30 Days 30 Psalms -- Day 11

 Psalm 27

There are two well-known passages in today's Psalm that I want us to go over. The first one is the first verse that states, "The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?"

Fear is an emotion that plagues us all from time to time. Unfortunately, I have to say that I have spent a lot of time being afraid. And this fear was put into me by a religious community that my parents were members of. We were always taught that God was just looking for something to punish us for. If someone did the slightest thing that the church thought was wrong, God would cause something bad to happen. It took many years for me to learn who Jesus really is and what He really taught.

The Bible tells us that perfect love casts out fear. When Jesus is in our hearts, we have his love living in us. We don't have to be afraid. We can live in the light of His love.

We don't have to fear what this life brings, including death, when we know Jesus. Because Jesus has been raised from the dead, we have eternal life. Jesus is the resurrection and the life.

The second well-known verse in this Psalm is verse 14. This verse says, "Wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart, and wait for the Lord."

This verse has two meanings as I understand it. First of all, we have to be patient and wait for answers to prayer. Jesus told us about this in the parable about the woman and the unjust judge.

I remember a time when I was praying for peace in two countries. It took many years for peace to come, so I had to continue to pray and wait for the Lord.

I also had to wait and persevere in pray when I asked Jesus to heal me of vitiligo. After about a year, I was completely healed.

My friend Toby had a skin problem caused by an immune problem. It took over one year of praying and waiting, but the Lord completely healed him. Praise God.

The second meaning of waiting on the Lord has to do with waiting for the Lord's coming. He will come and restore all things as He promised. We must have faith and not lose heart. One day Jesus will come, and joy will fill our hearts.