Our One True Hope...

So it's Day 3 of my new devotion...  I didn't set out intending to write every day, and I'm still not quite ready to make that commitment, but we'll see where this goes... (Warning... this one is a little heavy, but it's what is on my heart this morning...)

Today the Psalm is Psalm 130...  When I first read it, it didn't hit me...  So I slowed down and read it again, and again, and then again...  I started to put myself in the shoes of the writer...  What was he feeling?  Had I ever felt that before?  And that's when I really started to get this Psalm...

In verse 1, the writer says, "Out of the depths I cry to You, O LORD..."  Out of the depths...  I've been there before, it's a wretched place to be, but sadly I can't say my first response is always to cry out to God...  Usually I go looking for relief at the mall, or in a movie, or too often, a bag of M&M's...

Einstein once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting a different result...  I guess by his definition, I must be a little insane, because more often than not, when I find myself, even on the ledges just above the depths, I try too many other places before I cry out to God...

Now I'm thinking that the writer is suffering because of some sin because he talks about sin in verses 3 & 8...  But again, it prompts me to ask, does my own sin ever burden me like it is the writer?  Or am I too busy trying to escape it that I don't really notice...

But here's what I love about the Psalm...  Instead of running to all the other places he could run to for relief, he just waits for God, knowing that the only true relief will come from Him...  He writes, "I wait for the LORD (Yahweh...  the biggest name for God, representing ALL His glory and greatness)...  my soul waits..."  Don't you just sense this longing in him...  "In His Word, I put my hope..."  He's not trying to escape his pain, he's just waiting for God to show up and redeem his pain...

He says again, "My soul waits for the LORD more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning..."  That's some pretty serious waiting and watching...  I've never been a watchmen, but I can imagine that darkness was a really scary time for them...  And think about this...  The watchmen waited for the morning because they were CERTAIN that it would come!!

And that's what the author of this Psalm gets...  He can wait for God to show up because he is just as certain that God is coming as he is certain that the morning will come after the dark!!

And here's why...  "O Israel, put your hope in the LORD, for with the LORD is unfailing love and with Him is full redemption.  He Himself will redeem Israel from all their sins."

He waits on the LORD, in the midst of his deepest suffering because he KNOWS...  Beyond a shadow of a doubt...  that God will show up because of His GREAT love!!  And that great love will bring full...  complete... redemption where NOTHING is lacking!!  And God Himself does it!!  He reaches down into the pit of our life... the muck of our mess and lifts us out...  If we just wait for Him!

Nothing will EVER bring such satisfying relief, such complete redemption as God Himself...  I don't know about you, but I think it's time for me, no matter what's causing me to feel like I'm in the depths, to stop this insanity and run to Him!

Have a GREAT day...