psalmthing to chew on: psalm 65

as i read the first four lines of this psalm it felt like i was part of a liturgical choir speaking them out:

1 Praise awaits You, our God, in Zion;
    to You our vows will be fulfilled.
2 You who answer prayer,
    to You all people will come.

the psalm is subtitled as being a song of David and so maybe that is why it conveys that fullness of message and delivery. i can imagine a congregation speaking this out together.

the rest of the psalm is pretty much a ‘God you rock’ anthem, but some parts in particular stood out for me:

3 When we were overwhelmed by sins,
You forgave our transgressions.

i mean that bit is quite magic as well. the contrast between the idea of being ‘overwhelmed by sins’ and ‘you forgave’ – the first one seems to impossibly huge and the second comes across as this quite effortless motion.

4 Blessed are those you choose
and bring near to live in Your courts!
We are filled with the good things of Your house,
of Your holy temple.

not going to get caught up in the predestination trap in that verse – i think the bible is very clear that everyone is chosen but not everyone chooses to be chosen. but what is eye-catching is the whole notion of being ‘filled with the good things of Your house, of Your holy temple.’ 

i think we miss out on so much of that sometimes. talk as if we are a King’s kid but live like a pauper. i love [and don’t necessarily fully understand] these verses in 2 Peter 1 that say:

3 His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

Galatians 5 starts with this verse:

1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

before heading on to:

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 

and so many more places and times where God reveals to us the extent of our inheritance and birthright as His children but this last one from 2 Timothy says it clearly when it shows three resources that we should theoretically never be short of and yet…

7 For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.

the rest of the psalm is David gushing about God and His awesomeness and the last verse i want to pull from there [but go read the whole thing and take time on it] is this one:

9 You care for the land and water it;
you enrich it abundantly.
The streams of God are filled with water
to provide the people with grain,
for so you have ordained it.

the principle that ‘we have enough’ or at least that ‘there is enough’ or should be… until you start taking notice of the fact that a very small percentage of the ‘we’ are holding on to or controlling most of the stuff and how that somehow leads to truckloads of oranges being dumped in the desert or young children dying in Africa because they can’t get access to clean water and more…

but never forget that ‘the streams of God are filled’ or as i like to say, ‘God is bigGER!’

 [To return to the Intro page and be connected to any of the other Psalms i have walked through before now, click here]

a prayer of abundance

do you wish to be FREE?

tbV and i are friends with a guy called Mark Scandrette, who together with his wife Lisa, just finished a book called ‘Free: Spending your Time and Money on what matters most.’

the presentation that they did for the book was so inspirational that we signed up to lead an 8 week book study which will be starting early October. the main question the book asks is whether you are spending your Money and your Time on the same things that you claim to Value most in life [which most of us probably aren’t]. then through activities and discussions it seeks to help you put some things in place and change some mindsets so that those things will line up a lot more.

i have just started reading the book and this ‘prayer of abundance’ really connected with me. The invitation is to pray this prayer daily as you are working through the book:

I know that I am cared for by an abundant Provider

I choose to be grateful and trusting,

I believe I have enough and that what I need will always be provided.

I choose to be content and generous.

I know that my choices matter for myself, for others and for future generations.

Help me to live consciously and creatively,

celebrating signs of your new creation that is present and coming.

Creator, who made me to seek the greater good of Your kingdom,

Guide me to use my time, talents and resources to pursue what matters most.

Teach me to be free,

to live without worry, fear or greed in the freedom of Your abundance.

Give me my daily bread, as I share with those in need.

Thank You for the precious gift of life.

[From ‘Free’ by Mark Scandrette]

imagine what the world could, and would, look like if we all prayed that, and meant it, every day.

[To look at the next post i did on Avoiding the Rush of Life, click here]

your wealth is my poverty but his just getting by

do you see yourself as rich? i would imagine probably not

if i had to put myself on a wealth scale i would probably rate myself as below average

i would compare myself to the people i know who have so much more than me – own houses, better cars, holiday house, huge screen television, able to fly overseas on holiday (or even have lavish comfortable holidays here), more impressive toys and so on

would i see myself as poor? definitely not – having lived in a township for a year and a half i have witnessed a small aspect of what poverty can look like and so i know that i am completely not close to being poor (altho to be fair there were a lot of people in the K who had better phones, cars, toys, clothes than me so i wasn’t even the toppest rich there)

but the reality is that if i can read (which i can) then that puts me in the top 30% of people in the world – if i own a computer (which i do) that puts me in the top 1% of people in the world – when you look at things like acess to safe drinking water, three meals a day and so on then suddenly my wealthometer reading is skyrocketing

the truth is that wealth is relative – apparently 6% of the people in the world own 59% of the entire world’s wealth – India and China (two of the countries with some of the world’s poorest people in them) are top of the list of most new millionaires this last year

to some of my friends and people in my church i am poor… but to some of the guys i work with in the K and to the guys lining up in the road down the road from where we stay every morning looking for work i am most definitely very rich – my ‘poverty’ is another man’s ‘incredible wealth’ and my ‘abundance’ is another guy’s table scraps

in the Bible in the book of Timothy (1. chapter 6.10) it says ‘for the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil’ – the bible doesn’t speak of money as evil (it’s the love thereof) and doesn’t even say you can’t be rich (but does say a lot that to be rich is more difficult and that rich people better use their money wisely) but it does teach us to use what we have well. very well.

i imagine wherever you appear on the wealth scale, there is someone less wealthy than you that you can reach out to and encourage and assist and help up, and so my question is, what are you doing with your wealth to ease someone else’s poverty?

and above all, i guess my point here is that as much as i would love to see myself as ‘below average’ i am in fact overwhelmingly rich, as are you if you are reading this.