Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Psalm 87 is a fascinating but enigmatic poem, about the City of Jerusalem. At this point in the Psalms, Jerusalem is frequently mentioned as a city destroyed by the Babylonians, mourned by the Israelites, mocked by the nations, and ignored by God. 

But in Psalm 87, there is no hint of the destruction. Instead, Jerusalem is the city God loves and favors, almost like a summer cottage on a granite rock, caressed by gentle lake breezes, protected by a forest of evergreen trees. a place of glory and sunshine and life, God’s home on earth. 

This psalm is also amazing for the place it assigns to the nations of the earth. In the poem, God does a brief roll call of nations that have been Israel’s enemies: cruel world-dominating empires like Egypt and Babylon; smaller and closer enemies like Philistia and Tyre; and even the distant Ethiopia, .

God does not threaten these nations with judgement and destruction. Instead he calls them to become citizens of his favorite city, Jerusalem. He says, “They were born here”–that is, they have the same rights of citizenship as native-born Israelites. In our world today, we see nations and rulers making laws that exclude foreigners and undocumented aliens and people from terrorist countries. But in this psalm, King God sends a worldwide invitation for nations to become members of his city and citizens of his kingdom.

Let’s pray. 

Our father, Psalm 87 pictures you, the creator of all, welcoming the nations into your kingdom. Nations that have warred against you, who have killed your people, taken captives, and destroyed your city and your temple.

In many psalms, your people ask you to take vengeance on their enemies, but in this psalm you show a heart of reconciliation and peace to every nation. Here you begin to undo the work of the tower of Babel–the confusion of tongues and the scattering of nations. 

O God, we pray today that you will work among our modern nations.
– Heal the hermit kingdom, North Korea.
– Bring your rule to a restored yet corrupt Russia.
– Bring the citizenship of your city to war-shattered Syria.
– Bring peace to the violent nation of Israel.
– Bring hope and land to the Palestinians.
– Bring justice to all refugees of war and violence.
– Bring truth to the United States.
– Bring wisdom to Canada as our politicians descend again into pettiness and foolishness.

O God, make of the nations one kingdom, ruled by your son, speaking the language of peace, paying allegiance to your rule and your fatherhood. 

And may we share the poet’s song, “All my fountains are in you” (v. 7). Yes, the fountains of life are not in the things we own, or the nations we conquer, or the temples we build; they are found in the city of God, in the place where you dwell on earth.  

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.

In the first four verses of Psalm 86, the poet references himself twelve times. His prayer focuses on himself and his needs. God is almost an outsider in this psalm, a distant being who might be persuaded to help. Listen to the prayer. 
     Hear me, Lord, and answer me,
        for I am poor and needy (v. 1).
    You are my God, have mercy on me,
        for I call to you all day long (v. 3). 

By verse 8, the poet’s focus has done a U-turn. In three verses at the centre of the poem, every line speaks of God, and the poet does not appear even once. Listen to his praise:
    Among the gods, there is none like you, Lord;
      No deeds can compare with yours.
    All the nations you have made
      will come and worship before you, Lord;
      they will bring glory to your name.
    For you are great and do marvellous deeds;
       you alone are God (vv. 8-11)..  

I like the way this psalm shows the shifting focus of a person who is seeking God. We often get fixated on ourselves–our problems, our poverty, our needs, and how God could help if only he would listen and respond. Then somehow we find grace and wisdom to let go of ourselves, if only briefly, to focus on the great God we serve. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, like the poet we tell you our complaints. We have heard great things about how amazing it is to serve you–but today we are stuck in the mud again. The scriptures are dry as dust. Our prayers are meandering and unfocused . Our lives are anxious and distracted. We fear the isolation of a long COVID winter. We worry about worldwide failures in politics and economics, about civil unrest and disappearing freedoms.

Our father, as we grow older, we have not discovered the joys we hoped for, only new difficulties and new sorrows. As Fosdick describes it, “…our Edens are behind us with flaming angels at the gate. We have had friends and lost them and something has gone from our hearts that does not return. . . ; we have sinned, and though forgiven, the scars are still upon us; we have been weathered by the rains and floods and winds” (Fosdick, Harry Emerson. The Meaning of Faith. Good Press: Ebook, 2019. Original work published 1917). 

