Holston Daily Devotional February 12, 2021

Focus Scripture

Psalm 50: 1-6

1 The mighty one, God the LORD,

speaks and summons the earth

from the rising of the sun to its setting.

2 Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,

God shines forth.

3 Our God comes and does not keep silence,

before him is a devouring fire,

a mighty tempest all around him.

4 He calls to the heavens above

and to the earth, that he may judge his people:

5 “Gather to me my faithful ones,

who made a covenant with me by sacrifice!”

6 The heavens declare his righteousness,

for God himself is judge.

Devotion

I along with others served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War. I was a medic. When I had fulfilled my obligation, I was separated from the Army and

resumed my study at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.

On Sunday evenings, a group of us students would invite one of our teachers to go to Shoney’s for hot fudge cake and coffee. One of these professors asked me, “How did the Vietnam war affect your Christian understandings... your Christian life?”

I replied that I did not ask for God to protect me when I was there, because it was difficult for me to ask God to protect me when we were engaged in an unholy task.

This reply reflects the questions I was asking then and that many of us are asking now about God’s justice and God’s judgment on injustice in our world— a yearning that God would not remain silent but speak God’ righteousness.

I am writing this on the day before the 59th inauguration of a president and vice president of our United States and the day after the celebrations of Martin Luther

King Day. This is a good time for us to reflect on the ambivalence of our times

and to ask about God’s sense of justice and “righteousness” for all of us. A colleague of mine says that the Scriptures often find us rather than the other way around. Certainly this one has. Our answers are often imperfect at best and so too are our understandings. This scripture says we have a God does not remain silent but speaks God’s words. Could we listen, in this time, for a God who does not remain silent but speaks to God’s faithful and exercises God’s judgment and justice in ways we cannot?

Prayer

“From the rising of the sun to its setting” you speak to your people and

assure us that your judgments and your righteousness rise above all our ours. May our faithfulness to you give us ears to hear and hearts to understand. Amen.