Wednesday’s Word

Failing Friends and Summer of Psalms

Welcome to Coffee Hour @ Chicklit Power and Wednesday’s Word @ Trench 

Classes United. I’m so delighted you took the time to join us for a break today! Grab your coffee and your Strand of Faith and let’s go tie some knots in our faith while learning how to put ourselves into the Scripture with the goal of it coming alive within us!

So we are currently in our Summer of Psalms series, and since today is the 28^th, we’ll go to Psalm 28. It is always good to read any caption that comes before the Psalm as it usually gives us a sort of heads up, why it was written and usually it will tell us by whom it was written. So this particular Psalm was written by David after being betrayed by friends. Let’s stop right there.

Have you ever been betrayed by a friend? Yeah, I feel you;  it’s no fun, and yet, the sooner we realize that all relationships are meant to grow us more into the image of Christ, the sooner others’ betrayals will have less power over our emotions. Don’t get me wrong; unless your emotional dashboard is in the “off” position, it will always be an uncomfortable and even painful occurrence, but those feelings of emotions and betrayal don’t have to drive our cars and cause emotional wrecks in others’ lives!

Think back to when someone you cared about betrayed you. Do you have that in mind? Let’s take a few of these verses and put ourselves in here. For the sake of time, we’re going to start with verse 3.

^3”Do not take me away with the wicked and with the workers of iniquity who speak peace to their neighbors but evil is in their hearts.”

Now we all have seen duplicity, people who say one thing and do another, people who speak kindly to our face but horribly when we turn and look the other way. 

Here’s an example of a rewrite of this verse:

Do not let me be like those who hurt me with their unkind words and actions, whose hearts are filled with ugly things.

Now let’s go to verse 4:

4”Give them according to their deeds and according to the wickedness of their endeavors; give them according to the work of their hands. Render to them what they deserve”

Now notice David is telling God what to do here, which you may think is a bit arrogant, but if we look at the spiritual principle here, he is allowing God to fight his battles. Let’s do the rewrite:

Bring ____ to the end of her/him self that he/she would completely surrender, acknowledging that what they’ve done is not of you and if it is not in their heart to surrender unto you, the Just One, Abba, then give to them what they deserve for when one hurts one of Yours, they hurt You.

Now I don’t know about you, but as I rewrote that verse, my heart softened toward the one(s) that have betrayed me. Coffee Hour Friend, when we take the time to do this, to read, meditate on, rewrite the scriptures according to our own stuff, and then speak them…all I can say is WOW! Try it; you have absolutely nothing to lose and a whole lot to gain.

In His Word,

Evinda