OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 86

Psalm 86:1-17

86:1 As a child of God, we have the privilege of the attention of Father. We call to Him, and He answers. He hears and cares. Whatever our lack or need is, He is willing and able to fill it. 

86:2 God preserves the lives of those who set themselves apart from the ways of the world in order to adopt God's philosophy. When we are faithful to the path of God, we always arrive at the kingdom. Along the path of God are the fruits of righteousness and the protection of God. We trust in God exclusively and are therefore not called off of the path by any voices in our periphery. We may hear them, but we do not trust them and therefore we do not choose them.

86:3 In 1 Thessalonians 5:17, we are told to pray without ceasing; we must involve God in every aspect of our lives. Continually in conversation with Him, requesting and absorbing His counsel, ceaselessly grateful and consciousness in faith. Because through such active faith, our lives are open to so many blessings. The more directly we follow our Father's example, the clearer our path to His kingdom and blessing.

Pray continually for mercy and truth, justice and love, compassion and hope.

86:4-5 David identified himself as a servant of God. When we pray, we pray not just for ourselves but as instruments of His will. We pray because we want to abound our blessing, share with, and thus lift, others. As we have been lifted.

86:6-7 David depended on God; he knew that if he called on God, God would answer. He always trusted that God would have an answer, a solution, a plan of rescue, redemption and victory. The strength of our faith is the solidity of our trust in God.

86:8-10 Nothing, no one, no force or entity or institution of idea compares to our God. Our Creative Father. He is wise and powerful and compassionate. He is just and merciful and good. He does wondrous things, and His children have experienced that wonder. Then and now. And nothing compares. Nothing fills us or cares for us the way He does. No one plans the way He plans. No one have the scope or strength of power that He does. No one has access the way that He does to the minute details the way that He does.

86:11-12 David prayed as a servant, wanting to be a lifelong student of our Masterful Teacher. David worked to live a life of reverence and praise for God. He committed his whole heart to God and God's cause. Eternally. Because David realized that God is worthy of such commitment. There is nothing better or more productive we could commit ourselves to than righteousness.

86:13 David personally experienced the rescue. We call to God and He changes our whole lives. Drowning in a swirling sea, He places us on a mountain top. Alone in a desolate wilderness, He brings us into His house. He turns our entire lives around. From crooked to straight. Inside-out to outside-in. He corrects all the little things, strengthens all the weak points and loves us fiercely through the journey. He provides abundantly through the journey. His touch in our lives is amazing.

86:14-15 Fierce enemies did not overwhelm David because he knew that they were nothing compared to His God. Evil and fear cannot break the defenses our God places around His children. They may come close, but their entrance is restricted. Our faith is too strong a barrier between us and them.

86:16-17 David prayed, cried out for rescue and He knew that God would come. He knew that God would help and comfort. Because God keeps His promises. David's life is a reminder to us to bring God into every moment of our lives, the constantly talk with God. To constantly depend on Him and trust in Him. Our prayer in faith gives us access to the storehouses of God's heart. To spiritual armour and blessing and truth and provision and protection and plan. Praise our glorious Father.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 85

Psalm 85:1-13

85:1-3 A statement of all the things God has done for His people; God is favorable to us, rescues us, forgives us, cleanses us. He is merciful when our behavior does not deserve it. We receive so much from God in addition to forgiveness: blessing and protection. He redirects us; He places us on His path, thereby separating us from the way of the world.

85:4-7 The Psalmist pleaded for the mercy and forgiveness God promised to those who would love Him and live righteously. In time of discipline, we pray for His forgiveness. But our prayer only matters if we are sincere and willing to learn and change.

85:8-9 We must listen to God's instruction. He teaches peace and outlines the path to it. But we must commit to His philosophy of life. To His commandments, statues and laws. We must emulate Jesus' life of fierce and steadfast faith, compassion and servitude. Salvation is within the grasp of those who revere the Lord. Glory dwells in our land when we dwell with our God.

85:10-11 For our Father is the merging of mercy and truth, righteousness and peace. He establishes truth and righteousness as the law of the land, directly from heaven.

85:12-13 Our God provides goodness and abounds goodness. He increases what He gives. His tree of life yields eternal, abundant. To follow Him, we need only to live righteously. The path of righteousness has been made by God's footsteps, His character and soul and choices.

