22 - The God Who Reveals Himself

Psalm 19:1–6 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. 3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard. 4 Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun, 5 which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy. 6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

One significant blessing of these days when we are more confined in our movements than usual has been the absolutely beautiful weather! It is perfect for going out for a walk (which we are still encouraged to do, provided we maintain a safe distance from others). The colors in the sky, the trees and the flowers are stunning. There is a whole variety of scents - especially after a shower of rain like the one we had at lunchtime today.

We don’t yet understand all there is to know about our own sun and how it works. And when it goes down, the moon and the stars form a display that quickly leads us to awe and wonder. With the Hubble telescope, we have come to realize that we are in one of perhaps thousands of galaxies in the universe - it is literally mind-blowing! Then we start to study objects like black holes, and we attempt to figure out how light bends around planets and what invisible forces there are that hold everything together. How small and limited we are!

All of these things, from the subatomic particles, through atoms, molecules, cells and organisms on the one hand, and on to the stars, planets and cosmic phenomena on the other, are speaking something important to us every day. It is a message that needs no words in order to be understood by everyone, and one which no place on the surface of the earth cannot hear. It is loud. It is in all of our faces 24 by 7. This is the message: “A GLORIOUS GOD MADE ALL THIS!!!”

This is how God reveals Himself to every single one of us - it is called “General Revelation” because it reaches every creature under heaven and we all understand it. Paul assures us that God’s “invisible attributes namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.” (Rom 1:20).

But if we look further, we may realize from the disasters that beset us in this world (including the current pandemic) that something is wrong. We might even deduce that the God Who made all this is angry for some reason. Our consciences, which can condemn us or acquit us, and may cause us to fear an ultimate reckoning, might lead us to believe that we are the ones who have caused the problem.

We can’t tell much more than this by looking at the world around us and at the stars, however. We need more information about this God and specifically about our relationship with Him to help us - a Special Revelation. And we have this available to us as well - in the Bible!

Psalm 19:7–14 The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; 8 the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; 9 the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the Lord are true, and righteous altogether. 10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. 11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward. 12 Who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults. 13 Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me! Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression. 14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

God’s Word tells us about His perfections and His matchless beauty. But it also tells us that we do indeed have a problem in our relationship with Him because we rebelled against His rule over us and we became separated from Him. Our refusal to submit to Him killed us - we became dead to Him and set on a path towards an eternal death.

But the Special Revelation of God tells us that He intervened to rescue us from this plight - that God the Son lived a life of submission to God that we couldn’t, and then sacrificed Himself, dying the death we deserved, and then rose from the dead to show that He had conquered death and that His rescue mission was successful. By being joined to Him in His life, death and resurrection, we escape the torment our rebellion deserved and enjoy eternal life with God.

So the message in God’s Special Revelation is very special indeed! It revives our souls, makes us wise instead of being fools, rejoices our hearts instead of leaving them dead, gives light to our eyes (which were blind). It is pure and lovely and good - much more precious than all the treasures in this world to us who hear this message and respond to it. It offers a reward of eternal bliss to all who will submit to God and rest in Him alone for all their righteousness!

This Easter is the opportunity to remember the focal point of this Special Revelation from God - the cross where our sins were dealt with by the conquering, spotless Lamb of God!

Is this God your God? Is this Savior your Savior? Has He revealed Himself to you not just in all the wonderful things He has made but in the amazing grace of the salvation that He has made possible and has told us about in His Word?

21 - It's The Real Thing!

2 Thessalonians 3:17 —  I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. This is the sign of genuineness in every letter of mine; it is the way I write.

We have already remarked on the fact that the Thessalonians were in danger of becoming alarmed and unsettled by false teaching - some of which came to the church in the form of letters that appeared to have come from the Apostles, including Paul (2 Thessalonians 2:1–2).

Paul often would dictate his letters and have someone else actually write them down for him - see Romans 16:22. There is speculation that the “thorn in the flesh” that he mentions in 2 Corinthians 12:7 was an affliction of the eyes - which is why he comments that the Galatians would gladly have surrendered their own eyes to help him (Gal 4:15). It may be for the same reason that he writes in large characters at the end of the letter to the Galatian churches (Gal. 6:11). Be that as it may, at some point, Paul obviously decided that he could also authenticate his letters by writing a few lines at the end in his own handwriting.  He does that in the passage above but see also Colossians 4:14, Galatians 6:11, Philemon 19.

