Psalms – Prayers of Honesty
Sometimes you just have to stop and praise the God who made everything and everyone. He knows the storms hit, floods come, earthquakes happen, and then peace. A silent blessed peace. Restoration comes next.
I think of praises to God for his care during and after flooding in Nicaragua where friends live to help those they love find and follow Jesus. I think of praises to God when I read about how people who live in Panama City are reaching out with all they have to help others through losing stuff to live life. This next Psalm is dedicated to all of you.
Psalm 29, The Message
A David Psalm
1-2 Bravo, God, bravo!
Gods and all angels shout, “Encore!”
In awe before the glory,
in awe before God’s visible power.
Stand at attention!
Dress your best to honor him!
3 God thunders across the waters,
Brilliant, his voice and his face, streaming brightness—
God, across the flood waters.
4 God’s thunder tympanic,
God’s thunder symphonic.
5 God’s thunder smashes cedars,
God topples the northern cedars.
6 The mountain ranges skip like spring colts,
The high ridges jump like wild kid goats.
7-8 God’s thunder spits fire.
God thunders, the wilderness quakes;
He makes the desert of Kadesh shake.
9 God’s thunder sets the oak trees dancing
A wild dance, whirling; the pelting rain strips their branches.
We fall to our knees—we call out, “Glory!”
10 Above the floodwaters is God’s throne
from which his power flows,
from which he rules the world.
11 God makes his people strong.
God gives his people peace.
God is still with us. God will makes us strong in and through the storms of this life. God gives us peace when our eyes look to Him with praise and adoration.
I pray for peace. I pray for restoration in all ways.
In Jesus Name, Amen
There will be times in our lives when we feel God is not listening. We feel He is napping as we experience silence from Him. We pour out of hearts to Him and wonder if He is too busy to take care of us. It is human, completely human to think that way. We are very impatient as people. We have all thought these thoughts. Be honest.
6-7 Blessed be God—
SOMETHING TO CHEW…
HEART CHECK:
It is hard to wait for God. Sometimes it is extremely hard. We are a people who like to fix things, control outcomes and help others do the same. But we cannot and should not do anything without God’s leading and only then we point them to God. God is the One and Only Who saves, heals, fixes, repairs and restores in ways we cannot imagine. 
Light, space, zest—
5 That’s the only quiet, secure place
SOMETHING TO CHEW…
HEART CHECK:
It’s going to happen sooner or later in each of our lives. Someone will say something about us that is not true. Others will join in with their opinions and summations of what they think we are thinking. You are not given any recourse to even defend yourself. You begin to believe the lies about you, too. Fair? No. David had the same troubles. It’s an age old problem with humans. However, read how David thought it through…with God.
8-10 God, I love living with you;
Let’s take a look at how and when this happens. It happens to me when I’m trying the hardest to keep in step with God and His will for my life. It happens when good results are happening or about to happen in the work God gave me to do. It happens when sweat from all the hard work trickles down my face and back. It happens at the pinnacle of ministry. Fair? No. But that’s life here. (And Jesus said it wouldn’t be easy and promised trouble.)
Our inclination is to fight back or make excuses. The best way to fight, as you have probably heard is to fall down on our knees before God and ask for His forgiveness and then His help so we can “keep in step, never missing a beat” with God as our guide. THIS is what our enemy hates most…Believers on their knees, crying out in the Name of Jesus Christ for God’s help to defeat the enemy. The enemy flees at the sound of this battle cry to God. Our enemy knows he is no match for the Creator, Our Father in Heaven, the One and Only God.
Finally, brothers and sisters…Go to church! I know she’s not perfect but God’s forgiveness is perfect. We need each other to remind us of God’s forgiveness, love, mercy and grace. We need to ask God often to examine our hearts. AND we can expect forgiveness because of Jesus’ work on the cross. We can expect joy and a renewed Spirit. After looking to God first, now look left and right at others who were broken, seeking the same and now set free, too. Rejoice, sing God-songs, together, to the top of your lungs, too. Tell God-stories of your life. LISTEN to others tell God-stories of their lives.
We all get down in the dumps from time to time. We might not sing the song that was humorously sung on the old country show, Hee Haw, but our insides feel like it. We sulk and soak in our despair until physical aches and pain appear. “When it rains, it pours”…was the phrase my mom used to say when bad things happened to us all at once.
4 Show me how you work, God;
10 From now on every road you travel
HEART CHECK:
As kids we played many rounds of hide and seek growing up in a safe neighborhood. We played until the sun went down and our parents would call us to finally come in for supper. We knew that if we looked hard enough we would win the game by eventually finding all our friends who were hiding and giggling behind trees and bushes. We loved the game. We love the hiding but we also loved to be found.
1-2 God claims Earth and everything in it,
SOMETHING TO CHEW…
3. Seekers Are Victors Who Celebrate His Glory in Conquest (v. 7-10). 
Are we playing a game of hide and seek with God? Are we hiding something from Him, with hope He doesn’t find it and take it from us? What is it? Is it time to let go of that game?
Dear Heavenly Father,
A David Psalm
Certainly this psalm has a message for the sorrowing, but it’s unfortunate that it’s used primarily at funerals, because Psalm 23 focuses on what Jesus does for us “all the days of [our] life” and not just at death (v. 6). It’s also unfortunate that people tend to spiritualize the psalm and fail to see it in its true setting. They see David, a “young shepherd boy,” lying on his back in the pasture and pondering the things of God, when he probably wrote this psalm late in his life, possibly during the rebellion of Absalom (2 Sam. 13–19). 
Those of you who take time to read this from wherever you are on this earth have probably had a time in your life, like me, when you felt God was not listening, not at his post, not available to see what others are saying and doing to us. We yell a desperate prayer in times like this, “God! Are you there?” “Are you listening?” “Can you not see what they are saying and doing to bring me down?”
3-5 And you! Are you indifferent, above it all,
19-21 You, God—don’t put off my rescue!
25-26 Here in this great gathering for worship
Centuries later, Jesus, Son of God, who is God, prayed this same prayer of the Psalmist on the cross as he hung there for our sin. Unlike David, Jesus lived a perfect life without sin yet when it came time to complete his mission to save us, people beat him, mocked him, spit on him, nailed him to a cross and threw his own words back in his face. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me” Jesus, the son of man, desperately cries out in the last hours of his death. 
No, God has not moved. God did not change His address. God is God and we are not. God never lets us down. While we suffer, God is there. While we rejoice when the trial is over, God is there. God uses everything, good and bad, in our lives to grow and mature us. God does not look the other way when others try to bring us down. God is there listening.
Psalm 21, The Message 
Psalm 20
SOMETHING TO CHEW…
3. Know A Sovereign Lord
