our high calling

Behold as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their Master, so our eyes look to the LORD our God till He has mercy on us, Psalm 123:2b

Have you ever received a call that has changed your life?  Well, Jesus changes everything.  He turns the tables upside down.  With Jesus, life is not business as usual not is it life as usual.  

God has a great call on your life.  The calling is not something that we choose.  It is something that we discover.  It is something that God has planted in us.  God’s call is two-fold: first, we are called to Him and secondly, we are called to join Him in His Kingdom pursuit.

God has called us to the great work of being a servant on His behalf!  Being called a servant of God is the greatest calling of my life.  

In the previous Psalms on our journey we covered the territory of Repentance (this is where all of our journeys begin) then Providence (God’s guidance) then worship (the melody that leads us Home) and now service (the privilege of a lifetime).   

It is fitting that worship comes first and that service is the result.  Jesus, said, you shall worship the Lord God and serve Him alone, Matthew 4:10.  Worship and service go together.  They must not be separated.  They are like the two sides of the same coin.   

Here is a life changing principle:

  

     “WE SERVE WHAT WE WORSHIP and WE WORSHIP WHAT WE SERVE.”

  

If we serve without worship, it leads us into the sweat shop of performance driven living.  If we worship without serving, we become so star struck that we are no earthly good.  No. God designed our life around worship and service, not worship or service.

Here are three lessons I have learned (still learning) on improving my serve.

1.  Look to God as ultimate authority, Psalm 123:1. This may seem obvious but is it really the way I conduct my life?  The issue of authority is at the root of civilizations, nations, marriage, our life’s problems including Adam and Eve.  We are made to live in submission to God not independent from Him. Question: So, by whose authority am I orchestrating my life by: God’s or mine?

2.  Listen to God for His instruction and direction, Psalm 123:2.   When I played baseball, I would often play catcher.  It was my responsibility to signal the pitcher to tell him what to pitch.  I did not come up with the decision on my own. I looked to the manager of the team who called the “shots” or pitches in this case.  In the Christian life, we are like the catcher, listening to our Master who calls out His will from His Word.  Question:  So, where do I get my direction from:  God or me?

3.  Live for the applause of the One, Psalm 123:3-4.  I tend to be a people pleaser, which is rooted in pride.  I have made a discovery; pride and the Christian life do not mix well.  God is opposed to the proud, I Peter 5:6.  When I am living for the applause of the crowd, I am image conscious instead of being integrity conscious.  This is a dangerous place to be.  The remedy is not to put yourself down. The remedy is not to try and pump yourself up.  The remedy is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  The Gospel tells us what Jesus thinks about us — and really, that is all the matters in the opinion column, read 1 Corinthians 4:1-7. In all honesty, the Gospel tells me that I am more wicked than I dare believe but I am more loved than I could ever imagine.  Question:  So, am I motivated by what others think of me, what I think of myself or what Jesus thinks of me, Romans 8:1?  

the song of the heart

I was glad when they said to me, Let us go to the house of the Lord, Psalm 122:1

How would you finish this sentence:  I was glad when they said to me, let us go to ...?  Would your answer be worship?  Would it be even in your top five?

There are many songs for the heart but this Psalm is the song of the heart.  What is is the difference?  Songs for the heart calm us and stir us.  But the song of the heart flows out of us to God as a deep expression of worship.  The Lord made us for Himself, thus we are most satisfied when we turn from serving idols (man-made gods that we make in our own image) to worshiping the One who made us in His own image. God both delights in our worship and deserves our worship. As the Psalmist also sings, “Come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.  For He is our God and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand”, Psalm 95:6-7.

How can we worship God that “brings a smile to His face” and as a result satisfies the longing of our heart?

We are to come to God — honestly, Hebrews 10:22.  Because of Jesus Christ, we are invited to draw near to the Holy One with a sincere or honest heart. For all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do, Hebrews 4:13.  

We are to come to God — hungry, Luke 1:52. This means when we come to God, we come expecting to hear from God.  It is in a posture of worship that often times we “hear His voice, see Psalm 95:7.  Through worship, we come into His presence to look to Him and to learn from Him.  

We are to come to God — humbly, James 4:10. I read somewhere two great confessions, “Your are the Christ!”  “We are but men!”  We are not in ultimate control or even in control of the control that we think we control. The Lord, He alone is God!  He is beyond our understanding and our control.  

Yet, we are invited to feast in His presence in worship with an honest, hungry and humble heart. When we do, songs of worship arise and flow from our heart to His.  

the invisible hand of God

I will lift up my eyes to the mountains, where does my help come from? —Psalm 121

In this second step in songs for the journey we discover the invisible providential hand of God!  As we begin this journey we need to know that God is with us all the way, watches over us and keeps us along the way. 

What are you looking to for help and guidance along your way?  The Psalmist states that he lifts his eyes to the mountains.  Can they help?  In his day, people would erect altars of worship to idols on the mountains or on high places.  What is an idol? An idol is made by  men and women who create a god in their own image that they are comfortable with and can control.  But can an idol help us on our way?  Only the living One can.  My help comes from the Lord, who made the heavens and the earth ... and the mountains, Psalm 121:2. 

How does God help us?

