Advent Devotional: December 16
December 16: Psalm 80.1-7
Mike Brady
Historically, it was often written that the nation of Israel turned from God in how it lived and valued what was important to it. The writer of today’s Psalm was lamenting that God had turned his back on them and was punishing them.
The fact was that Israel had yet to change its ways and yet was expecting God to bail them out. If we think of this in terms of the prodigal son, he had squandered his gifts and inheritance, and he realized his mistake and asked to be fed only if he worked for it, even if it was from his father. If he had cried that “I need to be fed, but I want to continue in my wayward ways, it was not fair that I would have to change”, then he would have been like the writer of this Psalm.
In life there will always be good times as well as bad times. How do face those difficult times?
Paul writes in the second chapter of Timothy, that if you set your sights on serving God the Father and Jesus Christ the Son, that whatever adversity is faced, it will be worth facing it. If you have your sights not on serving yourself and your daily pleasures, but on serving the Anointed One, there is no difficulty too great. God will give you strength and be with you always.
As we are approaching the Advent, a season when we can take stock of our lives and the changes that need to be made, let us see how we can align our lives with what God wants us to do and be. His will, not ours be done. Then no adversity will be too great. Amen.
