February 9, 2017: Day 40 – Psalm 40

This psalm is legitimately a psalm of thanksgiving through and through.  Except for maybe vs.11 where the psalmist asks God to make sure that he doesn’t withhold his grace and favor from him, and maybe even vs.12 where there is a descriptive statement on the evil that surrounds him, but everything is filled with thanksgiving.  The psalmist praises God for all those times in his life when he was in the miry pit and God drew him out.  I want to focus a bit on vs.3.

You notice that the psalmist is able to say that he has a new song because of what God has done for him.  The past is finished and gone and he has been blessed tremendously.  He wants to tell everyone what God has done for him.  This is a natural inclination for anyone who has been blessed by God.  You just don’t want to keep it to yourself.  But in the last part of this verse he states that many will see that God has done good things to him because of what he says and does, but he also says that many will fear.  

Keep this in mind.  How we act or react in our lives is not just an indication of our character, but it is also an indication of who God is in our lives.  If our lives don’t reflect the joy that we have in the Lord, then people will see that and mock God.  We do have a responsibility to ensure that our lives mirror the life of Jesus or else when we tell others about the love of God, well, it simply will not be believed.  Why should anyone believe us that God is good when we treat others in a way that no one should ever be treated?  Why should anyone want to hear the good news of Jesus Christ if we, the ones who follow him, ultimately turn our back on the world?  In the paraphrased words of Gandhi: I love Jesus, it is just Christians that I can’t stand.