But with the poet, we turn our focus to you. You alone are the God of creation, who hung our little planet in space, and set it spinning night and day, circling through the seasons. You alone are the God of salvation, who unexpectedly became a pilgrim in our world, and set up housekeeping among us, and died like a criminal. But you rose again and you offer us the gift of resurrection life. You alone are the God who gives us breath, who  hears the prayers we breathe, who breathes your Holy Spirit into us, who sends us news of your kingdom and your coming. 

Oh God, we need fresh news of you. Do not forget us. Send us your compassion and grace, be slow to anger and full of love and mercy toward us. With the poet we pray,
  Give us a sign of your goodness,
      so our enemies will see it and be put to shame,
      for you, Lord, have helped us and comforted us (v. 17). 

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Today we look at Psalm 85, which uses the phrase, “Turn back” five times. 

Verse one says to God, “You turned back the captivity of Jacob”. Verse three says to God, “You turned back your fierce anger.” Do you ever feel it would help if God changed his attitude toward you, if he turned your life around? Perhaps he might turn back his anger toward you, or free you from captivity to guilt and fears and obsessions.  

The next two occurrences of “turn back” ask God to turn us around. Verse four says, “Turn us again, God our Savior, and put away your displeasure toward us”. Verse six says, “Will you not turn us again, revive us, that we may rejoice in you?” Yes, we need to turn a corner in our lives. Perhaps we need revival, a u-turn in our life toward God. Perhaps we need to turn our plodding emotional experiences to a habit of rejoicing.  

The final occurrence of “turn back” is in verse 8: “God promises peace to his people, but let them not turn back to folly.” 

Let’s pray some of the words and phrases from Psalm 85. 

Our father, revive us, turn us, so we may rejoice in you (v. 6). Your gift of new life is not just a package you deliver to our doorstep; it is the gift that Christ himself comes to live within us. As Paul said, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20). O Christ, live your life within us, help us to live your life as our own, help us to hear and obey your voice within. 

As the poet says, 
  I will listen to what God the Lord says;
      he promises peace to his people. . .
      but let them not turn to folly (v. 8). 

O Lord, our world resounds with noise and folly, the noise of hurricanes and politics and video games and advertisements. We are deafened by the  noise within–anxiety for family and friends, concerns for finances, stresses about the future, the noise of temptations and obsessions and lust. Teach us to turn down the volume on our noise. Teach us to listen to your voice within. 

In the quiet, we hear you promise peace to your people. As Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you” (John 14:27). O Lord, make us a people of peace. Help us walk in your peace through a winter of COVID-19, help us discern your peace in our conflicted lives, help us knit our families together in peace, to build our communities in the peace of your Spirit. 

As the poet says,
    Love and faithfulness meet together;
      righteousness and peace kiss each other (v. 10).

O Lord, in our war-torn world, in our conflicted lives, how good it is that we do not choose between righteousness and peace. For in your vision of the world, righteousness and peace kiss each other. Love and faithfulness meet together. Help us to be peaceably right and lovingly faithful to you, to your word, and to Christ within. 

Grant us the blessing Psalm 85 promises:
  The Lord will indeed give what is good,
      and our land will yield its harvest.
  Righteousness goes before him
      and prepares the way for his steps (vv. 12-13).. 

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Psalm 84 paints some of my favorite pictures of a good relationship with God. Here are three of them:

First, the poet speaks of God’s temple in Jerusalem as God’s home. Of all the words that touch us, “home” is close to the top. The poet begins:
  How lovely is your dwelling place,
      Lord Almighty (v. 1).

The temple is not only God’s home, for the poet continues:
    Even the sparrow has found a home
        and the swallow a nest for herself,
        where she may have her young–
    a place near your altar,
        Lord Almighty (v. 3).

The birds have a safe place near God’s altar. What a wonderful picture! There where sheep and bulls are sacrificed in a river of blood, the flitting swallow makes her home where she can have her young. God’s presence is safe for all who come home to it. As the poet says, 
    Happy are those who live in your house,
        ever singing your praise (v. 4). 

Psalm 84 presents a second picture, the poet’s journey, his pilgrimage to the temple to meet God. He writes:
  Happy are those whose strength is in you,
      in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
  As they go through the valley of Baca,
      they make it a place of springs;
      the early rain covers it with pools (vv. 5-6).

