The Lord will indeed give what is good

Love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. The LORD will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest.

Psalm 85:10-12

Harvesting in Volgograd, Russia. www.volganet.ru [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL 1.3 (www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl-1.3.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

Harvesting in Volgograd, Russia. www.volganet.ru [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL 1.3 (www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl-1.3.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

Have you ever made a promise that you had no intention of keeping? I’m sure it’s something that we’ve all done, even if it’s just the reassurance that yes, of course we’ll keep in touch that we give to someone when you leave school, university, or change jobs. It’s often kinder to assure your colleagues that you’ll get together soon rather than saying well, you know what it’s like, we’re all so busy these days, and no doubt I’ll make new friends in my new job and I won’t have the time nor the inclination to meet up with you in the future. Often people understand that this promise won’t be kept and they have no intention of keeping it either. Other times, if a genuinely strong friendship has formed, it might be quite disappointing.

The good news is that, with God, we can be confident that he will keep his promises. In today’s verses we get the reassurance that the Lord will indeed give what is good. God listens to his people when we pray to him and he answers those prayers. He speaks to us through his word, the Bible, and he works in our lives through his Holy Spirit. He doesn’t abandon us to fend for ourselves, but he supports us, nourishes us, comforts us, loves us, provides for us, and, ultimately of course, he died for us. The promises that God makes his people, the promises that we find throughout the Bible, are promises that are kept.

In God, we find love and faithfulness entwined. God loves his people, and faithfully keeps his promises. God’s righteousness, his holiness and blamelessness, and his peace, his willingness to reach out to us and spare us his anger, are all facets of his character. As the psalmist reflects in this verse, if we are faithful to God, we can be sure that God in his righteousness looks down from heaven at us. It is because of God’s character that we can have confidence in the promises that he makes us.

Give thanks to God today for who he is, for his love and faithfulness, for his righteousness and peace. And give thanks today that God listens to his people and answers our prayers!

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Filed under Bible Reflections, Something from the Psalms

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