The first casualties of upheaval can be love, kindness, and patience. But crisis is also a moment when love for God & one another can spring up. For 150 days, starting on 17th March 2020, I will write 300 words based on one of the 150 psalms in the bible. How can I find and give love in the midst of coronavirus?
If you jump off rocks almost anywhere around the coast of the Mediterranean and dive into the warm sea you will find, clinging to the stones hundreds of black, spiky balls. They are the purple sea urchin (Paracentrotus lividus) and whilst snorkelling in Spain and France I have seen them over and over again.
You can open them up and eat the insides – raw or cooked. They taste good. But, and it’s a big but – there is a problem. The spines are sharp, and the snap off easily, remaining stuck in your skin. I’ve had them stuck in my hand and my foot – and then have to sit with a sharp knife picking them out. They are good to eat – but they need to be handled with care.
This is true of Psalm 144. It is full of good stuff, but it needs to be handled carefully otherwise it could cause damage. For example:
1 Praise be to the Lord my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle. 2 He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me. 3 Lord, what are human beings that you care for them, mere mortals that you think of them? 4 They are like a breath; their days are like a fleeting shadow.
Some wonderful stuff here – the LORD is my rock, my loving God, my fortress, my stronghold, my deliverer, my shield. He cares for humans. Good huh?
However, God also trains our hands for war and sudues people under us.
Again, we need Jesus to interpret the psalm. David may have been thinking of actual war and subduing actual people. But the New Testament tells us that our battle is not against people – but against the devil and all his works. Waging war and subduing people is generally considered a bad idea.
7 Reach down your hand from on high; deliver me and rescue me
from the mighty waters, from the hands of foreigners 8 whose mouths are full of lies, whose right hands are deceitful.
Once again, asking God to deliver us is good. But saying that foreigners’ mouths are full of lies is not so good.
12 Then our sons in their youth will be like well-nurtured plants, and our daughters will be like pillars carved to adorn a palace. 13 Our barns will be filled with every kind of provision. Our sheep will increase by thousands, by tens of thousands in our fields;
Again, if you take this whole you could think that this is a guarantee of family and financial blessing. But we need to read with care – and yet go ahead and pray for our children and prosperity (and the same for others too).
So, read this Psalm with care. Pick out the good bits, use Jesus to help with the tough bits. But end up with the final verse – which is so true:
15 Blessed is the people of whom this is true; blessed is the people whose God is the Lord.
May you be filled with him today.
Love, Matt