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But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness Gal 5:22 |
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Dear
Friend,
If you do not already have a habit of gathering daily manna the first thing in the morning (we can look at the example given to us in Exodus 16 and find the pattern for make it a habit. Establish your life and your schedule to allow you the necessary time to do your daily collection first thing every morning to give you the strength to make it through the day. And remember that today’s manna will not be sufficient for tomorrow; tomorrow’s manna must be collected tomorrow morning. Tuesday, August 11, 2020
Today's Passage : Today's Passage:The Love of God (Part 2) Bible Verse:Psalm 103:15-22 "(The italicized verses are from yesterday.) Bless the Lord, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name! Bless the Lord, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits: Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies, Who satisfies your mouth with good things, So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s. The Lord executes righteousness And justice for all who are oppressed. He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, Nor will He keep His anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us. Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him. For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust. As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it, it is no more, And its place acknowledges it no longer. But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children, To those who keep His covenant And remember His precepts to do them. The Lord has established His throne in the heavens, And His sovereignty rules over all. Bless the Lord, you His angels, Mighty in strength, who perform His word, Obeying the voice of His word! Bless the Lord, all you His hosts, You who serve Him, doing His will. Bless the Lord, all you works of His, In all places of His dominion; Bless the Lord, O my soul!" Message:
We have reprinted the entirety of the psalm here, so that we can look at the overall structure of it. Once the entire psalm has been read in detail, and we understand what the verses say, it is time to step back and look at the psalm as a whole. The first thing one might notice is that the first and last lines are identical. This is a clue! The second line is a developments of the first (“. . . and forget not all His benefits”), and the lines before the last line are also variations on the opening/closing line.
Look at the section, “But the lovingkindness of the Lord . . . .” The theme is God’s faithful and eternal love for us, if we keep His word and live in awe and respect of Him. This is a treatment of the same general theme as the third section: “The Lord executes righteousness, And justice for all who are oppressed. . . .” The theme and tone of the second and next-to-last sections are similar, just as the first and last lines are identical.
Like the device of parallelism in pairs of lines, the psalmist has created an overall arrangement of ideas. If we divide the psalm into five parts, the first and last parts are similar; the second and fourth are similar, etc. The structure of Psalm 103 is either A-B-C-B-A or A-B-C-D-C-B-A, depending on how you want to look at it. “A” is a single identical line, “Bless the Lord, O my soul,” “B” is a description of the Lord’s power and “C” develops the idea of how He uses this great power in his love for us. The correspondence is not exact, but the structure is clear enough for us to appreciate that it is intentional and meaningful.
The middle of the psalm consists of four wonderful and well-known lines beginning, “As for man, his days are like grass;” Thus, the psalm moves continuously downward from praise of an eternal God, through intermediate stages describing God's eternal might, His love for humanity, ending in a description of the temporary and futile nature of earthly life. It then reverses direction and moves back through the same stages until we end where we began, praising the eternal God.
The structure has a technical name: chiasm. It was common in early epic poetry, and the Bible is full of it. It is very easy to see sometimes, as in Isaiah 6:10 — “Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts.”
The chiasm in Psalm 103 is more than a clever rhetorical device; it actually gives the psalm its primary meaning, because it encompassed the relationship of God and man, both in time and in holiness. It is a synopsis of the entire Bible. In the beginning was the Word (A); God created Adam as a holy being in His image (B), and loved him (C), but Adam sinned and death overtook him (D). Yet the Lord loved his creation still (C), and sent Christ to redeem him, reversing the process by remaking a man in His image (B); and the world will end in the holiness of God, just as it began (A).
Seeing this, we can truly appreciate how the psalmist uses structure to give the psalm not only beauty, but also enormous power.
Meditation : Prayer : God of love, Father of all, the darkness that covered the earth has given way to the bright dawn of your Word made flesh. Make me and all who confess your holy name people of this light. Make me faithful to your Word that I may bring your life to the waiting world. Grant this through Christ our Lord......Amen |
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