His footsteps are the path of the righteous.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 84

Psalm 84:1-12

84:1-2 In Mark 12:30, we are told to "love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength." The Psalmist opening of this Psalm is an expression of that love. It is an expression of awe and longing for God and the arrival of His just kingdom on the earth. Above all other longings of the heart and flesh, the Psalmist longed for God. 

As humans there are a lot of things and scenarios and people we dream of having and, being in and being with. But for a child of God, our ultimate longing is for Him and for His will in our lives. Our awe in His master plan causes us to push everything else out of the way to make space for it in the forefront of our lives. 

84:3-4 Our God is welcoming and gracious; His love extends to all: large and small, arboreal and terrestrial. He is the tree of life, the haven by which we all receive protection and provision. We are loved and blessed and so we praise from our place on His tree. 

84:5-7 Blessed are those who derive their strength from God. Blessed are we whose purpose and heart and mind and soul is solely focused on our journey to the heart and Kingdom of God. Our path is straightforward and lighted. We are blessed because on this path, we have the mercy, compassion, provision, protection, guidance and light of God. 

Along God's path we walk through spring and living waters, from strength to strength. It is a different path than the secular world chooses. Our path is selfless, righteous, faithful. Bright and restful and forgiving and generous. Our experience in life is wholly different because of God's fingerprints all over every part of our lives we devote to Him.

84:8-9 The Psalmist prayed for the ear and attention of God on His faithful children. And to that prayer, God always answers: yes. It is our duty to ensure that we are prayed to Him, inviting Him into our lives and handing over control to His hands. Because He will answer yes to the prayer, yes to the invitation, and yes to the responsibility of maintaining your life. But we must ask! Freedom of choice requires that we choose God.

84:10 The Psalmist perspective is perfect: A day in God's courts is better than a thousand days outside of it; the doorstep of the House of God is better than a whole dwelling place in the midst of wickedness. A humble life in the presence of our righteous God is better than an arrogant, controlling, greedy life away from Him. 

The victory, the abundance, the honor humans seek is only ever truly established through humility and obedience to God. The power and responsibility is found in servitude to God. The secular world seeks victory and honor, abundance and power by trampling on justice and rejecting selfishness. We must work on our perspective or we will never find true victory or honor.

84:11 God is a sun and a shield; He is our light and protection. He generously gives grace and glory and good things to those who live righteously.

84:12 Blessed indeed is the person who trusts in God. His wisdom is sound and eternal. His path is clear and leads to life. His justice is perfect. His plan is complete. His victory is secured. His love for you is true. His purpose for you is good.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 83

Psalm 83:1-18

83:1 Our ultimate prayed in life should be for God to be vocal, present and active in our lives and in the world around us. Our God is constantly a Father and employs instruction and discipline throughout our lives. We should welcome and treasure His contributions to our lives, His judgement on our actions and His advice for the growth of our character. Sometimes what He has to say will not be what we want to hear, but it will always be what we need to hear.

83:2-4 The Psalmist felt surrounded by enemies and tumult. He felt like the people around him where more cunning and powerful then he was. It's true that we, ourselves, will not at all times in all places be the smartest or the most clever. Neither will we be the strongest. But every time we walk into a room with God, with our faith, having given our Father full authority in our lives, we become those things. Because God is the smartest and most clever. He is the strongest. With Him, we are not vulnerable to our enemies. 

83:5-17 Our ultimate war is against evil; and it was a war God has already won. In the meantime, while people live and subsequently decide which side of the war they are on, we have our God to insert justice through our prayers. The Psalmist prayed for the wicked to be thwarted and ashamed of their behavior. We learn from scripture how powerful intercessory prayer is. God listens to and answers our prayers. Our work on earth as agents of His philanthropy matters. Our faith makes a difference; our prayer for others changes lives because our God is attentive and fantastically compassionate. 

83:18 The whole earth shall know that our God is the Most High. Enemies continue to fall as we raise God with our praise.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 82

Psalm 82:1-8

82:1-4 This Psalm is a prayer for justice. Our Father has taught us what perfect justice is: the defense of the impoverished and the orphaned. Care for the afflicted and needy. Freedom for those in the bonds of wicked. 

