Day 62

‘Selah’ continued. 

As we meditate on how Jesus and all other NT writers used the psalms, we should remember that a crisis does not produce character, it reveals it!  Life is not what happens to you but how you react to what happens to you that is the most significant. How we prepare in the good times will determine how we react in the hard times. Did men like Joseph, Daniel, and Ezra suddenly develop lives of faith and integrity in their crisis, or were they preparing for those times way ahead? It is apparent that Jesus knew the psalms intimately. Our meditations on the psalms, if not helping us through a hard time now, will help prepare us for the road ahead, for one thing is sure; you have either just come out of a hard time; you are in a hard time now, or you will enter a hard time sometime in the future.  Such is life on this planet in rebellion against God. 

In his sermon at Pentecost (Acts 2) Peter pointed to the tomb of King David. He said that people are still speaking about King David. God is still using the life he lived! What was it about David that left such a mark on history? Why did God say of him, “A man after my own heart?” How do you want to be thought of after your death? Who will speak at your memorial, and talk about what you’ve added to their life?

Whatever David’s qualities were, we in this world, do not easily recognize them. David was overlooked by the world around him. When he was sent to his brothers at the battle with the Philistines, they reprimanded his faith. When his oldest brother, Eliab, heard him speaking with the men, it says he burned with anger and chastised him.  (1Sam17: 28-30.)  Samuel had judged by worldly criteria when he at first overlooked David (1Sam 16:6-7.) Even David’s father overlooked him! Samuel learned that God has another criterion beyond outward appearance. What are the qualities, overlooked by the world, but important to God that are evident in David’s life?