Peace after the storm

Psalm study, continued. Psalm 28 is the prayer of someone who is in a dangerous life-threatening situation, and who knows that without God’s help he is doomed. God answers his prayer and the psalm shifts to a prayer of thanksgiving.

Blessed by the Lord for he has heard

my cry, my appeal. (v. 6)

·         I can think of several times lately where this prayer would be appropriate for me. How about you? Just the other day I prayed that the Lord help me get free of a certain distraction, and almost immediately the distraction dissolved and I was free to praise the Lord. This is a good verse to memorize so that we can recite it easily wherever and whenever our prayers (big and small) are answered.

The psalm follows with a wonderful statement of faith and joy.

The Lord is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts.

I was helped, my heart rejoices and I praise him with my song. (v.7)

·         What is your song of praise? I remember a little song I used to teach children’s choirs, and to this day it plays in my mind as I brush my teeth in the morning. I often wonder if any of the children I taught remember it and pray it as often as I do:

§  Thank you, Lord, for giving me life,

Thank you, Lord, for family and friends.

Thank you, Lord, for walking with me

Through the years till my journey ends.

Psalm 29 depicts the power of God in a great storm. The imagery is poetic and if you read it you can actually hear and sense the storm arising and passing by until things quiet down and The Lord sat enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits as king for ever. (v.10) And then, one beautiful statement of what our caring God comes to bestow on us:

The Lord will give strength to his people,

the Lord will bless his people with peace. (v.11)

·         I used to wonder why that verse was chosen to end a psalm which is essentially about a storm, but then I thought of all the storms that we pass through in our lives and how with God’s help the tumult eventually turns to a time of peace. And now I pray it for all the persecuted and uprooted people in our world these days: The Lord will bless his people with peace. Bring it on, Lord, bring it on!

God bless you and bring you his peace.