PSALM 141
1 O Lord, I am calling to you. Please hurry!
Listen when I cry to you for help!
I need help—some days I think I need it more badly—truth is that I need help badly every day. I am human and fallen and weak and I need God to show up and help me make it through the day and to live in this broken world.
If I don’t ask for help at the start of the day and during the day then I have slipped into self reliance—we ALL need help.
2 Accept my prayer as incense offered to you,
and my upraised hands as an evening offering.
The offering that God accepts, the worship that He seeks is the authentic heart coming to Him and saying, Lord I need You, I hold my empty hands up to You and ask you to fill them with more of Your Spirit.
My prayers are sweet to God because I am his child and He loves it when His children talk to Him. Also don’t worry about the wording—“He fixes our prayers on the way up—“. He knows what we mean. You don’t have to worry about editing your prayers and making them sound right.
3 Take control of what I say, O Lord,
and guard my lips.
Now there’s a good prayer. May the words I say please—Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to you.
4 Don’t let me drift toward evil
or take part in acts of wickedness.
Don’t let me share in the delicacies
of those who do wrong.
Drift and Delicacies—-two D words that are important and well chosen for us. Slipping away from Christ is a drift—it naturally occurs—we must press on. And delicacies is a good word for sin because it seems to taste so good—I like rich food but it tends to make one ill. We need to be careful. I am trying to stay away from sugar. It is my kryptonite. Sin is fun—it is delicious—it is stuff that we take in and take part in that will mess us up.
Be careful. The ones who want you to take part in sin with them will tempt you with the things YOU are susceptible to. Satan knows what sins you are partial to—vulnerable to. Don’t let the temporary highs of this world pull you away from your firm footing on Jesus.
5 Let the godly strike me!
It will be a kindness!
If they correct me, it is soothing medicine.
Don’t let me refuse it.
This is important—make sure that you surround yourself with people who will ask you the real questions. And give you godly advice. It may not be what you want to hear. But if they really love you they will tell you what you need to hear—not what you want to hear.
Don’t be offended when I tell you the truth about yourself and Jesus—I am just trying to save your life. God loves you. Christians love each other and speak the truth in love to one another.
I pray constantly
against the wicked and their deeds. Praying against something evil is fighting it. Is asking God to decimate the enemies of the cross and their deeds.
6 When their leaders are thrown down from a cliff,
the wicked will listen to my words and find them true.
Pray that people headed for the cliff turn around—repent means turn around—and rethink life—may the people we know, including ourselves—turn around when we are headed in the wrong direction. Right now the world is heading towards a cliff. Sin’s champions are going down. Don’t follow them to the grave.
7 Like rocks brought up by a plow,
the bones of the wicked will lie scattered without burial.
What sin does to humans is it robs them of the image of God—and it demeans who we were made to me—and it robs us of our dignity and sin ends up making people like animals. You and I were meant to live for so much more. And the saddest sight to see is a human being lying in a ditch the victim of sin—God means for us to live eternally—with purpose, with holiness, with purity and strength and creativity and love and joy and peace. Not to be part of the dog eat dog world and be at each other’s throats like competing crocodiles.
8 I look to you for help, O Sovereign Lord.
You are my refuge; don’t let them kill me. Realise that there are people who will try and destroy you—your faith—your reputation—they will try to rob your joy and again, try to distract you. There’s another D word for the day—don’t be distracted and step into a trap because you fell for the smoke and mirrors.
9 Keep me from the traps they have set for me,
from the snares of those who do wrong.
10 Let the wicked fall into their own nets
but let me escape.
Lead me not into temptation—but deliver me from evil.
Help me to see.
Help me, LORD not to DRIFT or be DISTRACTED by the DELICACIES of this world.
‘Nuff Said.
AMEN
