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

Psalm 30 is an envelope Psalm that  begins and ends with praise. It starts,
    I will exalt you, Lord  (v. 1)
and it concludes
    O Lord my God, I will praise you forever (v. 12). 

Inside this envelope of praise, the poet tells how he moved from despair to thanksgiving. The story begins with his intense need. He was in a  life-threatening situation and felt dragged into a dark pit. He was stuck in desperation and despair. 

Then God rescued him.  When he felt most abandoned, God showed up and pulled him out of the pit. The poet says God was angry, but that “his anger lasts only a moment; then he gives favor forever” (v. 5). The poet wept for one brutal night, but in the morning God gave the gift of joy (v. 5). The poet was shuffling hopelessly through life, but God set his feet dancing (v. 11).  

That’s Psalm 30, the poet’s thank you card to God, tucked nicely in an envelope of praise. 

Let’s pray our own envelope prayer, like the poet did. 

Lord, we give you thanks, we give you praise. Though parts of the world are darkened by industrial pollution and wildfire smoke, yet the sun still shines and crops still grow. Though right wing politicians mock truth and left wing politicians propose utopian fantasies, your law still governs our hearts and minds. Though the church strays into errors of liberalism and fundamentalism, still your word is preached and prayers are offered. Though our lives are narrow and selfish, you have made your home in us. We give you thanks.  

You answered our deepest prayers. The woman whose son has been decades in prison is at last able to visit him. The man who fell again into pornography confessed and started over. The boy dying of leukemia responded to treatment: his prospects are hopeful. The victim of unthinkable abuse has begun to find healing and forgiveness. The minister who scolded his people every week with the bad news of sin has at last found the good news of grace. We who resented the church and your laws and your people now feel your Spirit softening our hard hearts with a new way of love. 

We say, “Thank you, good Lord.” Thank you for intervening in our sickness. Thank you for showing us our sin and pointing us to a new life. Thank you for not abandoning us to the deadly consequences of our ways. Thank you for finding us drifting on the ocean and giving us a compass and setting our sail for home.

Where we were abused, you taught us forgiveness. Where we were lonely, you became our companion.  Where we were isolated you called us into community. Where we made bad decisions, you gave us grace to start over. When our carelessness broke relationships, you taught us how to rebuild. When all our roads led to despair, you built a bridge of hope. 

Thank you for not leaving us in the pit we dug. Thank you for shining light into our darkness. Thank you for rescuing us from our enemies. Thank you for being our help, our stronghold and our salvation. 

Amen.

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

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

Psalm 29 is a thunderstorm bookended in gifts.  It starts with our gift to God, saying,
“Give to the Lord the glory due his name
  Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness”  (v. 1). 

And it concludes: 
“The Lord gives strength to his people;
        The Lord blesses his people with peace” (v.11). 

Between our gift of praise to God, and God’s gift of peace to us, the psalm describes God’s power in a storm. It is much like that passage in Job where God speaks in a thunderstorm. Elihu said, 

“Who can understand how he spreads out the clouds,
        how he thunders from his pavilion?
    See how he scatters his lightning about him,
        Bathing the depths of the sea” (Job 36:29-30). 

One summer our family vacationed on the eastern edge of the Rockies. We stayed at a campsite in our thin nylon dome tent with matching blue nylon rain sheet. The made-in-China tent was supposed to sleep six, but the four of us filled it up. The gravel pad under the tent bent regular tent pegs, so we substituted 12-inch nails driven in with an axe. The tent floor had a small hole created by campfire embers from some forgotten expedition, but fortunately I had patched it with duct tape. 

One night after our evening walk to the running water and flush toilets at the “Trading Post”, the late summer twilight darkened quickly as black clouds hurried over the mountains. Large raindrops splattered on the dusty path so we crawled into our sleeping bags, zipped the nylon door, and waited. Heavy rain lashed our thin shelter and bursts of lightning flashed blue light through the walls. After each burst of light, a dark pause, then a rumble and an awesome crack of thunder. Water streamed down the flysheet and flowed in shallow rivers away from the tent. The duct tape on the floor held fast.

That’s probably the least protected I’ve ever been in a thunderstorm. It was beautiful and it was awesome, but in a  fearful and dangerous way. Like the voice of God.

Let’s pray the familiar verses of Psalm 29. 

The voice of the Lord is over the waters;
    the God of glory thunders,
    the Lord thunders over the mighty waters.
The voice of the Lord is powerful;
    the voice of the Lord is majestic.
The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars;
    the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon.
He makes Lebanon leap like a calf,
    Sirion like a young wild ox.
The voice of the Lord strikes
    with flashes of lightning.
The voice of the Lord shakes the desert;
    the Lord shakes the Desert of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord twists the oaks
    and strips the forests bare.
And in his temple all cry, ‘Glory!’ (vv. 3-9).

Amen.

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

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

Psalm 28 is a simple, classic psalm. It has nine verses. The first five are a cry for help. The last four give thanks for God’s help and deliverance. As usual in psalms of this type, the poet gives no clue about the event or experience that turned his desperate cry for help into grateful confidence.

Let’s pray some phrases from this psalm. 

To you, Lord, I call;
  you are my rock,
  do not turn a deaf ear to me.
For if you remain silent,
  I will be like those who go down to the pit (v. 1).

Lord, we have been in the pit and we do not want to go there again. A pit of depression, where our world is formless and dark. A pit of hopelessness, where life has no meaning. A pit of lethargy, where our efforts are futile. A pit of pain, where live in broken relationships. 

O Lord, when you are silent, we feel our feet slipping at the edge of the pit, we feel our heart hardening into fear, we feel our mind flirting with insanity. O Lord, be our rock, hear and answer us before we fall into darkness and chaos. 

As the poet says,
    Do not drag me away with the wicked,
   with those who do evil, 
who speak friendly words,
  that hide a heart of malice.
Repay them for what they have done,
  Give them what they deserve
Tear them down
    and never build them up again (vv. 3-4).

Lord, in the United States, the police handcuff perpetrators and march them past TV cameras on the way to court. O Lord, don’t make us do the perp-walk, don’t drag us away with the wicked, don’t send us in handcuffs to be judged. 

The wicked hide malicious hearts behind friendly words and smiles. Help us to see through their facade, help us identify the self-promoting televangelists, the dishonest telemarketers, the preachers greedy for their own glory. Help us resist those who try to control us with manipulation, fear, deceit. They have no regard for your work . Lord, we regard your work. You have taught us to wash our hands and cleanse our hearts and come to you in prayer and praise. Help us resist those who entice us back to our eating disorders and shopping obsessions and feelings of entitlement, greed and anger.

As the poet prayed,
    Praise be to the Lord, 
  for he has heard my cry for mercy.
The Lord is my strength and my shield,
  my heart trusts in him and he helps me.
My heart leaps for joy
  and I praise him in song (vv. 6-7).

O Lord, you have come to us as light dispersing our darkness. You have come as strength, enabling us to resist our fatal attractions. You have come as a shield, protecting from the evils that tempt us. You come as a rock of salvation, and our slipping feet at last stand firm. 

We sing to you songs of praise. You fill our hearts with joy and hope. We lift our hands, we shout your name, we trample the forces of evil. 

As the psalm says,
    The Lord is the strength of his people,
        a fortress of salvation for his anointed one.
    Save your people and bless their inheritance,
      Be their shepherd and carry them forever (vv. 8-9). 

Yes, Lord, be our strength. Rescue us, bless our inheritance, carry us in your heart, and be our shepherd forever.

Amen.

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