Psalm 3

      Greetings in the name that is the name above all names, Jesus Christ!  This last weekend was a busy one.  Saturday afternoon I helped with the Fall Fun Festival which is where the youth group sets up games and things for the little kids to come in costume and do.  I was helping with a game where they would cast a clothes pin on a string tied to a pole over a curtain like they were fishing, and then the kid on the back side would clip a piece of candy to the clothes pin and let them "reel it in".  I love little kids and the little kids have really taken a liking to that crazy Vicar Richter (even though they all struggle to say his name).  We had a blast though.  Then Saturday evening I had four college students come in and help me make 6 batches of chili.  We did one spicy recipe tripled and one mild recipe tripled in two roasters.  Then Sunday morning I went in before church, took the roasters out of the fridge, and got them simmering.  Then as soon as church was over we had ten students helping serve the chili to the members.  It was the quarterly voter's meeting and it is tradition that the LSF serves the meal.  It went really well and had just about the right amount left over.  Then after we got everything cleaned up, we went out to a member's house and had Gun Day Fun Day.  I had bought ammunition and clay pigeons.  I borrowed a thrower and we had a trap shoot.  We had eight students and several had very little experience with guns.  It was a fun day and I think all the students really enjoyed it.  It was beautiful out weather wise.  No body got hurt and everyone left with a prize and a smile.
    We did pumpkin carving last Thursday night before Bible Study and then this Thursday I hope to have a bonfire at my place after Bible Study as we watch the parade of costumes.  I figure we should be there just in time to watch the little kids ending trick or treating and the "Big kids" or college students start their walk from campus to the bars.  I also got the ping pong table in my basement finally so I am excited to get the students over and let them feel my pong wrath.
     I preach this Sunday for All Saint's Day which is cool because I got to preached it last year too.  I will post my sermon on Monday.  Other than that everything is going well, just busy and the time seems to be disappearing faster than a piece of pumpkin pie in front of me.  Here is my devotion on Psalm 3.

Psalm 3:2b and 8a

            It does seem that people today who doubt in this thing called faith or religion want everyone else to doubt it too.  They are constantly trying to tell Christians that they are “not good enough” or "not worthy” for God’s love and forgiveness.  This is sometimes referred to as the fourth use of the law when you hear those whispers and voices telling you that you have really done it this time!  There is no way God is going to forgive you for what you have done this time.  You have sinned too greatly, messed up too royally, and dug yourself so deep this time, even God can’t get you out of it.  Even if He could, why would He do that for a miserable sinner like you?  So not only do we hear the devil whispering these ideas into our heads, but then our “friends” and those around us also say the same thing.  Sometimes it seems like everyone around us, many rising against us, telling us that “there is no salvation for [us] in God.”  After hearing it so many times, unfortunately it becomes easier and easier to believe that maybe we really aren’t worthy of God’s salvation, that He really won’t forgive us this time. 

            However, even when King David feels this way, as he is fleeing from his own son, he continues on to end the psalm with a more positive note.  He feels everyone has turned against him, even his family is now his enemies, and the question of whether even God himself can get him out of this mess.  However, with a good night’s sleep, he wakes well refreshed and restored in his faith.  Have you ever had one of those nights?  Where you lie awake, tossing and turning, pondering upon the mess of your life, wondering how you got into this mess, wondering if you will ever get out of it?  It really seems like you are hopeless and helpless, as if this one is too tricky for even the good Lord to handle.  Again, even if God could get you out, why would He go to the trouble of helping a rotten person like you?  You are questioning everything you have ever known, but somehow you still fall asleep, and the next morning you awake refreshed, rested, and the whole thing just doesn’t seem as impossible as it did the night before.  The Lord has sustained you with a good night sleep and now you have the energy to tackle that problem, begin to sort out that mess, and climb back out of the hole you were in.  The strength and motivation comes from our Lord, because He does go to the trouble of helping us miserable, rotten sinners.  It is true, if it were up to us and what we do, we would never be worthy, never be good enough; but because salvation belongs to the Lord, He gives it to us sinners.  Because salvation belongs to Him, He has the ability to give it to people who are not worthy.  Now He does not just give it to us in our sinful state because He is a just God.  Nonetheless, He gives it to us.  He does so by washing us in the blood of Christ, cleansing us white as snow, pure and blameless just as Christ was when He was crucified.  Christ died to pay the price for all of our sin, He rose from the dead to defeat death once and for all, because we brought death into this creation at the fall of mankind.  Now, because we are washed in the blood of Christ, and made holy, sinless by His forgiveness, given the gift of eternal life, the gift if His salvation, that is His alone to give.  King David knew it was God and God alone who can give salvation, and bring us out of any mess into His life, into His peace and joy of sins forgiven.  There is no salvation from God for us by our own merit, but by His grace and mercy alone, the salvation that belongs to Him is granted to us His beloved children.  Praise be to Him for it!