82:5 While the world is often run by selfish gain, God seeks only the selfless defense of people who cannot fight for themselves. The system of the world is backward. It is opposite of God's system of compassion.

82:6-8 No one is holy except God. No one is mighty expect God. Everyone can be defeated except God. The proud and ignored will be humbled. We are all subject to God's judgement. Our behavior determines on which side of justice we stand.

82:8 Pray for the arrival of God's ultimate judgement. He will claim the earth and all inhabitants and His justice will reign across every part.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 81

Psalm 81:1-16

81:1-5 Praise God continually as He rescues us from what holds us captive. Internally or externally, God is able and prepared to bless us with freedom. For Him, we endeavor to live a life worthy of the covenant He mad with us. 

81:6-7 When we call, God answers. When we cry for help, He rescues. He is quiet but powerful. Unseen yet present. In our distress He is aware and active, awaiting our call and preparing our defense.

81:8-9 In the place of our rescue, God teaches us; He instructs us on how to never end up in those places of captivity again. We must listen. We must be faithful to His philosophy, for the world presents us only with detrimental options. Our souls understand and thrive on God's language, not the words of men.

81:10 We should be constantly open to receive His instruction, and when we are, we constantly receive His blessing. He will find a way to speak to us, to lead us, to teach us. We must be receptive and faithful students. We must discipline ourselves in that we learn to obey His instruction to be patient, solemn, and kind. 

81:11-12 God always allow us to make our own decisions. We have free will, but God's will is better. All-knowing, fully-capable and wholly kind. The tribes of Israel were allowed to walk away... but they walked right into destruction and captivity. Because we cannot see what God can see, so when He nudges us in a certain direction, we should trust Him.

81:13 Life would be so much kinder and easier if we would simply listen to our Father and walk in His ways. He only ever leads us into truth and strength and justice and peace. It is our own planning that leads us astray. The tribes of Israel refused to listen; countless people across countless generations have refused to listen. But individually, we can each choose to hear the words of our Father.

81:14 When we place God's authority over our lives, our enemies come under submission. When God takes the reins, no only else can wield us. 

81:15-16 It is truly a blessing to no one can pretend to be anything before God. He sees our true selves. He has no weakness in His defense. We are safe from our enemies when we are encamped with God; they cannot enter. God constantly promises us of His haven, we need only to choose Him and walk into it. He will satisfy us.

OT: The Book of Psalms, Psalm 80

Psalm 80:1-19

80:1-2 As a faithful child of God, we have the right and privilege to access our Father's presence, strength, and rescue. The Psalmist prayed, and prayed specifically to a God whose character and history with humanity he learned. Know that our God was first a Shepherd of Israel, the leader of Joseph and exists now in our present as scripture's posterity. 

80:3 They prayed for restoration; they prayed for the light of God; they prayed to be saved. God's process of restoration is always complete and complex and assured. He has a detailed plan for us when we request, and absorb, His leadership and instruction.  God's light is the light; the light that identifies the righteous path while driving out the darkness of fear and sin and captivity. And when we are saved by God, we are made whole by Him. Whatever darkness or iniquity harmed us, He heals. 

80:4-7 The tribes of Israel were tired of captivity; but they needed the period of captivity remember the blessing of freedom. Only when they needed Him, and realized how much He had done for them, did they remember God. Let us learn from their mistakes and include God in our entire life: sorrow and joy.

80:8-13 What God plants is strong and eternal. Except if it rejects Him. We are strong and eternal except when we reject God. The tribes of Israel asked God to visit them... but the only reason God was not already with them is because they left God. He never walks away from us.

It is important to have self-awareness. Their predicament was self-caused. God will help us through self-imposed and otherwise distresses but, especially when we are self-imposed predicaments, we must be able to perceive objectively and take responsibility for our contribution (perhaps lack of) to the situation.

80:14-18 It was not God who needed to return but His people. We are the ones who walk away. Yet because God is patient and merciful and compassionate, He does come. He answers our calls. He meets us in the places we call from. 

80:19 Like the Psalmist, pray for revival. Restoration. Maintenance. Whatever manner in which your life needs God to respond. And promise the same: to never turn your back.