I waited patiently for the LORD;
he inclined to me and heard my cry.
He drew me up from the pit of destruction,
out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
making my steps secure.
He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear,
and put their trust in the LORD.
Psalms 40:1-3
I’m not sure but when I read that first verse I am reminded of how I believe the Lord works in my own life, according to how He built me and all my perks and quirks. It’s quite different from what the Psalmist describes, in the sense that it is when I actually stop intentionally waiting that I see things happen in my life, which would leave me in awe and wonder proclaiming how good and how great our God is. The good Lord knows I like surprises, and for the past decade, I could actually say that He has been consistent to His Word. He has been fulfilling His promises, but of course, all that I see and count as the blessings (‘blessings’ being instances that would have me claim that God reached out from the infinite to assist me according to His power and peace in the part of my existence in this finite world) have all been propelled by what I say is the Blessing of Blessings – that is, Jesus Christ and His finished work.
I don’t believe that our God is so monotone and so rudimentary that He gives us all a blanket perspective on His faithfulness. No, the way I see it is that no matter how we see our Heavenly Father work in our own personal lives, we can be sure that it is all rooted in the greatest divine intervention – again, this is Christ’s birth, death, resurrection and ascension, the ministry of reconciliation which in itself serves as a template for how we live and move in this life:
As we are blessed, so we bless.
As we have been loved, so we love.
As we have been given mercy, so we grant mercy.
As we have been overwhelmed, so we overwhelm… fully, and completely.
Oh, I’d like to stay there a little bit longer. We could take heart, and we would be energized, motivated and inspired by God – His miracles and all the demonstrations of His goodness and greatness would have faith arise in us, but another aspect of the Good News that we have received and now therefore celebrate is that in His infinite power and eternal peace, He intentionally listens to us, and not only does He hear us when we cry, but as it is written, He inclined to us – that is, the Creator of the Universe and all that is seen and unseen would intentionally engage with us, taking in every detail, listening to the words and intentionally paying attention to the nuances and everything that said in the unsaid.
The God we have has an everlasting love for us, Jeremiah writes. And today I’m just so amazed to take in the truth that this everlasting love is ever so personal, intimate and straight to the core.
Again, it is during these times, and during these realizations of the personal and customized love of God for us that we ought to remember just how Christ loved us. He loved Nicodemus, sitting down with him in the evening and listening to what he had to say, before responding with what we know as one of the greatest verses in the Bible. He loved Peter by way of being real with him, openly validating him when he got it, and lovingly rebuking him (well, it was pretty solid) when he crossed the line. He loved the money changers and the animal peddlers in the temple area – He must have known that these folk would not get His point if He merely sat down and spoke to them in an assembly, but just as He would lovingly rebuke Peter, He would also overturn the tables and whip people away… all because of His great love for them, which was willing to take any scorn and resentment that was sure to result from His actions.
If it’s not being pushed too hard, I just like to bring to remembrance for all of us today that the Lord does love us just as intimately – rejoicing with us in triumph, weeping with us in grief, rebuking us when that’s the best way to get to us – He loves us by way of the movement of His glory in all of creation, and through people within or away from His body. He loves us by way of being with us unto the ends of the earth, to the end of time and beyond, no matter what happens – and in whatever DOES happen, praise God! For we are so loved by God that He is faithful to cause all things that DO happen to work for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (that’s us, if that isn’t made clear).
Indeed, this is our great Savior, who not only endures with us, but in the fullness of time He would also fulfill His promise as shared to by the Psalmist. For by Christ and His finished work we have truly been picked up and raised from the pit of destruction, where I believe anything and everything we tried to put our hands and resources into were all ultimately brought to no use. By His resurrection Christ pulled us out of the miry bog, indeed, a swamp where nothing grows, and where everything is stuck until it dies. No, on the contrary, now that we are in Christ, His life is now therefore involved and in infused in all that happens to us, and all that we make happen. We don’t necessarily have prosperity the way we would define it but we certainly have something better – again, Christ’s life in all that we are. Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life in all aspects of our being.
Yes, instead of us being stuck in a rut, we are standing confidently on the Rock, who is Christ Himself. And not only do we stand, but by God we are able to walk, and with every step we take, we are secure.
It’s in these moments where I would remember that there are many of us who still do not have that – security. Indeed, one thing I would not want to end all of this with is that one of the greatest blessings I have as a result of Christ and His finished work is reconciliation, and one so absolute that I can be secure that my God is with me, no matter what.
And really, it must be said and acknowledged by way of the template I mentioned earlier –
As we have been made secure, so we secure others.
As we have been assured of God’s faithfulness, so we assure others of God’s faithfulness.
I think that’s a good place to stop… No doubt, there have been songs sung for what many would probably say are the ‘greater’ aspects of the God we have, but today, the song is of His faithfulness.
For it is His faithfulness that we can trust in, no matter how we see Him working in our lives. We can move forth and discover more about this world, and explore how we ourselves have been fearfully and wonderfully made – all because of God’s faithfulness towards us, guaranteed through Jesus Christ. Indeed, no matter how we see His blessings – the result of active patience, or out of nowhere as a hard-hitting surprise – all of it stems from the fact that He loves us, and is therefore faithful towards us.
Great is thy faithfulness
Great is thy faithfulness
I lift my eyes
I won’t forget, how great Your faithfulness…
JB's Personal Brain Defragmenter 
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