Lessons from the Psalms: Asking for the Blessing of Peace

“The blessing of the Lord be upon you; we bless you in the name of the Lord!” -Psalm 129:8b (ESV) [Read Psalm 129]

This short psalm of Ascents is actually a song of victory over Zion’s enemies. Since this one fell on Mother’s Day in the sequence of going psalm by psalm to write these devotionals, I read the psalm three times before I determined that the second portion of verse 8 could be the text for a message of encouragement for mothers.

But first, let us look analytically at the Psalm to see its message for Israel’s day and for ours. Verses 1-4 tell how Israel has been persecuted severely by enemies, yet has been preserved. Verses 5-8 pray a prayer of retribution on enemies, and states that the enemy will never say of Israel: “The blessing of the Lord be upon you; we bless you in the name of the Lord” (v/8b).

Yet those very words sound like a prayer for blessings upon a beloved child. Can we thus apply that prayer as one prayed by beloved mothers? How often have they battled enemies of discouragement, heartache, and agony for wayward children? Yet godly mothers never gave up hope, never stopped praying, never stopped loving their children. And we have heard so many times stories of victory of how an erring child repented of waywardness and set a new direction in life. A mother’s love, like the love of the Lord for His people, is steadfast and binding.

President Abraham Lincoln made the statement, “All that I am and hope to be is because of the prayers of my godly mother.” A saintly mother never gives up on her children. She guides in good times and in difficult periods. She prays when immediate answers to prayer do not seem to be forthcoming. And she rejoices when she sees the blessing of the Lord extended to her children.

Dr B. B. McKinney (1886-1952) gave us beautiful words in a hymn which is a prayer, “God, Give Us Christian Homes.” The third stanza is about a godly mother and her influence in the home: “God give us Christian homes! Homes where the mother, in caring quest, Strives to show others Your way is best. Homes where the Lord is an honored guest; God give us Christian homes; God, give us Christian homes!”

As the Israelites long ago prayed for the blessings of the Lord, let us even now pray for godly mothers and the influence they wield on their children. Thank God for your own mother and do what you can to help young mothers to bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. -Ethelene Dyer Jones 05.08.2016

Joy in Going to the House of the Lord

“I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’” - Psalm 122:1 (ESV) [Read Psalm 121]

A ‘Psalm of Ascents’ or a pilgrim psalm, this psalm, attributed to David as author, celebrates going up to Jerusalem to worship at the Temple. It has become a doxology for all peoples everywhere who worship God and who enjoy going to the church house dedicated to the worship and gathering of His people.

Within the psalm which calls the people to worship is also a poignant reminder: “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! May they be secure who love you! Peace be within your walls, and security within your towers!” (Psalm 122:6-7).

A few years ago Billy Graham’s daughter, Anne Graham Lotz, went to Jerusalem, and standing on the hill overlooking Mt. Zion and the temple mount, she made a plea to Christians everywhere to pray daily for a whole month for the peace of Jerusalem, quoting Psalm 122:6. We know the distress and troubles that sacred city has known almost since its founding. Because of its importance to both the Jewish and the Christian believers, it is held in great regard throughout the world, and people are eager to hear of news of the city and its inhabitants. “Peace” (shalom in Hebrew) means more than absence of strife. It also means health, well-being, wholeness. “Salem”, meaning “place of peace,” was the original name for the city when Abraham met the priest Melchizedec there and the priest blessed Abraham (see Genesis 14:18). Jerusalem is a place many pilgrims from many lands and throughout the ages, even to our present day, want to travel to and see. It was my privilege in 1978 to visit the Holy Land with my husband, the Rev. Grover D. Jones. A special sense of sacredness and deep spiritual thoughts come to any pilgrims who can visit this city which has seen centuries of history unfold, both religious and secular. “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem” foresees the day when the new Jerusalem is established and the Lord reigns, a time when Jerusalem comes into its fullness and “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Isaiah 45:23; Romans 14:11; Philippians 2:10).

We gain experience in bowing before and worshiping the Lord God as we gather in our congregations and worship God together in concert and individually as believers. Strength and faith come from genuine worship. Since childhood, I have been “glad,” as the psalmist so aptly expressed, when it was time to go to the house of the Lord to worship. For those who claim they can worship as well alone as within a congregation, I do not doubt—if only we will. But there is strength in numbers gathered to adore and praise the Lord. The poet Henry van Dyke (1852-1933) expressed our desire to worship in the house of the Lord in corporate adoration as he penned the words of the hymn, “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee.” Set to the lofty “Hymn to Joy” tune by Ludwig van Beethoven (1170-1827), our hearts are lifted as we rejoice and sing:

     “Joyful, joyful, we adore Thee,/God of glory, Lord of love;

     Hearts unfold like flow’rs before Thee,/Op-‘ning to the sun above.

