Great Plains Daily Devotional for 11/24/2020

Psalm 28

To you, O Lord, I call;
    my rock, do not refuse to hear me,
for if you are silent to me,
    I shall be like those who go down to the Pit.
Hear the voice of my supplication,
    as I cry to you for help,
as I lift up my hands
    toward your most holy sanctuary.

Do not drag me away with the wicked,
    with those who are workers of evil,
who speak peace with their neighbors,
    while mischief is in their hearts.
Repay them according to their work,
    and according to the evil of their deeds;
repay them according to the work of their hands;
    render them their due reward.
Because they do not regard the works of the Lord,
    or the work of his hands,
he will break them down and build them up no more.

Blessed be the Lord,
    for he has heard the sound of my pleadings.
The Lord is my strength and my shield;
    in him my heart trusts;
so I am helped, and my heart exults,
    and with my song I give thanks to him.

The Lord is the strength of his people;
    he is the saving refuge of his anointed.
O save your people, and bless your heritage;
    be their shepherd, and carry them forever.

In the second verse of Psalm 28, the psalmist describes praying; arms lifted up and crying out for help. While we may not have physically lifted our arms in prayer and cried out to God, feeling hopeless, confused, frustrated, and alone and praying for help is something most of us have done.
 
Our relationship with God often brings us hope in the times we may feel hopeless. Hope isn’t the same as optimism. Optimism is the belief things will work out. Hope is the belief the future will be better, and we have some power to create that better reality. Researches who having studied hope say two of the key components of hopefulness are agency and spirituality.
 
Agency means we have more than simply a dream or a wish for something to get better. We have a way to achieve that improvement and a motivation to see it through. Spirituality is the belief is something bigger than us.
 
Our relationship with God brings us both spirituality and agency, for even when we may not have a plan to make the better future we are hoping for, we know God is at work in our lives in ways we may not immediately understand.
 
The psalmist knows this, too. In the beginning the psalm is crying out to God for help, but by the end the cry for help turns into praise for God. God has heard the psalmist’s prayer and hopelessness has turned to hope. We can also find hope in our times of hopelessness by lifting our hearts to God in prayer.
 

Prayer for Reflection

Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24
Psalm 100
Ephesians 1:15-23
Matthew 25:31-46