Blessed is the one who considers the poor! In the day of trouble the Lord delivers him; the Lord protects him and keeps him alive; he is called blessed in the land; you do not give him up to the will of his enemies. The Lord sustains him on his sickbed; in his illness you restore him to full health. As for me, I said, "O Lord, be gracious to me; heal me, for I have sinned against you!" My enemies say of me in malice, "When will he die, and his name perish?" By this I know that you delight in me: my enemy will not shout in triumph over me. But you have upheld me because of my integrity, and set me in your presence forever. Psalm 41:1‭-‬5‭, ‬11‭-‬12 ESV ¶Psalm 41 is interesting, in that the first three verses describe what life is like in the kingdom, in Narnia, so to speak, where "everything sad comes untrue". Then, in verse 4, the psalmist, snapping into a moment of honesty, (beginning with "as for me...") compares that with what ...

After the death of Saul, when David had returned from striking down the Amalekites, David remained two days in Ziklag. And on the third day, behold, a man came from Saul's camp, with his clothes torn and dirt on his head. And when he came to David, he fell to the ground and paid homage. And the young man who told him said, "By chance I happened to be on Mount Gilboa, and there was Saul leaning on his spear, and behold, the chariots and the horsemen were close upon him. So I stood beside him and killed him, because I was sure that he could not live after he had fallen. And I took the crown that was on his head and the armlet that was on his arm, and I have brought them here to my Lord." Then David called one of the young men and said, "Go, execute him." And he struck him down so that he died. And David said to him, "Your blood be on your head, for your own mouth has testified against you, saying, 'I have killed the Lord's anointed.'...

and he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: "blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of god. "blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. "blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. "blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the son of man! rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets. luke 6:20‭-‬23 ESV ¶Our purpose is to live prophetically, to import the "not yet" into the "already", to transform future reward into current rejoicing, not just to speak of future fulfillment, but to live fulfilled lives. Jesus wants to influence our present perspective not only with the promise of future reward, but also with past example. God used the prophets of old not just through what they said, but through how they lived their lives, ho...

One of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table. And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment. And Jesus answering said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” And he answered, “Say it, Teacher.” “A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.” And he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” Luke 7:36‭-‬38‭, ‬40‭-‬41 Jesus redirects this conversatio...

"To what then shall I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like? They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, "'We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not weep.' For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, 'He has a demon.' The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, 'Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' Luke 7:31‭-‬34 ESV Jesus came with dance-tunes from heaven. John came with a dirge. The gospel is good news, but it emerges out of the weeping of the dirge.

I said, "I will guard my ways, that I may not sin with my tongue; I will guard my mouth with a muzzle, so long as the wicked are in my presence." I was mute and silent; I held my peace to no avail, and my distress grew worse. My heart became hot within me. As I mused, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue: "O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Psalm 39:1‭-‬4 ESV ¶When we are feeling muzzled, who you gonna call? In his distress, the psalmist is mute, but when he decides to speak, he surprises us. He speaks directly to God. He makes his case, not before man, but before God. Paul expresses this in the first letter he writes to the church at Corinth in 4:3 "I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed, I do not even judge myself. 4 My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me." In our times of distress and conflict, th...

And he said to the people of Israel, "Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, 'I brought up Israel out of Egypt, and I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all the kingdoms that were oppressing you.' But today you have rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses, and you have said to him, 'Set a king over us.' Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your thousands." 1 Samuel 10:18‭-‬19 ESV ¶The Lord Himself offered to be their ruler and their king. The rules He gave them were not just for worship, but for all of life, domestic and legal. The commands were of a whole cloth. His people were His, not just on the Sabbath, but every day. The chaos of the period of the Judges was like a bad marriage. Now God's people want a divorce. Commands would no longer issue from the Lord, but from the king. Saul, the very first king, would even try to take over the pri...

  Unto thee, O LORD, do I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in thee: Let me not be ashamed, let not mine enemies triumph over me. Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed: Let them be ashamed which transgress without cause. Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: According to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness' sake, O LORD. All the paths of the LORD are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies. Psalm 25:1‭-‬3‭, ‬7‭, ‬10 KJV ¶Shame can be a powerful motivator. It never occurs in isolation, but only in the context of a relationship with another whose opinion is valuable. Even to say "I don't care what anybody else thinks" is to seek their approval of your independence. Isolation does not provide relief from shame. It only buries it deeper. We can hide from shame, but ultimately we are just hiding from ourselves. We can expose our shame, with the hope that someone will grant us the acceptance we crave....

And Zechariah said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years." And the angel answered him, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time." Luke 1:18‭-‬20 ESV ¶Zechariah is the perfect representation of his people, the Jews, and of us. When given the great good news of the Savior, we snag up on the age-old epistemological question: How can I know this? What justifies us in believing this hopeful message? Rather than receiving it with joyful celebration, we tend to compare it with our current situation, and lose out on the hope being offered right in front of us. This is not how personal/cultural transformation occurs, and it is not the way of redemption. Why is the presenc...

Ascribe to the Lord, O heavenly beings, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness. Psalm 29:1‭-‬2 ESV The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits enthroned as king forever. May the Lord give strength to his people! May the Lord bless his people with peace! Psalm 29:10‭-‬11 ESV ¶Glory finds its source in God, so glory is not something we actually have in our possession to give to Him. What glory, what weight, what heaviness, what significance we do possess comes from Him. Giving glory to God does not involve rendering something to Him that He lacks, or even returning something back to Him that He gave us. Amazingly, though, when we with our words ascribe to Him glory, we do actually increase His glory. We glorify Him. He uses us to make Himself more famous among the nations, and among our neighbors. God's Word orders and interprets our world so that it makes sense. The stat...

And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. Luke 2:8‭-‬11 ESV ¶How often are people told that a child born into someone else's family has been born "unto them"? This is no usual birth. The angel's only imperative: to glorify God. All else is in the indicative. No angel commanded the shepherds to hasten to the place of His birth. The news alone was sufficient. What followed? They went. It was the natural response of a heart filled with the good news of the Savior. Even now, from His throne in the holy city, alongside the river of the water of life, through gates open t...