The idea of authenticating documents in some way was not an innovation that Paul came up with. There was a long history of this already by his day. Kings would wear a signet ring (clearly the name has something to do with signing!) Their important written communications would be identified as theirs and as being authentic by pressing the ring into molten wax as the letters were sealed - so that they bore a mark of genuineness and authority on them. You can imagine what an honor it was when the king put his signet ring into the hands of others for them to write and seal decrees on the king’s behalf (see Esther 8:1-8).

The wonderful thing for us to think about is the spiritual ramifications for us in this practise:
First, all true children of God are marked at their conversion with a seal from Him that confirms they are genuine - authentic children of God! In this case, however, the seal also serves as a guarantee. Clearly, if we are true children of God and have been sealed by Him, all the promises and blessings that belong to the children of God in Scripture are ours, too - infallibly and irrevocably! The seal of God on His children, of course, is the Holy Spirit:

• 2 Corinthians 1:21–22 — And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, 22 and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.
• Ephesians 1:13–14 — In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.
• Ephesians 4:30 — And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Second, when God works (by His Spirit) through our proclamation of the gospel and adopts others into His family or generates Spiritual fruit in the lives of those who are already His, he sets His seal upon the message that is being proclaimed - it is the real thing! Paul writes here of a seal on his apostleship but I think the principle extends further to all gospel workers:

• 2 Corinthians 3:2–3 — You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all. 3 And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
• 1 Corinthians 9:2 — If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.

Finally, to bring us back closer to the text with which we began, Paul did what he could to defend the churches from those who wanted to use forgeries to spread false teaching. But (and following on from our second point) the Spirit of God supremely authenticates the Word of God. He speaks through the Word to the consciences and hearts of people, He convicts, He converts, He brings life from the dead. He is the seal of God on that which is truly God’s Word! This is one of the tests that the early church councils employed as they wrestled to decide which documents should be included in the Canon of Scripture and which should not.

So if we are God’s children this morning, we can truly rejoice in at least three things:

• that He has owned His Word and made it powerful through His Spirit to raise us to new life in Christ; 
• that He  then owned that we truly are alive in Christ and that we really are heirs of all the promises of God by putting His mark of ownership and authenticity upon us - the blessed Holy Spirit; and
• that we have the Word of God authenticated to us as that same Spirit confirms its genuineness in our hearts and lives!

2 Peter 1:16–21 — For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17 For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” 18 we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. 19 And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, 20 knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. 21 For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

20 - Comfort and Resolve

2 Thessalonians 2:16–17 — Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, 17 comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.

The Thessalonians had heard rumors of various kinds and may even have received forged letters that appeared to come from the apostles, containing erroneous information about the last times. There was the potential for them to become alarmed and shaken in their faith. Paul corrects the error of these false teachers and then reassures the church and urges them to stand firmly in the genuine gospel that they had received from authentic sources. Then he begins to conclude his letter with the verses that appear above - and they are full of encouragement for us.

The verses form an appeal to God that He would help the Thessalonians to stand firm, as Paul had just urged them to do. Verse 17 contains the request. Paul asks God:

• to comfort (strengthen - it’s that parakalesai word again - coming alongside to help) them in their hearts (their inner beings). This inner comforting is the work of the Holy Spirit
• to establish (fix, make fast, set) them in every good work and word (their outer walk). 

It’s interesting that Paul asks God to work both in terms of their inner life but also their outward walk. When we become alarmed or unsettled in some way (as the Thessalonians were in danger of doing) our whole being is affected. We become distracted, taking our eyes off the Lord, and grow weaker. I am thinking of Peter stepping out onto the water to walk to Jesus but then his faith failed him and he began to sink. If we are weakened and distracted inwardly, that must impact our zeal and our commitment to live for the Lord and to speak for Him. So Paul prays for a complete, whole-person remedy and defense for these believers.

