4 Show me Your ways, O Lord; Teach me Your paths.
5 Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day.
6 Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, For they are from of old.
We have to be honest before God, and His Spirit will show us the truth about ourselves and our spiritual condition. As we partner with Him in a consistent spiritual inventory, we can depend on Him to show us where we are falling short and affirm where we are walking in obedience to Him. He will also teach us about who we are in Christ, because the more we know and accept who He has made us to be, the more likely we are to walk in that manner.
In Psalm 62, we see a very honest portion of Scripture that can challenge us to appropriate what God has provided for us:
5 My soul, wait silently for God alone, For my expectation is from Him.
6 He only is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense; I shall not be moved.
7 In God is my salvation and my glory; The rock of my strength, And my refuge, is in God.
8 Trust in Him at all times, you people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.
Say what you want about the frontman of the legendary supergroup U2, a man simply known as Bono, but his indelible impact on music has been remarkable. He has professed to know Christ, and although I have found myself disagreeing with him at times, there is a spiritual component to U2's music that is undeniable.
Bono sat down to record a video recently with the man responsible for The Message version of the Bible, Eugene Peterson, recently. According to a Christianity Today piece, the documentary, called, The Psalms, was produced by the Fuller Studio Initiative of Fuller Theological Seminary. The article says that the two men's friendship began with Bono’s admiration for The Message, which the singer read to his dying father and quoted before the song “Where the Streets Have No Name” during U2’s 2001 Elevation tour.
Fuller professor David Taylor asked the two men this question: “What is your earliest memory of the Psalms?”
Peterson said, "I was totally confused, because I grew up in a culture where every word of the Bible was the word of God literally. Don’t mess around with it. That’s the way it is,” adding, “And I was starting to read that he keeps my tears in this bottle, shields, javelins, rock. ‘God is our rock.’ Come on.”
Bono related that he remembers the Psalms through hymns at his childhood Church of Ireland congregation. He said, "I remember thinking, ‘Great words. Shame about the tunes,’” adding, “Except for ‘The Lord is My Shepherd,’ which is a great tune.”
Psalm 56:3 (“When I get really afraid I come to you in trust”), made the top 10 Bible verses shared on Twitter in 2015.
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In Psalm 62, we see a very honest portion of Scripture that can challenge us to appropriate what God has provided for us:
5 My soul, wait silently for God alone, For my expectation is from Him.
6 He only is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense; I shall not be moved.
7 In God is my salvation and my glory; The rock of my strength, And my refuge, is in God.
8 Trust in Him at all times, you people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.
Say what you want about the frontman of the legendary supergroup U2, a man simply known as Bono, but his indelible impact on music has been remarkable. He has professed to know Christ, and although I have found myself disagreeing with him at times, there is a spiritual component to U2's music that is undeniable.
Bono sat down to record a video recently with the man responsible for The Message version of the Bible, Eugene Peterson, recently. According to a Christianity Today piece, the documentary, called, The Psalms, was produced by the Fuller Studio Initiative of Fuller Theological Seminary. The article says that the two men's friendship began with Bono’s admiration for The Message, which the singer read to his dying father and quoted before the song “Where the Streets Have No Name” during U2’s 2001 Elevation tour.
Fuller professor David Taylor asked the two men this question: “What is your earliest memory of the Psalms?”
Peterson said, "I was totally confused, because I grew up in a culture where every word of the Bible was the word of God literally. Don’t mess around with it. That’s the way it is,” adding, “And I was starting to read that he keeps my tears in this bottle, shields, javelins, rock. ‘God is our rock.’ Come on.”
Bono related that he remembers the Psalms through hymns at his childhood Church of Ireland congregation. He said, "I remember thinking, ‘Great words. Shame about the tunes,’” adding, “Except for ‘The Lord is My Shepherd,’ which is a great tune.”
You may be familiar with U2 songs that reference the Psalms, that were pointed out in the Christianity Today story: “Gloria,” “With a Shout,” “Magnificent,” and, most famously, “40,” which refers to Psalm 40.
Bono did take aim at Christian music, saying that, "The psalmist is brutally honest about the explosive joy that he’s feeling, and the deep sorrow or confusion, and it’s that that sets the Psalms apart for me.” He said that he asked often, "...why isn’t church music more like that?" He expressed a desire for the conversation to inspire people "who are writing these beautiful gospel songs" to write a song about a bad marriage or perhaps how they're not pleased with the government. He said, "...Because that’s what God wants from you—that truth,” Bono said. “That truthfulness … will blow things apart. Why I’m suspicious about Christians is because of this lack of realism, and I’d love to see more of that in art, and in life, and in music.”
Peterson said on the video: "The psalms … showed me that imagination was a way to get inside the truth."
The article pointed out the popularity of the Psalms themselves, saying that according to Bible Gateway, 22 of the 100 most popular Bible verses searched for in 2015 came from the Psalms. The content manager for that website told CT that Psalms was its most popular book of the Bible. The top verse from the book: Psalm 23:4, which was #5 overall. The Message version of that verse says: “Even when the way goes through Death Valley, I’m not afraid when you walk at my side. Your trusty shepherd’s crook makes me feel secure.”
Set aside Bono's generalizations about Christian music - I don't know how much of that genre he's really been exposed to or that his criticisms are really that valid. Sure, there is shallow music that is Christian and there is certainly plenty of shallow, meaningless music across the various types of popular music. But, I do resonate with His point - the truth, when we grasp the truth, will change our perspective. And, if we are honest before God and allow His truth to penetrate our souls, then we can find ourselves lining up more with the life He has in store for us.
A good word for us today is honesty, which is really a component of the Psalms. We have to be honest when we approach God and His Word, and allow Him to show us really where we are spiritually, to make an accurate inventory of our spiritual condition, so that we can take necessary steps to change. We can also take God at His Word and recognize that a description of our true, honest identity is found in the pages of the Scriptures. He shows us who we really are so that we can then become more of who He wants us to be.
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