Hummm...WHACK!

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,

Nor stands in the way of sinners,

Nor sits in the seat of scoffers;

But his delight is in the law of the Lord,

And on his law he meditates day and night.

Psalm 1

I was meditating on these verses today, or trying to meditate, or trying to try…you get the point.  The point is it’s hard to meditate. Hard to focus. It’s hard to make the mind travel a single path and not wander down every fork in the road.  I double back on myself, I repeat, I say the same thing again, I repeat, and I double back on myself.  And here’s that fork again, where was I?  Oh yeah, meditate.

I want the blessing.  And I understand the blessing.  There are so many ready to counsel us right into the worse decisions we ever made, ready to take advantage, ready to tell us we’ll never succeed.  Just when you were focused, they offer you a different path of discouragement and promises of failure.  If you’ve not met these people, believe me that you are blessed.  But you’ve probably met these people…most likely you just came from one of those meetings.  And they’ve dragged you down, making you feel unblessed. The feeling is hard to mistake and even harder to discard.  Meditate on God’s law, and there they are.  Walk, sit, stand…there they are.

As I was meditating on these verses I had a vision.  A vision of moles.  Whack-a-mole to be most accurate.  My meditating thoughts bounced in and out of prayer, in and out of my conscience, and my waking self wanted that giant mallet to take control again.  Beat back the scoffers, the sinners, the wicked thoughts.  I wanted to meditate on the blessing, but the moles just keep popping up.  And so I started looking for my mallet and…I found it.

I started thinking not just on the Law, but on its promises.  I started thinking on the promises that God gave me, not just of my crimes against that Law.  God is working something in me, he promised me that.  “If [I] confess [my] sins, he is faithful and just to forgive [me my] sins and to cleanse [me] from all unrighteousness.” (I John 1:9)  Where I fall short of the mark, even in my focus, God has brought something new in me.  He picks up a big mallet and plays the game for me.  And He’s really good at it. “Did [I] presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead [me] to repentance.” (Rom. 2:4)  Repentance…Changing the way that I think.  While even in my meditation, God has a renewing power.  To think on Christ and his perfection, and the Grace he offers me.

The Grace of God is a power unlike any other.  God uses this unexpected tool to open up a world to me that I never deserved.  I didn’t deserve the blessing.  “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do.  By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” (Rom 8:3)

So we have a delight today that Christ has acted for us.  And the wicked, and the sinners, and the scoffers can’t get us down.  My delight is in the Law of the Lord, And my Salvation is in Grace.  My delight is in Jesus Christ, And the blessing for me is real.  Now that I can think about. HUMMM…WHACK!