Note, though, that before he gets to this request in verse 17, Paul has already laid out in the preceding verse the grounds on which he firmly anticipates God will hear and answer him. He rests his confidence in the demonstrated character of the God to Whom he appeals:

• He is confident that the Lord Jesus Christ, Who has the Name that is above every name, and Whose Name (we saw in the quiz a while ago) is “Jehovah is Salvation” and “Anointed” (meaning Prophet, Priest and King) is interested enough to intervene in this matter himself (personally and not through an intermediary). He is the One who left heaven, came as a man into this ruined world, lived a perfect life, died an unjust death, rose to God’s right hand and intercedes for His children based on the merits of His shed blood. 
• Paul is also confident that the God Who sent His Son, Jesus, on this mission and Who has adopted them into His family so they may call Him “God our Father” will also engage on their behalf. The Father and the Son will do this, and they must do this, Paul argues, because through pure grace - unmerited favor they set their everlasting love upon the Thessalonians and have brought them irrevocably and unfailingly into a place of eternal comfort (His strengthening and coming alongside to help them) and good hope (the certain hope of glory that rest upon His promises, His faithfulness and His changelessness). He has personally guaranteed this to them by sealing them with the Spirit as a downpayment!

So this is a prayer God has to answer for His blood-bought children, and there can be no doubt either of His willingness nor His ability to do so!

All of us have been unsettled by the coronavirus. We have all felt uncertainty as some of the things we have been leaning on in life (many of them perfectly legitimate) have been taken away for a season. We, too, can be weakened by such times and can find our spiritual life ebbing somewhat. But the God to Whom Paul made this appeal for the Thessalonians is our God, too! He is no less interested in our circumstances today; no less willing and certainly no less able to comfort our hearts and help us to hold fast to Him in our works and in our words. So although we can admire Peter in his stepping out to Jesus on the water when all his friends stayed behind in the boat, let’s learn from him and not take our eyes off our Jesus, Who reaches out His hand to hold us fast and to bring us the comfort we need!

19 - We have a beautiful inheritance!

Psalm 16 follows so well from what we were looking at yesterday - it is an object lesson in counting our blessings! It is rich with meaning and may be understood at many levels. First, it had meaning to David in his specific situation. Second, as is clear in the New Testament, David spoke prophetically here by the Spirit of God concerning his Greater Son, Jesus Christ and especially of His resurrection. But there is a third sense in which this Psalm may be understood, in that it speaks to the experience of a believer who, like David, follows in the steps of Christ. It is in this third sense that I have put together the following comments.

1 Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. 
David begins by calling on God for protection, since God is His refuge.

2 I say to the LORD, “You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.” 
He declares His allegiance to God and His love for Him. He owns that the Lord is his highest and greatest good. It is so good from a sincere heart to express our admiration for God, and not jump right into our requests when we spend time with Him! Do we feel like this about God?

3 As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight. 
David’s delight, other than the Lord himself, is to be in the company of those who feel the same way about God as he does. The Lord is his greatest love, yes, but then he delights in those who are being made like the Lord in this world. Fellowship is a blessing we are appreciating more and more in Grace Church, now that we are temporarily deprived of face-to-face interaction - hand-shakes and hugs - and must resort to other approaches which are not as good! How we should thank the Lord for our fellowship with the saints!

4 The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply; their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips. 5 The LORD is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot. 
Now he pauses to think about those who do not have the Lord as their greatest good and do not delight in fellowship with the saints. Rather, they run after other gods, and whose sorrows and misery increase. Compared with the blessings God’s children know in this life, which David has mentioned, the lot of the unbeliever is misery. But when we all pass into the age to come, the contrast becomes stark indeed. So David renews his resolve not to follow them down their idolatrous path. He is determined to have God as his portion, and to be content in the knowledge that God holds his future in his hands.  That’s a good thing for us to do, too - knowing that whatever happens in our lives is from our Highest Good, for our ultimate best.
He spends the rest of the Psalm contemplating  what this actually means for him in practice - and in large measure, it means the same for us!

6 The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. 
He is thinking about his possession in the Lord - the boundary lines that mark out the territory of which he is an heir by God’s grace - and everything that falls within those lines is beautiful indeed! Have you thought about your inheritance in Christ lately - the marked-out, heavenly territory of which we are co-heirs together with Christ - your “mansion in glory,” if you like? It defies human speech to describe it appropriately, but we have a glimpse of its splendor and glory in Revelation 21 and 22 - and this is what Jesus has purchased for us with His blood!

