Psalm 33 – Day 1
“For the word of the Lord holds true, and we can trust everything he does." – Psalm 33:4 NLT
Do you trust God? I mean really trust Him? If we're honest, we have to admit that there are a lot of things in our lives that we either refuse to trust God with or we fear trusting to His care. But David reminds us that we can trust God with anything and everything. After all, He made everything that exists in the universe, from the solar system to the earth itself. He created the land and the oceans, and everything that lives, including you and me. He is greater than the most powerful nation on the planet. He can easily frustrate their best-laid plans and bring to nothing all their schemes for glory and power. And this great, powerful, awesome God not only loves righteousness and justice, He loves seeing that it happen, and He is powerful enough to bring it about. But the key to comprehending and appreciating the power and justice of God is to have a right relationship with Him. David knew that the Hebrew people had been chosen by God. Not because of anything they had done or because they somehow deserved His selection of them. No, God had chosen them and made them His own. He had blessed them with His presence and prospered them with His power, often in spite of their own stubbornness and stupidity. So when David considers the greatness and the graciousness of God, he can't help but say "sing for joy to the Lord!" He tells us to praise Him and rejoice in the fact that we have been chosen by Him. We are to fear Him, honor Him, respect Him, and rely on His unfailing love. We are to put our hope in Him, understanding that He alone is who we can trust. Only God can save. Only God can rescue. Only God can deliver. So we put our trust in Him. Hope is anticipatory. Hope is expectant. Because hope is based on truth – the reality that God is faithful, powerful, merciful, and fully capable to accomplish His will on our behalf. It flows from His unfailing, unceasing, unquenchable love for us. He loves us. We belong to Him. He will not abandon us or forget about us. We can trust Him to do what is just and right on our behalf, even when we might not understand or like what is going on at the moment. We can praise Him preemptively because we KNOW He is going to come through for us eventually.
Father, I praise You now for what You are going to do, not just for what You've already done. Your grace and mercy to me is guaranteed by Your own character. Your love for me never fails. Your power on my behalf is never limited. So I can praise You now for what You have yet to do. Because You will always do what is right and just. Amen