Psalm 13

      Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  We are down to two weeks and couple days of the quarter left so I am going to be extremely busy writing two big papers and five shorter papers.  I also have to build an art project for my class on the Holy Spirit.  I will try to include pictures of it after I spend all day Saturday building it.
      I am going to try to do some shorter posts as I will be scrapped for time.  Here is my devotion for Psalm 13 that I wrote this last Lenten season while on vicarage.  Enjoy.

       As I am working on my Lent series of the penitential psalms, I realize Psalm 13 is basically a summary of all the penitential psalms together. In Psalm 13 David is bold enough to call God out on the fact He doesn’t seem to be doing anything. The reason Psalm 13 in not a penitential psalm is because David is not confessing his sins; he is blaming God for letting these evil things happen to him. He is not saying, O Lord, I am a sinful wretch and that is why these terrible things seem to be happening. He is calling God out saying how long are you, the God who is in control of all things, going to keep letting these bad things happen to me? How long am I going to be suffering from sorrow and fear of my enemy, how long must I cry out to you before you do anything about this? Then he basically pleads his case one more time. He calls God out for not listening and not doing anything, then immediately goes to telling God what he wants. Do not let me die, do not let my enemies have the victory over me. Hear me this time God when I cry out to you and do not let these bad things happen to me. Then he ends with how he trusts in God and His steadfast love. Not only does he trust in God, he is going to sing a song to God for how He has dealt bountifully with him. Wait a second?! Is David bipolar? He just went from accusing God of not listening to him, not helping him, not protecting him, to praising God for the bountiful way He has dealt with him. What is going on here? He just made a complete 180 degree turn around in 109 words.
      Then as I stop and think about this, I have done this numerous times with things far less important than my life and God. When I used to work all kinds of various jobs, there would be times I would go from complaining about that job and how much I hate it and cannot stand it, to the fact that I can’t think of a better job for me and I can’t wait to go into work tomorrow. Or I get mad at someone and talk about how I disagree with the way they handle certain issues and am not real happy with them, and then as the conversation continues I am praising them for what a great person they are and how much I appreciate knowing them. Maybe I am the one who is bipolar. I think the biggest factor is that our sinful nature just needs to vent some times. It needs to get all the negative blaming and accusing out, so that it can realize that things are not actually as bad as we made them seem. One task of a job may be not fun or just doesn’t make sense so we gripe about it, but then once we have gotten that off our chest we realize that the job as a whole is actually a great job and that one little part that we didn’t like was actually no big deal. There are times where is seems God doesn’t hear us and He is doing nothing to help us through the troubles and trials of this life. But then as you vent about those things and get them off your chest, you realize how much God does do for you and all the times you know He heard you in the way your prayer was answered. Our sinful nature just needs to throw that blame and anger out there, only for us to realize how stupid it was and how wrong we were. This is when we back track very quickly, try to recover our misspoken words, and confess that things are not bad at all. We can throw that blame out at God, but we will realize very quickly how wrong we are, and that it is our own sinful fault these things are happening, and that God is there with us, listening to us, helping us through the whole thing. So we too make a 180 degree turn around and give God the praise He deserves and return our trust in Him. This psalm is not only beautiful for how complex it is even though it is so short, it is so meaningful because it fits our actual life habits of venting before confessing. It also is so powerful because it teaches us God is OK with us venting to Him, taking our stress and anger to Him. He wants us to talk to Him and be honest with Him. And this psalm is a way to give every emotion we have to Him and realize He is always there for us and always listening to us. Praise be to Him who does deal bountifully with us.