     Melt the clouds of sin and sadness,/Drive the dark of doubt away;

     Giver of immortal gladness,/Fill us with the light of day!”

    “All Thy works with joy surround Thee,/Earth and heav’n reflect Thy rays;

    Stars and angels sing around Thee,/ Center of unbroken praise.

    Field and forest, vale and mountain,/ Flow’ry meadow, flashing sea,

    Singing bird and flowing fountain/Call us to rejoice in Thee!” Amen!

And all the people said, “Amen!” -Ethelene Dyer Jones 05.01.2016

To God Be the Glory

“Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory, for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness! You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord! He is their help and their shield.” -Psalm 115: 1, 11 (ESV) [Read Psalm 115]

Psalms 115-118 were sung by Jews after the Passover Meal. Psalm 115 may well have been the psalm sung by Jesus and his disciples after they finished the meal which we know as “The Last Supper” (see Mark 14:26). Psalm 115 is a magnificent psalm of praise that can be outlined as follows:

1. God Reigns (vv. 1-3)
2. God Lives (vv. 4-8)
3. God Gives (vv. 9-15)
4. God Deserves Our Praise (vv. 16-18)

All people who know the Lord can exult and give praise. “Alleluia! For the Lord God omnipotent reigns!” (Revelation 19:6, NKJV). He reigns as sovereign God of the universe. Because of the Lord’s steadfast love and faithfulness and his ever-continuous reign, we who fear—stand in awe—of Him praise and magnify Him.

God Almighty is above any idol and worthy of worship. Scholars remind us that after the Babylonian captivity, the Israelites no longer went after idols. In the seventy-year exile there, they saw firsthand the fallacy of idol worship. As we sometimes say, that “cured” then of their sin of going after idols. The poetic device of anthromorphism—of giving human characteristics to things not human—was used to describe the fallacy of idols. They have mouths but do not speak. They have eyes but do not see. They have ears but do not hear. They have noses but do not smell; hands but have no power to help; feet but the idols could not walk; they had to be carried from place to place. The sad thought is that we become like what we worship. Those who worship idols become insensate like them. By contrast, worshiping our God who lives enables us to have ears that hear his Word, eyes that see needs we can fill in Jesus’ name, hands that are eager to do His work. Even our worship rises as “sweet incense” and our gifts “as a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God” (Philippians 4:18).

Trust is the theme of the third section (vv. 9-15) of Psalm 115. As we trust in him, His blessings are poured out upon us. Even in the hard times, we grow stronger because of our dependence upon Him and our unfailing trust in Him. Because He is the maker of heaven and earth, we should worship Him—not His creation—and certainly not what we think we have “created” for ourselves. Take verse 15 for what it says and promises: “May you be blessed by the lord who made heaven and earth.”

The psalmist saw only the living praising the Lord, but we as Christians look forward to praise forever in the courts of our God. Psalm 115:17 could subtly refer to those who worship “dead” idols as being themselves dead and therefore unable and unworthy to praise God. One of the principal points made by this psalm is the vivid contrast between those who worship the living God and those who worship dead idols, or the gods they make for themselves. But praise be to God, “we will bless the Lord from this time forth and forevermore.” Amen! - Ethelene Dyer Jones 04.24.2016

Lessons from the Psalms: Praise, Prayer and Promises

“My heart is steadfast, O God! I will sing and make melody with all my being! Awake, O harp and lyre! I will awake the dawn! I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples; For your steadfast love is great above the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the clouds. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens! Let your glory be over all the earth! That your beloved ones may be delivered, give salvation by your right hand and answer me!….Oh grant us help against the foe, for vain is the salvation of man! With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes.” -Psalm 108:1-5; 12-13 (ESV) [Read Psalm 108]

This Psalm of David is a repetition of portions of earlier Psalms by the great poet of Israel. Compare Psalm 108:1-5 with Psalm 57:7-11. In his exuberance, and in praising God with harp and lyre, the psalmist thinks he will “awake the dawn,” so happy is he with praising the Lord God. He will sing the Lord’s praises among all the peoples, for great is God’s faithfulness and steadfast love!