7 I bless the LORD who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. 
David also realizes that he has God’s Spirit and His Word to instruct him and to give him wisdom day and night while he remains in this world, and he blesses God for this. We have the same Spirit and Word to direct us - blessings worth thinking about and praising God for!

8 I have set the LORD always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. 
He has his eyes turned to the Lord and he knows that with the Lord as his refuge and strength, he shall not be moved. We stumble and fall when we take our eyes off the Lord and look somewhere else for strength, but when we lean on Him, His power is made perfect in weakness!

9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices;
And as David reflects on all these blessings that are his now in the Lord, he’s completely caught up with joy - his whole being rejoices!  And as we focus our minds and our hearts on the Lord and our secure inheritance in Him, our souls will be similarly expanded with joy and gladness!

my flesh also dwells secure. 10 For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption.
Looking beyond the grave, David knows that his body also is secure in the Lord and will not be abandoned. There will be an everlasting kingdom which Christ, as glorious Fore-runner, will usher in - in which we shall all certainly share as members of the new humanity, all with glorified spirits and spotless resurrection bodies, all renewed in Christ’s likeness!

11 You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
And so David is thrilled again that this secure and certain path of life is being made known to him and he anticipates (as we may) that “Our God is the end of the journey,” as a hymn-writer put it. We will enter into the very presence of his Lord and enjoy Him, our greatest Good, and all the pleasures of heaven forever!

18 - Be Happy!

1 Thessalonians 5:16–18 —  Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

I saw this painted stone by the side of the path on my walk today:

With the pandemic continuing to dominate news headlines, and children out of schools, the number of brightly colored stones bearing positive messages like this has been growing. The problem is that there is no foundation for happiness included in the message. It’s not like we have a “happy switch” that we can turn on in an instant. We see the stone, we think “that’s a good idea, we will be happy!” we flip the switch and boom! - we are happy! I have no doubt of the good intentions of those who created and placed these stones. But they are fundamentally useless because they give no reason why I should be happy. In fact, without Christ in this world, no-one has a formula for lasting happiness and how it may be experienced - so the message is essentially a vague and empty wish, and that makes me sad, not happy.

Then I came across the verse above in my readings. On the surface, perhaps, the advice it contains seems almost as trite as the mantra on the stone - “Always rejoice! Be thankful in everything!” By presenting the verses in isolation as I have above, I have committed one of the more grievous offences of Bible exposition - I have lifted them clean out of their context. As an old adage says, “a text out of its context is a pretext”. So let’s fix that:

These verses come from the last chapter of Paul’s first letter to the church in Thessalonica. In the earlier sections, he has explained carefully what the Lord has done to them through the gospel:

• 1 Thessalonians 1:4–5 — For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, 5 because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction…
• 1 Thessalonians 1:6 — And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit,
• 1 Thessalonians 1:9 — For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God,
• 1 Thessalonians 2:13 — And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.
• 1 Thessalonians 3:2–4 — and we sent Timothy, our brother and God’s coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith, 3 that no one be moved by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we are destined for this. 4 For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know.  3:6–8 — But now that Timothy has come to us from you, and has brought us the good news of your faith and love and reported that you always remember us kindly and long to see us, as we long to see you— 7 for this reason, brothers, in all our distress and affliction we have been comforted about you through your faith. 8 For now we live, if you are standing fast in the Lord.
• 1 Thessalonians 4:1 — Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more.
• 1 Thessalonians 4:9 — Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another,
• 1 Thessalonians 5:9–11 — For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 10 who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. 11 Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.

So, they had been chosen by God, received His word with a joy given to them by the Holy Spirit, even though enduring much affliction. They turned their backs on worthless idols to serve the true God, being convinced that what Paul and friends had taught them was God’s Word and not man’s. This was obvious to them, because like a sharp, two-edged sword, the Word was active among them. They had stood firm in the faith during affliction, even when the missionaries had had to leave them for a while. They had continued to live in a way that was pleasing to God, and were radiant with the love of Christ for one another - they were concerned to encourage one another and to build each other up.

“So,” Paul says, “rejoice! Be thankful!” No longer an empty and trite expression, but something that the Thessalonians had every reason to do, given what God had done and was continuing to do in them and among them. This is how Paul and Silas were able to sing joyfully in the jail in Philippi, isn’t it? They reviewed all that God had done to save them, their current spiritual blessings and their future hope. A few shackles couldn’t take away the joy of those things!

