God is still good

November 6, 2021 (Saturday)

 

Sit with me today as I dig into Psalm 146. This Psalm reaffirms amazing theological truths and opens the shutters so we can see the heart of God. Let’s begin.

 

“Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul!” [Psalm 146:1 ESV] We are urged to praise the Lord. How is this possible when the world is burning down around us? We are in a pandemic whose icy death grip does not want to let go. The current estimates is that in Europe alone, 500 million more people will die from covid before the end of February. Still, the psalmist urges, “I will praise the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.” [Psalm 146:2 NIV]

 

Maybe we get off track in our understanding; and it is this that dampens the desire to praise the Lord. To put it simply, “Don’t trust leaders; don’t trust any human beings— there’s no saving help with them!” [Psalm 146:3 CEB] What is being exposed here is our dependence and trust in humans. There are those that look to the government to solve our problems. While government can be useful, trusting it is like leaning on a broken stick.

 

This is contrasted to, “Blessed are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God.” [Psalm 146:5 NIV] When we talk about hope, we are talking about something we do not yet see, even if we already have it. Untimely our help comes from God. This is the sure trust we have. When we begin to trust humans, we take our eyes off God and bad things happen.

 

Let’s consider this God we trust for a moment. “God: the maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, God: who is faithful forever.” [Psalm 146:6 CEB] If you follow the next few verses you will learn God gives justice to the oppressed, feeds the hungry, and sets prisoners free. Still, it seems injustice rules the world, people go hungry and starve. Don’t prisoners deserve to be in cells? However, if we look at God, the truth is He never breaks a promise, even if we do not see or understand what is happening.

 

There is a physical understanding of this verse, but it might run deeper. Physical hunger is an important issue, but what good does it do to feed someone and ease their travel to Hell? Amos warns, “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God, “when I will send a famine on the land— not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.” [Amos 8:11 ESV] I think this reflects the warning to not trust humans as our source of truth or hope. When we listen to (trust) humans, it chokes our ability to “hear the words of the Lord.” Ironically this is a famine God deliberately sends.

 

“The Lord opens the eyes of the blind.” [Psalm 146:8a NLT] No prophet ever healed the blind. Jesus did. If only the Lord can heal the blind, and Jesus healed the blind, then it follows that Jesus is the Lord. Again, go back to the fundamental problem listed in this Psalm… trusting human beings. When we trust humans as our source of truth or hope, we will be spiritually blind.

 

Let’s consider the consistent character of this God we trust. “The Lord watches over the foreigner and sustains the fatherless and the widow, but he frustrates the ways of the wicked.” [Psalm 146:9 NIV] God’s heart is ALWAYS for the weak. God cares for the foreigner (immigrant) who has been displaced from the comfortable and familiar to a place where even the language is strange. God takes the side of the fatherless and the widow. Those that oppose God demonstrate their wickedness against the most vulnerable and helpless of us. They can expect frustration and finally ruin if their ways continue.

 

Bottom line: why can we praise the Lord, even in troubled times? Because God is good, all the time. Just because I (or you) don’t understand what is happening doesn’t mean God is not in control, not good, or not caring. Humbly consider, a worm has a better chance of understanding a human than a human does of understanding God.

 

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” [Isaiah 55:8 – 9 ESV]