Month: October 2025

Psalm 24 NIV – A psalm of David.

¹ The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.  The world and all its people belong to Him.  ² For He laid the earth’s foundation on the seas and built it on the ocean depths.

³ Who may climb the mountain of the Lord?  Who may stand in His holy place?  ⁴ Only those whose hands and hearts are pure, who do not worship idols and never tell lies.  ⁵ They will receive the Lord’s blessing and have a right relationship with God their Savior.  ⁶ Such people may seek You and worship in Your presence, O God of Jacob. Interlude

⁷ Open up, ancient gates!  Open up, ancient doors, and let the King of glory enter.  ⁸ Who is the King of glory?  The Lord, strong and mighty; the Lord, invincible in battle.  ⁹ Open up, ancient gates!  Open up, ancient doors, and let the King of glory enter.  ¹⁰ Who is the King of glory?  The Lord of Heaven’s Armies— He is the King of glory. Interlude

Observation

To most of us, this psalm has no relationship to ones before it.  However, at the time of Jesus, this psalm was the third in a well-known set – Psalms 22, 23 & 24.  When Jesus on the Cross cried out, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”, every Jewish man there knew what followed in these three psalms, from 22:1 all the way to 24:10, “Who is the King of glory?  The Lord of Heaven’s Armies – He is the King of glory.”  Psalm 22 was about the sacrifice.  Psalm 23 was about the Shepherd’s promise to protect and care for His sheep (His people).  Psalm 24 is about the King coming in final victory.   Each of these three psalms gives insight into Messiah – the sacrificial lamb, the comforter and protector, the victorious King returning from battle. 

However, as we look forward to His next coming, we embrace Who He is and always has been – “Who is the King of glory?  The Lord, strong and mighty; the Lord, invincible in battle.”  Those who knew the Scriptures and stood at the Cross that day would have known what Jesus was saying – “I am the Messiah for Whom you wait.”  How they must have struggled to accept this Messiah dying on a Cross.  This certainly did not live up to their expectations, but Jesus was living and dying up to His Father’s expectations as part of the eternal plan to redeem humankind.  I wonder where we set unrealistic expectations for God according to our limited understanding of His eternal plan?

Impact on Me

I can see Jesus and how God works in my life in all three of these psalms.  I have felt like God lost sight of me when the circumstances seemed to hard to bear, and yet put myself in His hands, turning to Him in praise and worship because there was nowhere else to go.  I have heard the voice and sensed the presence of Him comforting and protecting me when fear began to arise.  And, too, I have known the joy of experiencing His power, presence and anointing in miracles that made the Enemy tremble and flee. 

Over the years I have learned that God is sovereign (“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.  The world and all its people belong to Him.”).  He is not – and should not be – subject to perform to my expectations developed on my limited understanding, but, rather, continue to hold me to His (“Who may climb the mountain of the Lord?  Who may stand in His holy place?  Only those whose hands and hearts are pure, who do not worship idols and never tell lies.”).   So, I need to let the Holy Spirit have free access to conform my expectations to His, trusting that whatever the circumstances, I will praise, worship and be subject to Him and His will and purpose, letting Him count the cost to me.  I want to be in that company that enters with the King of Glory on that day! 

Devotion

You are the Lord, strong and mighty; the Lord, invincible in battle, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the King of glory, Immanuel, the Promised of Ages.  There is none like You.  Lord, I don’t always understand why I struggle with what I see in the world – the pain and suffering, the cruel and heartless acts, the injustice.  It is then that I am reminded by You that those who watched Jesus on the Cross also did not understand why this had to be, why this event was the pivot point of all history.  I want to live by Your expectations for me.  I want to embrace that Your heart aches over the evil (the emptiness without Your light and goodness).  Instead of being discouraged by the prevalence of evil, may I be an instrument in bringing Your light and presence of the King of Glory into the dark places of this world.  Make it so, in Jesus’ name.

Romans 9:30-33 MSG  How can we sum this up? All those people who didn’t seem interested in what God was doing actually embraced what God was doing as he straightened out their lives. And Israel, who seemed so interested in reading and talking about what God was doing, missed it. How could they miss it? Because instead of trusting God, they took over. They were absorbed in what they themselves were doing. They were so absorbed in their “God projects” that they didn’t notice God right in front of them, like a huge rock in the middle of the road. And so they stumbled into him and went sprawling. Isaiah (again!) gives us the metaphor for pulling this together:

Careful! I’ve put a huge stone on the road to Mount Zion,
    a stone you can’t get around.
But the stone is me! If you’re looking for me,
    you’ll find me on the way, not in the way.

Observation

Romans is a book about righteousness and how it only comes in and through Jesus Christ.  Jesus was “in the way” for the religious leaders of Jesus’ time because they lost focus – “instead of trusting God, they took over” – and heaped on rules (their “God projects) over and above the Law of Moses as a means to obtain righteousness.   For heaven’s sake, they created pages of rules about how and when to wash your hands AND different rabbis had different interpretations of the buckets and buckets of rules.  Have we done the same with many denominations and varying traditions that we hold sacred instead of bonding together as the Body of Christ around Jesus despite our differences?

In Jesus’ time, the religious leaders devalued those who broke their rules, labeling them as irredeemable sinners – unholy and unworthy.  Here, Paul is telling those same religious leaders they are missing God’s point by trading religious duty, works and rules for redemptive mercy, grace and love.  Jesus once accused the religious leaders of straining out a mosquito and swallowing a camel because they were so focused on the minutiae.  Jesus even accused them of locking the door of Heaven to keep the unworthy out but forgetting to go in themselves.  Oops!  There they go, sprawling over the Rock in the road. Jesus died to open up the doors of Heaven to “whosoever will come.”  God placed Jesus prominently as the Rock in the middle of the road to redemption so we would have to make a choice to embrace Him or ignore Him at our peril. 

Impact on Me

As I think about the differences that separate denomination from denomination today, I wonder if we are stumbling on the same Rock?  Are we more concerned with our differences than the Jesus we have in common?  Are we judging others as unworthy because they don’t live up to our expectations, our rules, or have lifestyles with which we do not agree?  I wonder who we consider unredeemable?  Jesus drew much criticism for eating with those considered unclean and unworthy.

So, I have to examine my response to the world around me.  Who do I consider untouchable because of lifestyle, behavior, or differing beliefs?   Would Jesus reach out to those same people with love, grace and truth regardless of what others think?  I was not so pretty and acceptable when Jesus allowed me to embrace His grace and become a child of God.  How can I then execute judgement on anyone else because they don’t appear pretty and acceptable to me?  If I want to be like Jesus, I need to do as He did and look past the outward evidence to see a tortured soul who needs redemption.

Devotion

Lord God, my Redeemer, full of mercy and grace, give me the fortitude to become more like You.  Give me Your eyes to see past the circumstances of another’s life to the soul You created in Your image.  Give me the compassion of Your heart to help me allow You to reach out to that soul through me.  Build in me the resilience to never give up because Your word, Your grace, Your presence, is mighty to save.  Make it so in Jesus’ name.