May 4, 2017: Day 124 – Psalm 124
May 5, 2017I went in to see a member of our church yesterday who was in the hospital for minor surgery (is there such a thing as minor surgery?). Anyway, we read this psalm and for some reason it proved to be especially meaningful. In the face of having overcome a difficult medical situation we are able to say in vs.6: “Blessed be the Lord who has not given us as prey to their teeth.” We can be thankful that when an organ, even if it is a useless one, is removed we have not succumbed, or been given up, to the elements which would seek our life.
You know, this psalm really begins with a key verse: “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side…” We can all rest assured that God is on our side. If God were not on our side…, well, I don’t even want to think about it. The Psalmist thinks about it and lists a whole bunch of things that would happen if God were not on our side. Now, I don’t want any of you to jump to a double effect where you say: so, if God is on our side, then it means He isn’t on the side of…, and then you fill in the blank (wow, I have a lot of …). That is not where this psalm is going and that is not where we ought to go either. Just rest assured that God is on our side now and forever more.
If by Rudyard Kipling
That poem has been burned in my memory from the 8th grade. Each student had to memorize a poem and say it in front of the whole class. I chose “If”. Great call Dot.