Savoring the Scripture

Night Songs Psalm 137 To believe in Christ when He is shrouded in darkness, to stick hard and fast by the Savior when all men speak ill of Him and forsake Him—that is true faith. He who singeth a song to Christ in the night, singeth the best song in all the world; for he singeth from the heart. Charles Spurgeon Psalm 137 is a communal lament. The people have been captured and taken to a foreign land. They have witnessed the brutality of their captors and are mourning deeply for their many losses. And to make it worse, their captors are taunting them to sing, to sing a song of Zion, their beloved city that now lay in ruins. The psalmist cries, “How shall we sing the LORD’s song in a foreign land?” (137:4). How do we sing the Lord’s song while living as sojourners in a foreign land? While experiencing hardship and loss? While waiting in the dark, longing to see a ray of light on the horizon? For surely, in this world we will have trouble, and our Lord was and is not ignorant of this, and...

Will You Forget Me Forever? Psalm 136 Passages in which God “remembers” are always followed by proofs that God never forgets. gotquestions.org An enslaved people. A barren woman. A broken man. All in impossible situations. And all servants of a God who, in His faithfulness, remembers them and acts.   Exodus records the plight of the Israelites enslaved in Egypt. In their oppression, they cried out to God and “their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God. So God heard their groaning and God remembered His covenant” (Exodus 2:23-24 NASB). God was aware of their sufferings, and God delivered them. Hannah, barren and in great anguish, prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly, and “the Lord remembered her. And it came about in due time, after Hannah had conceived, that she gave birth to a son” (1 Samuel 1:19-20 NASB). In the days of the kings, King Hezekiah became deathly ill. He prayed to the Lord, “‘Now, O Lord, please remember how I have walked before you in faithfulness an...

When You Want Out Psalm 135 Not always OUT of our troublous times, And the struggles fierce and grim, But IN—deeper IN—to our one sure rest,  The place of our peace, in Him. Annie Johnson Flint If only. If only __________, then I would feel less stressed, happier, calmer, trust more, not worry so much, be more Christ-like. For many of us, we could quickly and easily fill in the blank. We have those things in our lives that we just want to see changed. We have situations or people in our lives that we think if they were just different, better, less problematic, we would be better. We may not actually say the first sentence, but our emotions, attitudes, and fears suggest that’s what we truly believe. Our happiness, joy, hope, and peace have become intertwined with these realities of our lives. Realities we would change, if we could. And not just our present realities. We look to the days ahead and, for some, we feel fear not hope, anxiousness instead of anticipation. The troubles of ...