Psalm 40:1-3 ESV
“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.”
We, as humans, will go through trials and tribulations. We
will face sickness, death of loved ones, natural (or unnatural) disasters, loss
of jobs, pandemics (or plandemics), leaders who are corrupt, loss of freedoms,
and changes in the way that we live which are out of our control, etc.
As believers in Jesus Christ, we are to call on our Lord
during these times, trusting our lives into his hands, believing in his sovereignty
over our lives, and praying for deliverance from or through our trials so that
our trials do not overtake us.
Sometimes the Lord will deliver us out of our trials, he
will heal our diseases, he will remove our suffering, and we will rejoice. Other
times the trials continue, but we learn to trust him in our trials, and we grow
to maturity in our walks of faith through those trials, and so we rejoice.
The important thing here, whether delivered from or through
our trials, is that we put our trust in the Lord, and we rest in him, and we
follow his lead, and that we don’t give way to fear. Then, we can have a song
of rejoicing whether still in the trial or away from it.
When we respond correctly to our trials with faith and not
fear, and we remain faithful to our Lord, despite our circumstances, it serves
also as a testimony to others to encourage them in their times of testing, and
to help increase their faith or to turn them to faith in Jesus Christ.
And that, too, is much cause for rejoicing that our trials
were not for naught but that they served not only to strengthen our own faith,
but to help others to put their trust in the Lord or to be strengthened in
their walks of faith.
Psalm 40:4-5 ESV
“Blessed is the man who makes
the LORD his trust,
who does not turn to the proud,
to those who go astray after a lie!
You have multiplied, O LORD my God,
your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us;
none can compare with you!
I will proclaim and tell of them,
yet they are more than can be told.”
We, as a nation, and as the world, and as the people of our
nations, and as the people of God who have put our trust in Jesus Christ, are
going through a global trial right now with a capital “C.” Depending on one’s
perspective of the reality of that trial will depend on one’s approach to that
trial.
Personally I believe it is all orchestrated and that it all
has a diabolical plot to it all, and it is not for the good of the people of
this world, but it is to bring us all under a one world government (of the beast)
and under a one world religion, too. So, the capital “C” is really about “control.”
You may have a different take on the situation than I do,
but one thing we, as believers in Jesus, must share in common is that the Lord
is our trust, and not humans, especially not humans who are deceitful and who
are trying to get us to follow after their lie.
So, how do we discern who is lying to us and who is telling
us the truth when it is something outside the realm of biblical knowledge and
interpretation? For example, how do we know if we can trust Donald Trump or
Nancy Pelosi or Joe Biden or Anthony Fauci, et al?
How do we know they are who they say they are, or that they
have done or will do what they say they have done or will do? How do we even know
that what is being reported to us in the news is totally real? There is so much
deception, so much fakery these days, that it is hard to trust anyone.
Certainly, we can look at the characters of these people, at
what is at least portrayed to us. But what if they are all performers? What if
they are all actors on a stage and what we are seeing is just an act and none
of it or little of it is real? I happen to believe that not much of it is
believable.
So, how do we discern who is good and who is bad? For, we
need to discern so that we don’t end up following after a lie. We need to pray
and we need to ask the Lord to give us wisdom, and then we need to read more
than one news source to get a broader perspective of what is going on in the world,
for if we do, we might just learn that we’ve been duped.
But another fundamental truth here is that we are not
supposed to look to men (to humans) to be our salvation from what ails us. We
are to have no other god before God. We are not to look to Trump or to Biden to
save our nation, but we are to look to God, and to God alone.
Our focus, too, should not be on politics to save us, and it
should not be in promoting a particular political candidate. But we should be
spending our time and energies on sharing Jesus Christ and his gospel message
with as many as will listen, for Jesus is our only hope for what ails us.
Psalm 40:6-8 ESV
“In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted,
but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.’”
So, what is this gospel message we should be sharing with
people instead of promoting a human as the one to save us?
First off, we can do nothing in and of ourselves to secure
our own salvation and eternal life with God. Nothing we might do in ourselves,
which we think is for God, is going to gain us his approval (Rom 3:23; Eph
2:8-9).
But that does not mean nothing is required of us who believe
in Jesus Christ, for Jesus died on that cross that we might die with him to sin
and live to him and to his righteousness. He died that we might no longer live
for ourselves, but for him who gave his life up for us (1 Pet 2:24; 2 Co 5:15,
21).
When Jesus shed his blood for us on that cross it was to buy
us back for God so that we would now be God’s possession, and so that we would now
honor God with our lives (1 Co 6:19-20; Tit 2:11-14; Eph 2:10).
And, when we come to faith in Jesus Christ, we are crucified
with Christ in death to sin, and we are resurrected with Christ to newness of
life in him, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. We
leave our old lives of sin behind us and now we walk in obedience to our Lord
(Lu 9:23-26; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-17; 1 Jn 1:5-9; 1 Jn 2:3-6; Eph 4:17-24).
So, although there is nothing in our flesh which can earn or
deserve our own salvation, and it is only by God’s grace, through faith, that any
of us can be saved of our sins and have eternal life with God, faith in Jesus
Christ means dying with Christ to sin and living to Christ and to his
righteousness.
If we are truly in Christ, by genuine God-given faith in
him, we should delight in doing the will of God, not in finding some
rationalization for why we don’t have to obey the Lord. We should want to do
what pleases our Lord, and we should not want to live to please our sinful flesh.
So, we need to be discerning about who we listen to here, as
well, only here we can discern who is telling the truth and who is not for the
Bible is very clear on what God requires for our salvation from sin and for our
eternal life with God, and on what happens to us if we don’t follow him in obedience
but we continue living in sin (Gal 5:16-21; Gal 6:7-8; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23).
For
Our Nation
An
Original Work / September 11, 2012
Bombs are bursting. Night is falling.
Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.
Trust Him with your life today.
Make Him your Lord and your Savior.
Turn from your sin. Follow Jesus.
He will forgive you of your sin;
Cleanse your heart, made new within.
Men betraying: Our trust fraying.
On our knees to God we’re praying,
Seeking God to give us answers
That are only found in Him.
God is sovereign over all things.
Nothing from His mind escaping.
He has all things under His command,
And will work all for good.
Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.
Men deceiving: we’re believing
In our Lord, and interceding
For our nation and its people
To obey their God today.
He is our hope for our future.
For our wounds He offers suture.
He is all we need for this life.
Trust Him with your life today.
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