Psalm Meditation 498
Epiphany Sunday
January 3, 2010

Psalm 70
1 Be pleased, O God, to deliver me. O LORD, make haste to help me!
2 Let those be put to shame and confusion who seek my life. Let those be turned back and brought to dishonor who desire to hurt me.
3 Let those who say, "Aha, Aha!" turn back because of their shame.
4 Let all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you. Let those who love your salvation say evermore, "God is great!"
5 But I am poor and needy; hasten to me, O God! You are my help and my deliverer; O LORD, do not delay!
(NRSV)

There are folks who can do things for us in such a way that we know we would have been better off having gone without their help. They remind us on a regular basis how much they did to help us. We know they will never call in that favor because it will take away their leverage in the relationship. “Be pleased, O God, to deliver me.” is a way of asking God for help that does not make a big issue of it.

The good thing about that is that God is pleased to help us and is not likely to remind us what great things have been done for us by God. It is not about pay backs and bargaining where God is concerned. There is no, ‘I’ll do this for you if you do this for me,’ where God is concerned. God is not manipulated by our bargaining; God is pleased to be a part of our lives. God does not set us up with conditions on our relationship so that we have to jump through lots of hoops to get God to pay attention to us. There are rules and conditions to a relationship with God, just as there are with any relationship and those rules don’t change from one day to the next. God wants to be in relationship with us.

It is probably better to say no to a request from a friend than it is to use that favor as a leverage point in the relationship. If we can’t find a way to be pleased to help another we are probably better off not to help in this case. Eventually an opportunity will present itself that catches our interest and excitement in such a way that we are pleased to help out. When that happens we will know that we are doing a work of God and we can all rejoice together.

© December 28, 2009
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
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