Psalm 37 as a meditation to remain centered
In Psalm 1 there is an instruction to meditate on God’s law. The whole of Psalm 1 is a summary of healthy living, in that regard – so meditation on God’s law or the broader concept of scripture is a way to bring your life into a place of peace – not being at war. Nominally, the use of a personal pronoun in ‘good writting’ is to be avoided. That said, I explicitly ask God to give me a scripture to meditate on – to read, reflect, listen. That is Psalm 37.
One way that I meditate is to take the words of the passage and attempt to get past any trivialization of meaning brought on by assigning the passage to just feeling good. The power of scripture is beyond consolation, albeit consolation is vital to a wound. A useful grid of meditation on scripture is to look at:
- What does it precisely say? This requires something that can give you higher vocabulary than 5th grade for the power of the meaning. Fortunately, it is not neccessary any longer to rely on one person’s statement.
- What does it mean? That is a bit harder – it requires having a rich construct or ‘model’ of God, Man, and essentially sin and redemption. Most people refer to this has moving past milk to the hard meat of the word – which means that you must cultivate a background of all scripture, not just a few proof texts that you might use to defend your fallen character as actually righteous.
- What do I do with it? Scripture is given to equip us for life here, in a place where there are constant reminders of how broken people are. Certainly, it declares Jesus for salvation. But that is quick, simple, and attractive as the palliative. “Well, they must not be Christians.” The sad fact is that some of the greatest evils (Hello, Russia in Ukraine?) are done by people loudly proclaiming their Christianity. The question for us personally, is what do I do with me when I read a scripture, and it stops me from moving past to selfishness?
Psalm 33:3 (Berean translation): “Trust the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land, and cultivate faithfullness.”
First: Trust. Saying “I Trust God” is virtually pointless without understanding what you are trusting God about.
- Trust Trap 1: Undefined Trust – Typically an excuse for or method of looking for a pass on some temporal difficulty.
- Trust Trap 2: Temporal Trust – While God is merciful and gracious, when we are trusting Him for a parking place it is more likely that we are actually asking for His mercy. This may be hard to agree with, but the type of trust called out in Psalm 37:3 is not asking for mercy.
- What are the eternal factors which you cannot control?
- If God has a plan (Psalm 37:23 – the steps of a man are ordered by God) then if we Trust him, there are tension areas related to that plan.
- We trust Him with our finances. But we have to balance our checkbook.
- We trust Him with our health. But we have to do the healthy living thing.
- We trust Him with a living place. But we have to mow the lawn, do the laundry, fix the things that break.
- We trust Him with a place to worship. But we have to accept that our worship is about Him, and not about us.
The core point in the above is that “trusting God” absolutely requires a level of self honesty. If you are “trusting God for a parking place” more likely you are asking Him for the mercy to give you something important in the moment. It would be more direct to recognize that you can trust God with what exactly He as said and promised – “I will never leave you nor forsake you” for example. More importantly, “I know the plans I have for you…” (And my plans are not your plans, and my thoughts are not your thoughts…)
Second: Doing Good. Doing Good is used to cover a multitude of bad human behaviors. An example is helping a baby wild animal – whose mother then rejects it. Or helping a butterfly come from a coccon – and killing it because it needs the struggle to get it’s wings going. So. What is ‘doing good?”
- Doing – choosing to act. That’s easy. If this is instruction, the implication is that the doing is not the natural behavior.
- Good – an act for the benefit of others. Well, what is the benefit to others? Is doing something well beneficial to others? So, doing something quick and easy is to benefit me – there is only enough effort to check it off the list.
- So Doing Good is about benefiting others. Tangible benefit is implied and supported by text.
- Doing Good includes doing things well. Half done, or barely done isn’t ‘good work.’
The context of doing good seems to fit the conclusion of the verse – cultivating faithfulness.
Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness
Here is a complaint: taking a clear directive and declaring it to be a metaphor or allegory is interposing personal belief over the integrity of the word. Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfullness are quite direct. That is:
- You are where you are because that is God’s plan. That plan may be a toxic situation, but if so, you have a responsibility to deal with the toxicity.
- If you are to do good, that is where you are to do good. Note that the best good may include what used to be called “tough love.”
- Faithfullness is a very very rich word. This is so rich, that it required aligning multiple “hues” of the picture:
- Fidelity: completely accurate representation of truth.
- Integrity: whole and completely consistent
- Trustworthy: dependable, capable of accomplishment
- Unwavering Commitment
The interesting point here is that the reader or the one being instructed is not inherently any of the above. It is evident that cultivating faithfulness means that a person intentionally pays attention to their own behaviors – and does what is needed to develop a faithful character.
Final thoughts
Anxiety is rooted in a knowledge that control of any life situation is not in your hands. That is, what happens next may be what you hope or you dread – and after enough dreaded things have happened, well, you doubt that hope can come forward. Oddly enough, hindsight is usually blind in this matter.
Trust then seems to have three cornerstones:
- Do Good. (And do it well)
- Dwell in the land. (be a steward of your place)
- Cultivate Faithfulness. (hold yourself accountable for integrity).
