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Then they believed His words: / They sand His praise.
Psalm 106:12
Remembering Failure
After opening this psalm on a note of thanks and hope, the writer spends the next forty verses relating the tragic history of the Jews from the crossing of the Red Sea to the conquest of Canaan. In many ways this is a sad Psalm for the longer it goes on the more hopeless things look as God's people just can't seem to get it right. They sin; God punishes. They repent; God rescues. But, it only takes a verse or two before the story repeats itself and the sin-punish-repent-rescue cycle begins again. The actors and situations keep changing but the story just goes round and round.
This endless circle might seem in direct opposition to the hopeful opening remarks but closer observation reveals a key in verse 12 that pulls the two together. "Then they believed His words; / They sang His praise." When we go through an experience-even one of failure and defeat-then see how God straightens our mess out in the end, singing is a natural response. We laugh, we giggle, we rejoice, we sing when we see the promises of the Lord fulfilled and know He has not left us alone on earth in spite of our weaknesses, flubs or outright rebellion.
Sometime when we remember a failure we realize His word was fulfilled because our character has been purified by the trail. We blew it, but God used the sharp fragments to stitch together a hole in our soul. The sting of the memory may never quite fade, but if we use the memory to remind us how God kept His promise to purify us, the memory becomes a useful thing that we need not run from or avoid. Our failure will never be erased, but knowing He used it for our good brings hope.
At other times our memory of a failure shows His faithfulness to His word because a triumph followed closely on the heels of defeat. We faced a mess that we knew was our own creation but when we repented and lifted the tangled knots to our Father, something wonderful happened. We confessed and asked for help, and He gave that help just as He promised He would. The knots begin to unravel, the rough waters become smooth and a situation that seemed impossible worked out far better than we thought possible-far better than we deserved. We remember our failure and sing because we know at a new depth within our soul that He kept His word.
Want a reason to sing today? Remember a time when you failed God and what happened next. Did he purify your character through discipline? Did he pull you out of the mess you made? If you take a moment to remember some failure-repent-rescue cycle from your past, you may find yourself not only a lot wiser, but happier as praise naturally bubbles out. |
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Wishing You Grace and Peace,
Elizabeth Baker
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