Psalm 43

Occasionally, my wife Cheryl travels to visit our grandchildren, and leaves me home alone. I am not completely alone, our Springer’s, Buster Brown and Hershey, are with me, and we do stay in contact through the telephone, email and Skype. Even so, I am pretty useless while she is gone. What I do accomplish requires more effort than usual. I know she will soon return. I know she is simply gone from my sight, that's all. She is just the same as when I saw her, but things seem different.

Perhaps the psalmist had similar feelings in his relationship with Elohim. For whatever reasons, his present reality caused him to use hyperbole to express his sense of loss, his sense of longing for closeness to God. Whatever his inner turmoil, the psalmist was single-minded in his purpose: “There I will go to the altar of God, to God—the source of all my joy. I will praise you with my harp, O God, my God!” (v.4) The psalmist knows who alone can fill the God shaped vacuum in his heart.

People often have scripture passages bookmarked, taped to walls or attached to their refrigerators. Is verse 5 included in your collection? If not, today is a good day to add it to your collection.

Why am I discouraged?

    Why is my heart so sad?

I will put my hope in God!

    I will praise him again—

    my Savior and my God!

Sē’lah

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What word or phrase in today’s reading of the Psalms

 attracts your attention?

Reflect on that word or phrase.

What insights come to you?

How does this passage touch your life today?

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Reading for June 14, 2012                   Psalm 44