Day 69.
Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me,
O Lord God of hosts;
let not those who seek you be brought to dishonor through me,
O God of Israel.
7 For it is for your sake that I have borne reproach,
that dishonor has covered my face.
8 I have become a stranger to my brothers,
an alien to my mother’s sons.
9 For zeal for your house has consumed me,
and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me.
10 When I wept and humbled my soul with fasting,
it became my reproach.
11 When I made sackcloth my clothing,
I became a byword to them.
12 I am the talk of those who sit in the gate,
and the drunkards make songs about me. (Ps 69:6-12 ESV)
Here is a case when David feels the anguish of suffering for doing the right thing. It is not fun to be scorned and ridiculed by others, especially when you stand up for what is right. Why does David do it? “For zeal for your house has consumed me.” You know you have reached some degree of spiritual maturity when it is zeal for God and His “house” (or church as w might refer to it today) that drives you to do what is right rather than a desire to show your own righteousness. And as you find God’s house something that you care more about than your own life, you also find the reproach that people have for God’s house (the church) to fall upon you. You become scorned by association. But what an honor that is! What brings you to that point? It can only be an experience of God’s grace that has captured your heart. God’s grace reaches into your life, pardons your sin, and draws you into a new relationship with the Father in heaven. It fills the hole in your heart. It rises to such a level of appreciation and joy that you cannot shake it from your mind and it leads you even to rejoice when scorned on account of God.
What about you? Do you know that kind of relationship with God?
Chronological Reading Plan plus Psalms: Num 35-36, Ps 69