Travelling a dirt road on the way to the temple in Jerusalem, the writer finds strength and refreshment. Because it’s not just a dirt road for his sandals, it’s a highway in his heart. His heart yearns for God (v. 1) and rejoices at the thought of visiting God’s home and the swallow’s home, because that is also where his heart is most at home.

A third picture in Psalm 84 is where the poet says,
  One day in your courts is better
       than a thousand elsewhere.
  I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
      than live in the tents of wickedness (vv 10-11).
Better a menial task in God’s home than comfortable lodgings with his enemies. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, when the poet was crushed by powerful enemies and drowning in seas of despair, he prayed psalms of desperation. What a welcome break is this psalm of joy and hope and homecoming. Thank you for shining a light into my darkness, for reminding me of a safe place where even birds can nest, for teaching me that my road to your presence can be a glad highway of the heart. 

We have built other highways of the heart, but today we leave them untravelled. 

One is a highway of fantasy, imagining and longing for easy relationships, wealth, and respect. But that’s a dead end highway, for our reality never matches our fantasies. 

We have built a highway of despair, when we have found life difficult and sad and unendurable. We soldier on in the dark , doing our duty, not daring to hope for the light. This is another dead end, for you are the light of our lives and you lead us on the highway out of darkness.

Some of us have a highway of self-confidence, where we manage our own lives, convinced that hard work and discipline will achieve the outcomes we desire. But that highway leaves us isolated and unhappy, and alone.

Today we choose your highway, the highway of strength. As the writer of Psalm 84 says: 
    Happy are those whose strength is in you, 
       in whose heart are the highways to Zion (v. 5). 
You are our strength, You are our heart’s home. With the poet, we journey from strength to strength. With the birds we rest near your altar.

 Fulfill for us the promise of Psalm 84, our Lord:

    No good thing will you withhold
        from those who walk uprightly. 
    O Lord of hosts, 
        happy is everyone who trusts in you (v. 12).

Amen

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.

In Psalm 83, the poet tells about a time of national crisis, when ten nations around Israel conspired to attack and destroy Israel and claim the land. The poet’s prayer is that God will consume these enemies like a California wildfire, that he will terrify them with hurricanes like those that menace the Gulf of Mexico, that he will make them whirling dust like the tornados that sweep south central Alberta. 

But amazingly, the poet’s last petition is that the enemies will come to know God. He prays:
  Let them know that you alone,
      whose name is the Lord,
      are most high over all the earth (v. 18). 

Let’s pray against some of our enemies today.  

Our father, we pray first against the enemies of the world you created. We pray about climate change, though some question whether it is a natural variation in temperatures or whether it is caused by pollution. Either way, it presents a challenge, as famines and water shortages ravage Africa, as uncontrolled fires consume Brazil, Siberia, and the Pacific Northwest, as hurricanes and cyclones become stronger and more damaging, and as Arctic ice melts away. O Lord, order or reorder your creation for the salvation of humankind.

We pray also against the raging of nations. You made us all of one blood, but you separated the people and the languages at Babel, and we have fought each other ever since. Each tribe and nation protects its turf, and uses race and culture and power to expand territory and diminish neighbors. Lord, still the raging nations. 

A third enemy is religion. In your name, we implement crusades and jihads, killing and conquering, unrighteously building our vision of a righteous society, establishing unjust rule in your name. Lord, bring quickly the rule of your son, who will teach us true religion and just government. 

We pray also against the enemies of your church.  

We pray against divisiveness. Since the Reformation, churches and denominations have split unhappily on lines of doctrine, spiritual gifts, politics, and personality cults. O Lord, bring your church to unity of faith and baptism and purpose. 

We pray against the rationalism that constricts your church. Too often, our Bible studies and sermons are mere intellectual exercises to develop a technical interpretation of scripture, to discover the precise meaning of Greek verbs, to find the most illuminating cultural explanation of obscure sayings. O Lord, lead us back to our plain duty, to love you instead of arguing about the Bible, to love people instead of using scripture to bludgeon them into good behavior. 

We pray against complacency in the church and in our own lives. Fill us with yourself, fill us with the fire of your spirit that will refine us and fit us for your service. Fill us with a fire of love that will consume our heart and soul and mind and strength. 

We pray against the enemies of our souls. Drive from our hearts every stronghold of the world, every lust of the flesh, every influence of the devil.

O Lord, help us to walk today as Jesus walked: to do the will of the father, to discern and denounce evil, to help and heal and pray. 

Amen

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.