DEVOTION - FRIDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2012

DEVOTION, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2012

Concise and complete

BY

PASTOR BOB COY

Praise the LORD, all you Gentiles! Laud Him, all you peoples! For His merciful kindness is great toward us, and the truth of the LORD endures forever. Praise the LORD! Psalms 117 (NKJV)

With just two verses, Psalm 117 is the shortest Psalm and also the shortest chapter in the entire Bible. It's so short that we may even be tempted to think that it's incomplete. Our minds might conclude that its length only allows it to start something without finishing it.

Yet the truth about Psalm 117 is that although it's incredibly concise, it's also incredibly complete. Keep in mind that the Holy Spirit is the one who inspired the Psalmist and ultimately wrote it. So it's the Spirit's Psalm, and He never leaves things half-finished or undone. Sometimes He makes His point with many verses. Sometimes He makes His point with just a few. Here, He makes His point with just two.

This shortest of all Psalms says exactly what it's supposed to say, and what it's supposed to say is this: at the end of the day it's all about the Lord and not about us. It's His merciful kindness and His truth that's the launching point for our praise.

What a simple yet utterly profound point this is! How many times have we unknowingly strayed off course when it comes to this? We lose focus of the Lord's merciful kindness in our lives, lose touch with the wonderful truth of who He is, and our worship is warped into an unworthy counterfeit of some sort.

God's Spirit nails the problem behind this, and He only uses two verses to do it!

God of Mercy and Truth, may we enter into the reality of what Your Spirit is saying in this Psalm. May our praise be based on who You are. May it always be about You and not about us.