Approaching God

Psalms 103

Come, read to me some poem,

Some simple heartfelt lay,

That shall soothe this restless feeling,

And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,

Not from the bards sublime,

Whose distant footsteps echo

Through the corridors of Time.

...

Then read from the treasured volume

The poem of thy choice,

And lend to the rhyme of the poet

The beauty of thy voice.

...

Excepts from "The Day Is Done" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Thinking on the beginning of Psalms 103...

A Psalm of David. My soul, praise thou the Lord, and all that is within me, praise his holy Name. My soul, praise thou the Lord, and forget not all his benefits.

Psalms 103:1-2 GNV

A very, very Silent Saturday it was, that day after which we remember Good Friday and before that Resurrection Sunday known as Easter. For some then there was all of three years of having been with Jesus hearing Him speak often repeating the same truths for others to hear. And then there were the miracles, healing, water changed to wine, thousands fed from five barley loaves and two fish, or seven loaves of bread, and even several brought back from the dead, most recent and very notable His friend Lazarus. He had even preceded that event telling a story using specifically the name of Lazarus. But this one day all was very, very silent. Even the ability to cry possibly stifled from utter disbelief that He is dead. He is gone. Even thinking of Psalms 103 was a meaningless jumble of words, "forget not all His benefits". Benefits? Who is talking "benefits" at a time like this?

For us today tomorrow there will be many preachers who will eloquently expound using every homeletical skill to open the wonders of the resurrection. These might be thought of as the "grand old masters" of which Longfellow speaks. And they are so necessary to dig down deep to hear from God through the Word of God. The depths of the truths they bring out may speak of:

He hath not dealt with us after our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heaven is above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. As far as the East is from the West: so far hath he removed our sins from us.

Psalms 103:10-12 GNV

At the time of Christ Psalms 103 had been written twenty eight generations BEFORE Jesus (see Matthew 1). And then today for Jesus, the power of the cross where Christ became sin for us, we look back even longer, two thousand years. But as the writer of Hebrews reminds us that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Even so on that Silent Saturday all those truths didn't seem like there was any truth in it at all, they had known Jesus face to face side by side for years

But here seeing what I share in my meditations, my "simple heartfelt lay", to just see the truth of daily living as each portion of Scripture strikes me in my situation of that day, what the Holy Spirit brings for me what I need in particular, it is very, very important to know it's not necessarily the focus of the preacher's needful depth and focus on Scripture, nor my simpler focus on Scripture for me in my day, but rather that the heart of each of us is in approaching God. Believe me, the sensitive preacher is absolutely affected by searching the Scriptures because he is approaching God in all he presents his message when he speaks of God. And God definitely approaches him.

Just the same hopefully you've seen that God approaches me in my meditations. Yes, I too search the Scriptures because it is needful in my desire, that I must approach God. I need Him, much like the preacher must approach God for God's message for the listeners. And in the end of the day, even this Silent Saturday, whether listening to the preacher or reading this meditation, much is as was quoted that Mark Twain had once said, and what even now God works in your heart,

It ain’t the parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.

And what we do understand is what the Holy Spirit uses to work in our hearts, even as was going on in the disciples hearts on that very Silent Saturday.