1.  The LORD made the heavens and the earth.    This means that the Lord is ABLE to help us wherever we are on the journey.  “Ah Lord God behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm.  Nothing is too difficult for You, Jeremiah 32:17.  Lift your eyes on Him!

2.  The Lord is ready to help AT ALL TIMES.  He is not only “out there” but He is “here” at the same time.  He is the God transcendent and also immanent (near and involved).  He does not sleep nor does He slumber, Psalm 121:4.  He is always available twenty-four/seven. Lift your eyes on Him!

3.  The Lord is the One who KEEPS you.  He has your back.  He has you.  He personally watches over you.  He has every hair on your head numbered.  Jesus said, He knows every sparrow that falls to the ground. Are you not much more valuable than they are?  What say you to that?  The trials that come in our lives are not to destroy us but to from us, James 1:2-4.   Like Job, we ask God, where are you in this?  God answers I am here in ways you do not and cannot comprehend. In the fog or your life then, lift your eyes on Him!

4.  The Lord is the one who PROTECTS you.  Nothing - no no thing will ever separate you from Him, His love, nor His good purpose, Romans 8:37-39.  Lift your eyes on Him! 

5.  The Lord is the one who GUARDS you.  In other words he helps you from the beginning of your journey to the very end.  What God starts, He completes, Philippians 1:6.   “The promise of the psalm — is not that we shall never stub our toes,but that no injury, no illness, no accident, no distress will have evil power over us, that it is, will be able to separate us from God’s purpose in us” — Eugene Peterson, Long Obedience in the Same Direction.

Lift your eyes on Him!

a new beginning begins here

As you read this psalm we discover that the psalmist is in distress.  He sings a dirge or we can say, he sings the blues.   

What is he distressed about?  The encompassing culture surrounding him is wearing him out. He says, deliver my soul from deceptive talk, lying lips, constantly barraged by those who criticize, condemn and are really only concerned about themselves... and it gets wearisome.  

There is something terribly wrong with our world.  Most of our life will not make sense unless we realize this to be true.  

Here is how I see it.  I live in a world at war, and it gets wearisome.  War is not only something that is “over there” but it is here — in the constant “babyish” bickering between political parties; in our rebellious culture rejecting God’s value on human life and his sacred design of marriage; in our churches where we come to feel good as our goal instead of coming together to offer our worship to the Holy One; in our marriages defined more by “me” instead of “we”.  

And then, when I am brutally honest, I discover that the war is not just out there but it is in here — in me!   The Apostle James says, “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?  

Yes - We are a world at war — war is brutal, ugly, heart-breaking and ... it is wearying.    The psalmist has lived with and settled in too long with those who live in the tents of this darkness (tents of Kedar, Psalm 120:5).   So, he comes to the place of wanting a new beginning:  The starting point for this new beginning is — repentance.  

Genuine repentance is not just a turning over a new leaf or turing from some unrighteous behavior.  It goes deeper than that.  Repentance is not just correcting some bad attitude or wayward thinking. It goes deeper than that.  Repentance goes deep into the heart, where my war-filled heart is finally exposed for its deeply rooted selfishness and self-inflated view of itself.  It is where I am totally naked and exposed before the Holy “eye” of Him.  It is here, I surrender and lay down my weapons of selfishness and jealousy and choose to walk the path less traveled.  I choose follow the trail of Jesus Christ.  

He is the one who turns our dirge into a new song.  He puts our feet on solid ground making our footsteps firm and fills our heart with strength to face the day. So, this is where our journey begins.  If you agree with the psalmist, “woe is me ...too long has my soul had its dwelling with those who make hate peace, Psalm 120:5-6, then come on and together let’s follow His trail with these songs for the journey.  

songs for the journey

Songs for the journey is from the grouping of Psalms known as the song of Ascents, (Psalm 120-134).  Many think that these fifteen psalms were songs that the Jewish people read and sang as they “ascended” to Jerusalem from their villages for Festival Time.   These Psalms encompass the journey that we all go through in our return to God, to His Providence in our lives and our longing for intimate fellowship with Him!   

Many years ago I was inspired by Eugene Peterson’s book, “Long Obedience in the Same Direction” that unpacks these psalms. 

Here is a thirty-thousand foot look at the landscape of Peterson’s awe-inspiring themes and my titles to each one .  

Psalm 120 — Repentance: A new beginning

Psalm 121 — Providence:  The Invisible Hand of God

Psalm 122 — Worship: The Song of the Heart

Psalm 123 — Service: Our High Calling

Psalm 124 — God’s Help: The Way of Escape

Psalm 125 — Security: The Anchor 

Psalm 126 — Joy: When Joy Returns

Psalm 127 — Work: Don’t Be a Cow

Psalm 128 — Happiness: Our Reason to be Happy

Psalm 129 — Perseverance: The Road Less Traveled

Psalm 130 — Hope: Learning to Wait

Psalm 131 — Humility: True Riches

Psalm 132 — Obedience: A Daring Faith

Psalm 133 — Community: True Spiritual Community

Psalm 134 — Blessing: What a Day That Will Be

I encourage you to join me as we travel meditatively through each one of these Psalms and see how God sneaks up on us along the way.