Only Then Will We Be Saved

May 26, 2017

Only Then Will We Be Saved

Turn us again to yourself, O God.

Make your face shine down upon us.

Only then will we be saved.

Psalm 80:3

The psalmist is again expressing the cry of the remnant left behind when Israel was vanquished and her people taken away into slavery.

Perhaps the greatest temptation of humankind is to sing along with Frank Sinatra, “I did it my way.” We so very much want to chart our own course, to be the master of our own fate. Our challenge as Christians is in learning to distinguish our will from God’s will. As I noted in my meditation on Psalm 36 (March 27, 2017), seeking to know God’s will is not a denial of our ability to reason and work. It is an affirmation that human intellect and potential are fully realized within God’s divine grace and will.

In Psalm 80, the psalmist is living through the consequences of decisions made by the King to chart the course of Israel. He led the nation out from the shelter of God’s wings and into destruction. The remnant is desperate to find their way back to God. The refrain of this psalm, repeated three times (verses 3, 7, & 19), makes clear their only hope is for God to take the initiative to save them.

Today, churches and denominations are spending thousands of dollars trying to incorporate business strategies into the life of the church, in desperate attempts to revive dying churches. Campaigns and programs are not going to save our churches. If we want the fires of Godly revival burning brightly in our churches, we would do well to join our voices and sing with the psalmist,

  “Turn us again to yourself, O Lord God of Heaven’s Armies.

    Make your face shine down upon us.

    Only then will we be saved.”

Psalm 80:19

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.