|
1 I cried out to God for help;
I cried out to God to hear me.
2 When I was in distress, I sought the Lord;
at night I stretched out untiring hands,
and my soul refused to be comforted.
3 I remembered you, O God, and I groaned;
I mused, and my spirit grew faint.[b]
4 You kept my eyes from closing;
I was too troubled to speak.
5 I thought about the former days,
the years of long ago;
6 I remembered my songs in the night.
My heart mused and my spirit enquired:
7 ‘Will the Lord reject for ever?
Will he never show his favour again?
8 Has his unfailing love vanished for ever?
Has his promise failed for all time?
9 Has God forgotten to be merciful?
Has he in anger withheld his compassion?’
10 Then I thought, ‘To this I will appeal:
the years of the right hand of the Most High.
11 I will remember the deeds of the LORD;
yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.
|
|
12 I will meditate all your works
and consider on all your mighty deeds.’
13 Your ways, God, are holy.
What god is as great as our God?
14 You are the God who performs miracles;
you display your power among the peoples.
15 With your mighty arm you redeemed your people,
the descendants of Jacob and Joseph.
16 The waters saw you, O God,
the waters saw you and writhed;
the very depths were convulsed.
17 The clouds poured down water,
the skies resounded with thunder;
your arrows flashed back and forth.
18 Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind,
your lightning lit up the world;
the earth trembled and quaked.
19 Your path led through the sea,
your way through the mighty waters,
though your footprints were not seen.
20 You led your people like a flock
by the hand of Moses and Aaron.
(NIV)
|
|
Psalm 77: There is a feeling that this psalm is a combination of two psalms. The vocabulary is the same, so the feeling is that this is a prayer for Israel a form of unity in some national distress. The psalmist longingly looks back on better times, when the people found God in the things they did and saw.
I wonder do we look for God in the world around us when things get too much for us to bear.
What do we do when we feel the world is against us?
Do we cry out to God for help, or do we try to battle through our problems on our own, and only cry out to God, when all that we have done has been no good.
I remember one church I attended; it had a bill come in and there was not enough money in our account to pay for it. Our minister asked us all to remain seated after the service and we all prayed for a solution. We all stayed there half an hour or maybe an hour and just prayed.
Later that week, the minister sent round a message that some funds enough to pay the bill had just come in. You see, God does work His miracles through us today.
|