PSALM 73 KEEPING THINGS IN BALANCE

There are two kinds of meditation There is mindless meditation which is a mental oversight This is a mental relapse a failure in comprehension of true values

There’s mind-full meditation. This is a freeing and fulfilling musing of God’s Word

This is disciplining our thoughts and flooding our hearts with phrases of spiritual truth

When weighted down with wrinkles and worries. When bogged in with the fears and frustrations of the foolish of our cultures. The only thing that can liberate our hearts is Jesus healing truth and His perfect perspective.

FAULTY WRINKLE V.1-3

THE PRESENT STRUGGLE

FOUNDATIONAL PROPOSITION

OUR POSITIVE RESULTS

Truly God is good to Israel,

Truly, or, more correctly, ONLY, “God is good to Israel.”

He is all we have that is good,

Nothing else is good and better

He gives the best to all of His own,

Yes us, we are His special ones.

Jesus our God can’t act unjustly or unkindly to us; His goodness. to us is beyond dispute; His goodness to us is without lack.

OUR PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

even to such as are of a clean heart

Are we clean in the inward parts

Are we pure in the vital mainspring of action.

Are we sure of what we do know,

Are we molested by those mysterious storms which arise from things which we do not understand.

These cryptic enigmatic and inscrutable things,

Suddenly we’re wondering, are there certainties somewhere?

Our experience has placed some tangible facts within our grasp;

we have to cling to these.

We need prevention from being carried away by hurricanes of infidelity. These come from the wilderness wanderings. These are. like whirlwinds, and can lift the four corners of our house and threaten to overthrow it.

O my God, however perplexed we get, never let us blame and accuse You.

We don’t understand You, but let us never stop believing in you.

You’re good to us as You’ve made us good;

You’re good to us as You’ve renewed our heart

You’re good to us and You’ll never forsake us.

THE POTENTIAL STAGER V.2

DOUBT

But as for me, my feet were almost gone

Here begins the narrative of a great soul-battle, a spiritual Marathon, a hard and well-fought field of conflicts is being waged,

But here the half-defeated became in the end wholly victorious.

He contrasts Himself with his God who is ever good;

He admits his personal want of good,

He then also compares himself with the clean in heart,

He then goes on to confess his defilement.

The Lord is good to his people, “but as for me,” am I one of them?

Can I expect to share His grace? Yes, I do share it;

But I have acted an unworthy part,

I’m very unlike one who is truly pure in heart.

Errors of heart and head soon affect the conduct.

There is an intimate connection between the heart and the feet.

Asaph could barely stand,

His uprightness was drooping, drifting and then going,

His knees were bowing like a falling wall.

When we doubt the righteousness of God,

When we linger questioning that Our Lord Jesus does everything right

When we distrust the Spirit of Christ’s presence

When we’re uncertain of His purposes in us

Then our own integrity begins to waver and we shiver in fear

DISAPPOINTMENT

my steps had well nigh slipped

Asaph could make no progress in the good road,

His feet ran away from under him like those of a man on a sheet of ice.

He was weakened for all practical action,

He was in great danger of actual sin and of a disgraceful fall.

We have to plead to our Father to watch over our inner person, Our inner waverings and instabilities are fragile. This unnerving can have a forcible effect on our outer character and responses.

Help us Lord to confess our weakness in plain, explicit need.

Phillips shares how he was raised at the seas edge:

“There was a muddy tidal river which flowed through our home town.

When the tide was out vast mudbanks were exposed. As children we could get too close to them, and I can still feel the chill of sheer terror which gripped me as my foot slipped and I felt myself sliding toward a horrible death.…

Fortunately, my foot hit a protruding rock, and I was saved. I learned the wisdom of obedience the hard way.

“My steps had well nigh slipped.”

It is a good idea to think this problem through and then to stay away from the treacherous mudbanks the psalmist describes.”

Our steps had well nigh slipped

THE PREDICTABLE SUSPICION V.3

RESPECTING REJECTERS

For I was envious at the foolish

The foolish is the generic title of all Christ rejectors

The foolish are the ones who twist and muck up everything:

There are fools and there are leaders of fools who are perverted beyond all other fools. We corrupt ourselves in extreme ways when we envy fools.

Some read it, in place of fools “the proud”

These, by their ostentations and pretentiousness, invite envy

They plunge our mind out of gear spiritually,

This is a deadly viral infection with that wasting disease.

This is a pitiful thing for us who will inherit heaven to have to confess

“I was envious,”

But, it’s worse that we say,

“I was envious at the foolish.”

“I was envious at the proud.”

This acknowledgment is really what we can confess daily.

FULL OF WEALTH

when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

Our eye gets fixed too much on one thing;

We see their present

We forgot their future,

We see their outward display

We overlooked their soul’s discomfort.

Who envies the steers fat when he sees him in the slaughter house?

When we’re afflicted we’re jealous of the Christ rejectors temporary plenty.

As one has noted:

“We never know that we have a grip on Christ, Or that He has a grip on us, as well as when the devil is using all his forces to attract us from Jesus; then you feel the pull of Christ’s right hand”

Extreme afflictions shouldn’t be viewed as punishment, but extreme trials are our opportunity of extraordinary graces.

Archbishop Leighton writes

“God has many sharp-cutting instruments

Our Father has His rough files for the polishing of His jewels;

Those He specially loves, He make the most resplendent,

Those who are precious to Him He has often His tools upon”

“In a factory building there are wheels and gearings,

There are cranks and pulleys, beltings tight or slack–

Some are whirling swiftly, some are turning slowly,

Some are thrusting forward, some are pulling back;

Some are smooth and silent, some are rough and noisy,

Pounding, rattling, clanking, moving with a jerk;

In a wild confusion in a seeming chaos,

Lifting, pushing, driving but they do their work.

From the mightiest lever to the tiniest pinion,

All things move together for the purpose planned;

And behind the working is a mind controlling,

And a force directing, and a guiding hand.

So all things are working for the Lord’s beloved;

Some things might be hurtful if alone they stood;

Some might seem to hinder; some might draw us backward

But they work together and they work for good,

All the thwarted longings, all the stern denials,

All the contradictions, hard to understand.

And the force that holds them, speeds them and retards them,

Stops and starts and guides them–is our Father’s hand.

–Annie Johnson Flint