A Many-splendored Love

I am away from my computer this week so may I leave you with just a short thought I have been pondering? 

What if we believed, really believed that all God does and all He allows in our lives is done in love…what if we saw the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ as tokens of His love at work in us?

It’s easy enough to celebrate His steadfast love when things are going well and all is ‘tickety-boo’ with us, but what about when things ‘go south’ as a friend puts it?  What if we were to see His hand at work in this too?  Always at work…for our good and His glory.

All through Scripture we are told to pay attention to what God has done, to remember, to ‘behold’, to consider…I don’t know about you but my mind runs to the blessings, the amazing ‘good’ things I’ve known Him to do.  I don’t straight way think of the hard things, the ‘disasters’, the hard things.  But these too are a product of His hand at work in our lives and in our world.

I  was just looking through  Psalm 107 for example.

It starts off well and good: “Let the redeemed of the LORD say so, whom he has redeemed from trouble…”  We celebrate the redemption but what about the trouble?  Sometimes it’s the direct result of our choices.  Consequences.  But even so, it is out of the Lord’s love and mercy that we are made to suffer consequences and so turn to Him…

…then they cried to the LORD in their trouble; and he delivered them from their distress…

…:So he bowed their hearts down with hard labor” (v.12)

“Some were fools through their sinful ways and because of their iniquities suffered affliction” (v. 17)

“For he commanded and raised the stormy wind which lifted up the waves of the sea.” (v. 25)

“He turns rivers into a desert…a fruitful land into a salty waste…” (v.33,34)

Yikes!  Did I read that right?

This psalm concludes: “Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things;
let them consider the steadfast love of the LORD.” (Ps.107:43)

There’s more to consider than at first meets the eye.  This too I am pondering.  His love endures forever, through every trial and crisis.  Does my praise?

--LS

Bless our God, O peoples; let the sound of his praise be heard,  who has kept our soul among the living and has not let our feet slip. ...  Blessed be God, because he has not rejected my prayer or removed his steadfast love from me! (Ps. 66: 8,9,20)

They have lyre and harp, tambourine and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the LORD, or see the work of his hands. Therefore my people go into exile for lack of knowledge; their honored men go hungry, and their multitude is parched with thirst.
Is.5:12-13)

I remember the days of old; I meditate on all that you have done; I ponder the work of your hands. Ps.143:5

Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and forget not ALL His benefits!