoices
Psalm 21
We need extraordinary strength for the struggle. We need encouragement. We need positive hope. We need to know that God has our backs.
These are difficult days and we cannot always count on our own strength.
Sometimes, those we count on for support may fail us or even actively oppose us.
Struggle accompanies victory and victory is seldom celebrated outside the context of conflict. The psalmist leads with joy and praise, but as we read further, we see that his gladness is in God’s help, vindication, and power in the presence of enemies without and within.
It is God’s strength that brings victory and God’s strength is sufficient to do so.
Awareness of the conflicts we face, lament, and despair must not displace hope and resolve. There are some struggles now and there are some struggles ahead. Hear the prayerful reflection of the psalmist as he considers God’s help.
Psalm 21:1 — O LORD, the king rejoices in your strength. How great is his joy in the victories you give!
The truest and noblest kind of joy is always rooted in who God is and what God does. Human victories are inconsequential. Heavenly victories are sources of great rejoicing because they are divine in origin, eternal in duration, and complete in their perfection. Jesus told the disciples to rejoice, not because the demons were subject to them, but because their names were written in the book of life. Rejoice today in the victories that God is working and, by faith, embrace them.
Psalm 21:2 — You have granted him the desire of his heart and have not withheld the request of his lips. Selah
God answers prayer. The words have been spoken so often that they constitute and cliché. However, they remain true in every sense. In the case of this king, the desires of his heart have come to fulfillment and the requests of his lips have been granted. To what extent is your heart moved by God that He can trust you with the desires that originate there? How God-directed are the prayers of your lips that each may be granted with confidence by God? As God to change your desires that you may be more effective at prayer.
Psalm 21:3 — You welcomed him with rich blessings and placed a crown of pure gold on his head.
God’s welcome is a magnificent gift. The king so often received official guests — many begging favors. But when he approached the throne of God, it was as a mere mortal. His testimony is as surprising as our own when we meet the generosity and goodness of God. He is amazed. God, the King of the universe, crowned him! God, the Supreme Master, blessed him! Never stop being astounded by the goodness of God and always give thanks..
Psalm 21:4 — He asked you for life, and you gave it to him — length of days, for ever and ever.
Life is that gift which God most freely gives. He has given it to every man and woman. Eternal life is a treasure that He offers in the same and greater abundance. And it is always just for the asking. Have you received life from God? If not, you are not yet truly alive. If so, you must live it out. It is too precious to take for granted.
Psalm 21:6 — Surely you have granted him eternal blessings and made him glad with the joy of your presence.
How about you? Have you taken stock of the enormous storehouse of eternal blessings you have received from the hand of God? Have you responded with joyful thanksgiving? As we approach month’s end, take time to be specifically thankful and lift up your joyful voice to God the Giver in whose presence you stand.
Psalm 21:7 — For the king trusts in the LORD; through the unfailing love of the Most High he will not be shaken.
Trust God. It is the source of life and joy. God’s unfailing love is our stability and confidence. Let not your heart be shaken whatever the circumstances of life. You are encompassed by the goodness and love of God.
Psalm 21:8 — Your hand will lay hold on all your enemies; your right hand will seize your foes.
Trust God to handle His enemies. Let Him fight His own battles and vindicate His own Name. Then let Him have yours as well. He is perfectly capable of handling His business and yours and emerging victorious from any battle. Trust Him!
Psalm 21:9 — At the time of your appearing you will make them like a fiery furnace. In his wrath the LORD will swallow them up, and his fire will consume them.
God’s anger consumes all that wars against His ways and His people. That anger is, essentially love and love is against all that is against love. Truth always swallows up lies. Truth makes untruth irrelevant and exalts only the God of truth. To be an enemy of God, one must embrace a lie so tightly and with such adhesion that one is swept away with it. God’s judgment is the process by which He sets all things aright and makes plain what has been distorted. His wrath is not an emotional outburst of a spoiled child, but the energy with which He speaks and restores His reign. We would be wise to pray for God’s judgment within us that we might be liberated
Psalm 21:10 — You will destroy their descendants from the earth, their posterity from mankind.
Lies perpetuate themselves. If we are looking at enemies as spiritual forces working inside and all around us, then we recognize that God’s enemies are our enemies — even if they are so intertwined with our personalities and character that we have come to identify them with who we are. Allow the Word of Truth to pry your soul away from the sin distortion that has erroneously redefined your humanity. Then, cheer as those falsehoods are destroyed and their power to reproduce is obliterated from the face of the earth. Pray to that end today — ruthlessly. This is about being made free!
Psalm 21:11 — Though they plot evil against you and devise wicked schemes, they cannot succeed;
If it were not so dead serious, the comedy of God’s enemies plotting and devising wicked schemes against Him would be overwhelming. We smugly decry the audacity and, without making the connection to ourselves, try to “pull the wool over” God’s eyes in our own secret sins. We cannot succeed. God knows all, sees all, anticipates all, and always has the last word. He is not shocked by our addictive and destructive behaviors, but He calls us to truth and reason. He enables us to see failure as the inevitable outcome of sin and His way as the only hope for real success. Get real!
Psalm 21:12 -… for you will make them turn their backs when you aim at them with drawn bow.
Sin cannot face truth. Test it. Darkness will turn away from the light. It always retreats. Liars are not prone to confront the evidence that discredits them. They run away. It does not require argument or eloquence to expose falsehood or to disarm God’s enemies and those enemies of our souls that are devouring us from within. It only requires truth. It is your best medicine in the war for healing from negative “self-image,” destructive thoughts, and corrosive behaviors. Take a dose of truth daily. Chase it with Living Water and be refreshed. Watch sin turn away in fear and defeat.
Psalm 21:13 — Be exalted, O LORD, in your strength; we will sing and praise your might.
If you can pray for the exaltation of God, then you are, at the very core of your being, a friend of God. The enemies within you do not constitute the real you. The sin residing in your soul is not your true nature. You desire the things of God at the very depths of who you are. Build upon that desire with the practice of praise. Do not allow Satan to torment you with insidious notions like, “You hypocrite! You don’t mean it — I saw you …bla, bla, bla…”
Resist those thoughts and praise God with all your might.
The Holy Spirit will activate your spirit and God will fight the enemies within you.
The king rejoices in your strength, O Lord.
When the glory in the canopy!
Isaiah 4:2–6
On that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land shall be the pride and glory of the survivors of Israel. Whoever is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy, everyone who has been recorded for life in Jerusalem, once the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and cleansed the bloodstains of Jerusalem from its midst by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning.
Then the Lord will create over the whole site of Mount Zion and over its places of assembly a cloud by day and smoke and the shining of a flaming fire by night.
Indeed over all the glory there will be a canopy. It will serve as a pavilion, a shade by day from the heat, and a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain.
Therefore encourage one another.
1 Thessalonians 4:13–18
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died. For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will by no means precede those who have died.
For the Lord himself, with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call and with the sound of God’s trumpet, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air; and so we will be with the Lord forever.
Therefore encourage one another with these words.
By your endurance
Luke 21:5–19
When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, he said, “As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”
They asked him, “Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is about to take place?”
And he said, “Beware that you are not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and, ‘The time is near!’ Do not go after them.”
“When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately.” Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.”
“But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. This will give you an opportunity to testify.”
So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance; for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. You will be hated by all because of my name. But not a hair of your head will perish.
By your endurance you will gain your souls.”
