“I am a great sinner and Christ is a great Savior.”

Reflection on Psalm 25:5-9

“Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all the day long. Remember your mercy, O LORD, and your steadfast love, for they have been from of old. Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions; according to your steadfast love remember me, for the sake of your goodness, O LORD! Good and upright is the LORD; therefore he instructs sinners in the way. He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble his way.

David knew the sins of his youth were something that left to himself he could not cover up or deal with. The truth is that God sees all and knows all. This leaves us in a terrible predicament left to ourselves because we cannot do anything to erase our past, we cannot do anything to cover up those times we have hurt others and hurt God.

But David did not rely on what he could do to cover it up – in fact he did the very opposite, he confessed his sins (see also Psalm 51), he asked God to show him mercy, to pour out His steadfast love.

David turned the God who ‘instructs sinners in the way’, the God who ‘leads the humble’ and teaches ‘the humble his way’ – David turned to the God who does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.’… but instead …’as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.’ (Psalm 103:10-12).

Here’s the bottom line then. God is not looking for the pretender. He is not looking for the one who can put on the best show outwardly that they are good – but rather the one who admits they are not. And the one who in that turns to Him, to His mercy and His love – who turns to God alone to rescue them, to forgive them, to guide them, to save them.

John Newton the hymn writer who wrote the famous hymn ‘Amazing Grace’ put it beautifully when he said: “Although my memory’s fading, I remember two things very clearly: I am a great sinner and Christ is a great Savior.”

For the person who puts their trust in Jesus’ death on the cross as payment for their sin – their remains no more payment for sin, but total forgiveness and everlasting life with God as their Father – there is no other truth worth living for, and no other joy that arms us to face all our days. Oh, what a God! Oh, what a Saviour!

Our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.

A reflection on Psalm 124

¹ If the LORD had not been on our side– let Israel say– ² if the LORD had not been on our side when men attacked us, ³ when their anger flared against us, they would have swallowed us alive; ⁴ the flood would have engulfed us, the torrent would have swept over us, ⁵ the raging waters would have swept us away. ⁶ Praise be to the LORD, who has not let us be torn by their teeth. ⁷ We have escaped like a bird out of the fowler’s snare; the snare has been broken, and we have escaped. ⁸ Our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.

Israel had much adversity and trouble. Mostly because of choosing roads to take that were damaging. Roads away from the good path that God had told them to walk down. We are not told here though what exactly is going on.

However, we are shown how the LORD God was on His people’s side, how He kept them from being ‘swallowed alive’ and how He stopped them being drowned by the ‘flood’ of those who were set against them. ‘Praise be to the LORD’ he says.

Here the psalmist talks about God’s rescue – that ‘our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth’. It is God who is the helper of His people.

Sometimes we might think of God as distant and uninvolved. How can He allow such things to go on in this world, in our lives? – we may think or ask. The truth is that God has done something about our greatest enemies – sin, death, and Satan. The fowler’s snare (so to speak) of sin, and death and Satan have been broken, and there is escape…

God is not distant, unmoved and uninvolved… on the contrary He is our great Help. He sent Jesus to bring the help that we could never provide for ourselves. He made a way for our forgiveness, a way for eternal life in His presence and the defeat of the great enemy of our souls.

God has done all this in Jesus. In His death in our place. In His resurrection from the dead. In His Spirit that comes to dwell within in us, Who is the promise of our eternal life to come.

We can forget that God has rescued His people from the greatest traps, we must remember this, and that in all things:

In trouble… trust in God.

A reflection on John 14:1-6

¹ “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. ² In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. ³ And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. ⁴ You know the way to the place where I am going.” ⁵ Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” ⁶ Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.

Jesus’ disciples have much reason to feel troubled. He has just previously told them that one of them would betray him and the lead disciple (Simon Peter) has just promised to lay down his life for him but Jesus has corrected him to inform him that Peter will instead deny his master three times. The disciples not only here have great reason to have hearts that are troubled but soon they will have even more: Jesus, their leader will be crucified on the cross. In fact Jesus goes on to tell them: “I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy.” (John 16:20)

What is the remedy for a troubled heart?…

‘Trust in God, trust also in Me’ Jesus says. It is trust in God.

For the one who has placed their trust in Jesus’ death for their sins, and so follows Jesus as King – there is every reason for trust in God. Because Jesus tells his followers here that he is going to prepare a place for us. An eternal dwelling! In the Father’s house!

But in our trouble we may ask ‘Lord… how can we know the way to this eternal home?’ And Jesus answers us and he did them… ‘I AM the WAY and the TRUTH and the LIFE’

Through Jesus alone you and I can have certain hope and eternal peace in our hearts because in trouble we can know that we will be in our Father’s house forever because of Him.