What about us? Can we rejoice always and give thanks in all circumstances? Yes, we can! This isn’t some secret that only a few special believers discover (and then write books about!). Look at what Paul did for the Thessalonians - he reminded them of just some of the amazing things God had done for them (the complete list would fill several libraries!) and then says, effectively, “rejoice and be thankful in these things!” 

We need to keep our blessings in sharp focus, because they will cause our hearts to well up in thankfulness and joy whatever our outward circumstances may be.

There’s an old hymn that encourages to do just this in its refrain:

Count your blessings, name them one by one;

Count your blessings, see what God has done;

Count your blessings, name them one by one,

And it will surprise you what the Lord has done.

Recently, I have seen some in our church on specific occasions encouraging us to say what we are thankful for (I think Drew and Lisa posted something like that in the chat at the beginning of the service on Sunday). It’s a great idea at all times, clearly, from what we have seen today - but especially when the conditions around us might tempt us to become discouraged. So why don’t we start counting our blessings, tell others about them and see if the Lord doesn’t surprise us too?

17 - God’s Dwelling Place is Holy

Leviticus 10:1–3 —  Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the LORD, which he had not commanded them. 2 And fire came out from before the LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD. 3 Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the LORD has said: ‘Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.’ ” And Aaron held his peace.

Nadab and Abihu paid with their lives in a sudden and frightening outburst of God’s judgment. They offered incense before the Lord, which was supposed to have a fragrant scent, but the word translated here as “unauthorized” and in other versions as “strange” seems to be related to the idea of loathsomeness (as when Job’s breath was “strange” - stank - to his wife in Job 19:17). Despite the fact that God had given detailed commands concerning the various ceremonies that were to be conducted in the newly completed tabernacle, the 2 sons of Aaron were quick to depart from those by trying to innovate. It’s as though they were saying to God, “Thanks for everything, but we’ve got this now. We’ll worship you our way, not yours.” A pastor I had back in the UK used to call Frank Sinatra’s song, “I Did it My Way,” the theme song of the sinner.

It hadn’t been that long - probably no more than 2 years - since God had redeemed Israel from slavery in Egypt. Soon after, He gave them His law on Sinai (an enormous privilege). His voice terrified them as Sinai flamed and smoked and trembled, and one of the first things they heard Him say was that they shouldn’t make an image of anything in heaven or on earth to worship.
However, Moses stayed up the mountain and as their impatience grew, they innovated by making a golden calf to worship as a visible representation of the invisible God.

As a result, God threatened to destroy them but Moses interceded. Then God said He could no longer be with them but Moses interceded again. And now God’s presence is indeed among them, symbolized in the Ark of the Covenant within the tabernacle built according to God’s specifications. It is at this moment that Nadab and Abihu decide that a bit of creative thinking would be good in relation to the worship of God. They could hardly have been conducting this act in ignorance of the holiness and the requirements of God! The fire of God consumes them, and Moses explains to Aaron that God must be honored before all the people - He must be treated as Holy - and this includes worshiping Him according to His own commands.

It’s interesting to me that Chris spoke in the video he posted this morning about Jesus cleansing the temple soon after his Triumphal entry into Jerusalem. There certainly seem to be some parallels between that account and the one here, though as always we shouldn’t press them too far:

• The symbol of God’s presence with His people, the Ark, was now in the Holy of Holies in the temple
• outside are a bunch of traders who are treating God’s dwelling as a place for commercial gain - turning a house of prayer into a den of robbers - which could hardly be regarded as treating God as holy and honoring Him before all the people. 
• And then God the Son comes, and out of zeal for God and for His house, He purges this unholy treatment of His Father from the temple precincts.

God is holy still, and we are still to treat Him as such. We still need to be mindful concerning any place in which He is present (for instance, in His people as His temple, and especially when they gather for worship) to honor Him and worship Him in ways that are pleasing and acceptable to Him.

16 - Oh, that I knew where I might find him…!

Psalm 10:1 — Why, O Lord, do you stand far away? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?