Verse six is a prayer of deliverance and is inserted between the verses which are like Psalm 57:7-11 and those that are like Psalm 60:5-12 (which are those in Psalm 108:7-13). In verses 7-13 God himself speaks, assuring David that when he goes out to conquer Shechem, the Valley of Succoth, Gilead, Manasseh, Ephraim and Judah, they are all parts of the land that God promised to Israel. Moab, Edom and Philistia are neighboring lands that also belong to the Lord. David will be victorious, because these lands are already the Lord’s. David prays for success in battle in verse 12: “O grant us help against the foe, for vain is the salvation of man!” Man cannot save himself, even in battle and with a strong army unless the Lord is in the battle with the army. Knowing this truth about conquering those nations God promised to Israel, David encouraged the people with the victorious cry: “With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes” (v. 13). He promises to go with God and to allow God to direct him as he conquers the strong nations then occupying and fortifying the Promised Land.

In Psalm 108 we see a stalwart king going forth into battle to conquer because the Lord was directing him. During World War II our nation seemed to have direction, to know that to stop oppression we had to enter the war. Much prayer and supplication went up during that period for wisdom for our leaders in battle and especially for our commander-in-chief, the president of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Churches had “honor roll” reminders of the men (and women) from their membership who were serving in the military, many on the battlefields of the world. Prayer was made for them by name, urgently, at each congregational gathering of the church. Congregants were given lists of names and urged to pray consistently and regularly for those persons in harm’s way, defending our freedoms.

Now our nation is far removed from the confidence we had then in the causes we champion and the people we support with prayer. We need to praise God who will fight our battles. We need to acknowledge Him as Lord. We need prayer for unity of purpose, forgiveness for our sins, personally and nationally, and promises from the people that we will serve and honor God. A clarion call is going out: return to God. Seek his face and turn from our wicked ways. Only then will God hear from heaven, forgive our sin, and heal our land. These solemn conditions and the promise is given to us in 2 Chronicles 7:14 and reiterated in Psalm 108 with its strong message: “In God we shall do valiantly.” May we heed and follow. -Ethelene Dyer Jones 04.17.2016.

Lessons from the Psalms: Walk with Integrity

“I will walk with integrity of heart within my house; I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless. I hate the work of those who fall away; it shall not cling to me. A perverse heart shall be far from me; I will know nothing of evil.” -Psalm 101:2b-4 (ESV) [Read Psalm 101]

After several Psalms by anonymous authors, Psalm 101 is again attributed to Israel’s great psalm-writer, David, King of Israel. Psalm 101 is recognized by scholars as a royal psalm, one that gives the place the Davidic monarchy holds in God’s plan for His people. It describes the idealistic kind of leader a king or monarch should be.

Summarized, verses 1-4 declare that the king will seek to be blameless in his conduct and actions. Next, in verses 5-8, the psalm indicates the king will seek to destroy the wicked and favor the faithful and righteous people. The determination of the monarch himself is the key verse of this psalm: “I will walk with integrity of heart within my house.”

Oh, that every ruler of a nation would make such a vow before the Lord: to walk in integrity and to know nothing of evil. How differently would a nation be ruled if the monarch, president, whoever is at the helm of government would determine so to walk before the people, and lead the people themselves to follow in faithful and upright paths.

The focus in this psalm is political ethics. The history of David’s 40-year rule indicate that he did not always follow his own determination to be filled with integrity. He succumbed to temptation and knew much heartache because of wrong choices. He had severe problems with sins of commission and omission in his life. He failed to have the trust of his sons and sometimes of his generals. But there was good during his 40-year reign. The borders of Israel’s kingdom were expanded. He gathered the wealth so that his son Solomon could build the Temple in Jerusalem. He was in the direct earthly ancestral line of Jesus Christ the Messiah. He authored many psalms which we still read as the inspired word of God.

I well remember a lecture my father had with me before I went away to college. He sat me down, and in a serious frame of mind said that I should remember that I had been reared to choose the good and right over the wrong and that which would degrade my character and reflect poorly upon family upbringing. “Remember who you are and where you came from,” was his advice. That strong admonition followed me from my home into a different world, one where my decisions mattered greatly in the direction my life would take and what I might become.

Samuel Johnson 1709-1784), English writer, gave this advice: “Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.”

Eugene Peterson in The Message Bible renders Psalm 101:1 in this way: “My theme song is God’s love and justice, and I’m singing it right to you, God.” With a theme as lofty as this before one as he goes into the avenues and byways of life, how could he walk any other way than with integrity and purpose?           -Ethelene Dyer Jones 04.10.2016

A Prayer for God to Protect the Faithful

“Blessed is the man whom you discipline, O Lord, and whom you teach out of yoru law, to give him rest from days of trouble, until a pit is dug for the wicked. For the Lord will not forsake his people; he will not abandon his heritage; for justice will return to the righteous, and all the upright in heart will follow it.” -Psalm 94:12-15(ESV) [Read Psalm 94]

Psalm 94 is a community lament, with author not given. The subject is the injustice meted out against the faithful, not by an enemy power but by those who are within the nation who do not practice justice and upright living. Some scholars believe the psalm has reference to the reign of wicked King Manasseh (recorded in 2 Kings 21). He was king of the kingdom of Judah from 696-642 B. C., and had one of the longest reigns of any of the Judean kings. A son of King Hezekiah, he did not follow his father in faithfulness to God, but was wicked and did not acknowledge God as Lord. In 2 Kings 21:10-16, we see how his unfaithfulness led to Judah’s destruction.

