Destiny or Choice - Judas a tragedy

Sunday, September 20, 2020

Gratitude through Generations : Thoughts on Psalm105

 

One morning, as part of my own meditation, I read all of Psalm105. I didn’t plan to read it; I just happened to read it. This Psalm essentially asks people to worship and trust in the Lord, because of what He has done for us.

This Psalm has 45 verses, wherein almost about 600 years of history is captured, from Abraham to Joshua. Isn’t it amazing?

Let’s think a little bit about King David, who writes this Psalm. Can you imagine almost a thousand years separate him from when Abraham lived.  It is also almost  350 years after the Israelites went into Canaan. Now consider this, At the time when  King David  was writing this Psalm, he did not have access to the internet, nor to libraries in the same way that we do today.

There are a couple of things we can conclude about King David and his context. The first and the most obvious one is this: King David was a well-read man who had access to all the literature of that time. Second, there was some sort of thorough way in which history was recorded. Either it was meticulously passed on through oral tradition or it was carefully recorded in writing. Third, King David was a poet. His poetry was deeply reflective. He was able to connect the history of that time to his context and relate it to God’s faithfulness to His People.

Isn’t it amazing? Despite a 1000 years separating Abraham and King David, the king was able to connect various elements of Israel’s history right from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and then the travails of Joseph. Here, he speaks of Joseph’s role in prison and then as a helper to Pharaoh and it goes on. We then come to the birth of Moses, the captivity of Israelites in Egypt and how they lived for several years. Then arrive the plagues, miraculous signs in the plagues and then the journey of the Israelites across the Red Sea and giving them food through manna. He also opened the water from the rock,  All these aspects are captured by David in one single Psalm!

What struck me through all of this is the fact that we have a living word. At different levels and at different times, you will see that the mercies of the past and the promises God made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were all fulfilled. Thus, when we look at our current context, the Psalm 105  can inspire us to recount the faithfulness of our Lord over the past generations. We have an opportunity to connect God's Faithfulness from our  ancestors to our present times and Praise our Lord. 

The Creation of Adam- Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel

The Creation of Adam- Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel

I had the opportunity to take this picture 2018

2 comments:

  1. Lovely reflection Emmy! Does nudge me to also reflect deeper on Psalm 105. The Lord's graciousness has truly been pressed down and overflowing.

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  2. Beautiful insight on Psalm 105... it's a quick recap of the Exodus chapter. Thank you Emmy.

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