As soon as I read these words I knew I had to meditate on this passage today. Yesterday, we were thinking of God as a stronghold in times of trouble and yet here in the very next Psalm we find that God apparently hides Himself in those very times (and the Hebrew is exactly the same here as in Psalm 9:9). What are we to make of this? Surely God must either be a stronghold (a “very present help in trouble” - Ps 46:1) or a God Who hides Himself in days of affliction - how can He be both?

The first thing we have to admire here is the honesty of the Scriptures! If this were a man-made religion based on a book of human authorship, it is highly unlikely that two passages so close together would seemingly contradict each other in this way. So the fact that this occurs actually should increase our confidence in the Bible as a work of divine origin. But is there more we can say on this? If not, we might wonder whether we can trust His Word.

The second thing to note is that (as Cowper put it in the opening verse of the hymn we finished our previous meditation with), “God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform.” He doesn’t have to explain Himself to us, His creatures, as though He is somehow accountable to us. He never told Job why he went through the affliction that came into his life, or why, in the midst of his troubles, Job felt that God had withdrawn from him, as the quote in our title indicates (Job 23:3). In Romans 9:18-21, Paul imagines someone calling into question God’s purposes in election. His response to such a person is quite strong - “Who are you, O man, to answer back to God?”

So we have to do with a God who does as He pleases and works out His purposes according to the pleasure of His own will. But is there more we can say on this? If not, we might wonder about what strange and (to us) inexplicable thing He will do or allow to happen next (like a coronavirus pandemic), and how we could even begin to understand it.

That brings us to the third thing we must note here: we must never approach verses like this in isolation, as though we didn’t have the rest of the Bible to help us understand the hard parts. And we must never approach the Bible without realizing our dependence on the Holy Spirit to open our eyes and help us to see clearly, since our minds and our hearts are still subject to sin and liable to deceive us. In other words, when we think we see a problem in the Word, the first thing we should suspect is that the problem lies with us and not with the Bible!

We can lay a firm foundation from Scripture that will help us approach hard passages like this. For example, we know about God’s character (His Name) - His everlasting love, His grace, mercy, compassion, patience, faithfulness, kindness, goodness etc. We know about His omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence. We know He does not change. We know He is just. We can go on to list all that God has revealed to us of Himself.  We find of God that He isn’t safe, but He is most definitely good (as Mr Beaver says of Aslan in “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.”)  Then we see Jesus at Calvary, shedding His blood out of love for us, giving up His life so that we might be rescued from the second death. And that is the point where we give ourselves away to Him in utter faith based on His beautiful character. We say with Job, “Though he slay me, I will hope in Him” (Job 13:15) and we trust with Abraham that “The Judge of all the earth will do what is just” (Gen 18:25)

And with that background, we can return again to the text we began with in Psalm 10. If we perceive that God has withdrawn from us, does that mean He actually has gone somewhere else, or is it rather that our sense of His presence has diminished? There are many reasons why this can happen to us:

• We are fickle creatures, subject to changes of mood and situation that mean our awareness of God changes too
• We can quench and grieve the Holy Spirit so that we sense his removal from us to a degree - David prayed in Ps 51 that God wouldn’t take His Spirit away from him
• For His own good purposes, God can (to an extent) remove our comfortable sense of His presence for a season. We may never know why He has done this, but it could be to make us realize our need of Him and to redouble our cries to know Him near

But note this - in none of these situations has any change come over God. Nor has His determination to save us to the uttermost lessened to any degree at all, since we are His children. So He is STILL our stronghold, our best and only defense, our shield and refuge, the lover of our souls at these times - even if we do not feel Him with us in the same way. We can trust His Word, and He knows what He is doing! Christ’s blood is still sprinkled upon us and we have all His promises that cannot be broken to be anchors for our souls. We know that He will bring us to glory, even if there are times when “darkness veils His lovely face” and we need to “rest on His unchanging grace”. I am not sure that Paul (who had once been caught up to the 3rd heaven) felt God’s smile as fully when he was afflicted in Asia and felt intensely burdened, under a sentence of death, despairing of life.  How insightful are Cowper’s words in that hymn we quoted yesterday:

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, 

But trust him for his grace;

Behind a frowning providence, 

He hides a smiling face.

Thankfully, His ability to save and to be our stronghold does not depend in the least on our ability to maintain a felt sense of His smile upon us! A helpful word for us at distressing times like these when He knows what He is doing, seeing the end from the beginning, but we do not!