Even though this psalm voices a prayer for God to bring justice to those who cause calamity to come upon those who disobey Him, there follows a prayer for God to bring comfort and help to the faithful. The psalmist has a firm belief that God will never forsake those who trust Him.

We can easily apply the lessons of this psalm to our own day and to our own nation. A rhetorical question is asked in verse 20: “Can wicked rulers be allied with you, those who frame injustice by statute?” Of course the answer is that such rulers who go against known statutes of God Almighty cannot be allied with Him. What statutes could we name in our own day that bring answers to this question? Are not pro-choice, same-sex marriage, and entitlement assistance not within the parameters of manmade laws that ignore God’s teachings? Other statutes passed and in operation also fall within questionable bounds. Man has made laws to convenience his own self-centered and sinful pursuits instead of giving attention to the commandments of God. There will be “pay day some day” as noted in verse 23: God will “bring back on them their iniquity and wipe them out for their wickedness.; the Lord our God will wipe them out.”

The psalmist declares that in the end, God knows who is evil and who is good, and His judgments will be just and sure. Moses warned in Deuteronomy 4: 25 that the people were not to provoke God to anger with their evil doings. That warning is still intact and still comes from God. We have a clarion call to heed God or suffer the consequences. Will we? - Ethelene Dyer Jones 04.03.2016

Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken

“Glorious things of thee are spoken, O city of God.” – Psalm 87:3 (KJV).

It was early in the morning on the first day of the week. The sun had not yet risen. It was still dark, as we learn from John 20:1. Mary Magdalene, early, was at the tomb where Jesus had been laid and found the stone rolled away and the body gone. She hurried to tell Peter. Peter and the other disciple (probably John, who wrote the account) hurried to the tomb and found it empty. “They did not understand the Scripture, the he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes.” (John 20:9-10).

But Mary Magdalene remained in the garden, weeping near the tomb. As she stooped to look into the tomb, she saw two angels who asked her why she was weeping. Turning from the tomb, she saw someone whom she supposed to be the gardener. He asked her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” (John 20:15), It was only when her name was called, “Mary!” did she recognize the One speaking to her as the risen Lord, and she cried out: “ ‘Rabboni!’ (which means Teacher).” Jesus then gave Mary Magdalene a mission to go and tell the disciples that He was risen and would ascend to His Father. The mission for which Jesus came into the world had been completed. He died a sacrificial death. He arose victorious. “Go…tell.” This is a command still reverberating through the ages.

From Zion, holy city of God in the heavens, Jesus came to earth, ministered and taught for a few brief years, and then death claimed Him, a sacrificial death on the cross. And on that resurrection morning after being in the grave three days, he broke the bonds of death and the grave. These earthly events took place in and around the earthly city of Zion, or Jerusalem. From Zion flowed out the good news to all people. “He is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!” Jesus gave new meaning to the city of God, Zion, the new Jerusalem.

Because of His death and resurrection, we, too, can know life and expect to live in that heavenly city.

John Newton (1725-1807), great poet and songwriter, spurred by the scripture from Psalm 87:3, wrote the words to the hymn, “Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken” which tells of the place where we in victory will one day meet and live with the Lord of Glory. Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) composed the majestic tune selected to go with Newton’s words. Think “glory!” as you hum or sing this song on this Resurrection Day:

      “Glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city of our God.

       He whose word cannot be broken, Formed thee for His own abode;

       On the Rock of Ages founded, What can shake thy sure repose?

       With salvation’s walls surrounded, Thou may smile at all thy foes.

      “See, the streams of living waters, Springing from eternal love,

       Well supply thy sons and daughters, And all fear of want remove;

       Who can faint, while such a river Ever does their thirst assuage?

       Grace which, like the Lord the giver, Never fails from age to age.

       Round each habitation hovering, See the cloud and fire appear

       For a glory and a covering, Showing that the Lord is near!

       Glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city of our God;

       He whose word cannot be broken, Formed thee for His own abode.”

-Ethelene Dyer Jones 03.27.2016