Weekly Devotional 20th September, 2024
by Bruce Billington
Weekly Devotional 20th September 2024
We are continuing to explore the knowledge of God as expressed in the Psalms. This week we will look at Psalm 106 by an unknown author.
Psalm 106:8-12 – “8 Nevertheless He saved them for the sake of His name, that He might make His power known. 9 Thus He rebuked the Red Sea and it dried up, And He led them through the deeps, as through the wilderness. 10 So He saved them from the hand of the one who hated them And redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. 11 The waters covered their adversaries; Not one of them was left. 12 Then they believed His words; They sang His praise.”
The Lord very jealously guards His own name and honour. It shall never be said of Him that he cannot or will not save His people, nor that He won’t bring down the arrogance of those who defy Him.
Although Israel had sinned time and time again, and rightly did not deserve saving, He found a reason for their mercy – His own name and power needed to be protected and demonstrated. Pharaoh’s pride needed to be crushed, and He did that through the deliverance of Israel.
In one of the greatest miracles of the Old Testament, God spectacularly rolled back the Red Sea and led His people across on a dry seabed. “He rebuked the Red Sea” suggests that God parted the waters by the power of His Word, calling forth a strong wind that blew back the waves and dried the seabed (Exodus 14:21). We should stand in awe that He did this just by speaking. The sea heard His voice and obeyed.
“Through the depths” describes the walls of water that towered on either side of the people as they safely crossed on dry ground (Exodus 14:22). There was no danger for the Israelites because God was leading them. They were under the same divine protection He gave all His people. All those in Christ are under divine protection as they pass through many trials and afflictions. Because He is our guide, we should experience no fear and endure all perils. We have been led by Him, through the depths and the wilderness of life.
However, this same provision was not given to Pharaoh. When his army pursued the Israelites, the Lord caused these walls to collapse, letting the waters loose and drowning his army in the sea. As the psalmist noted, not one of them survived (Verse 10–11). The Lord does nothing by halves. What he begins he carries through to the end.
The power of Egypt was so crippled that throughout the forty years of wanderings of Israel, they were never threatened by their old masters. God had redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. This was a redemption by power and one of the most instructive types of redemption by God for His people.
As a result, we are told in verse 12 that they believed God’s word and sang His praise. However, we should understand that this is reporting what happened – not commending the Israelites. They believed despite themselves and, as the Psalmist goes on to describe, quickly dropped back into unbelief and stubborn complaining and rebellion.
Fortunately, God’s word cannot be destroyed, even when there is little faith to support it. We should consider this in our own life. After experiencing a most astonishing miracle, His people quickly began to murmur against God because things got touched again as they carried on into the wilderness. They became ungrateful to God and began to despise His benefits. Pondering on this John Calvin says,
The insatiable nature of our desires is astonishing, in that scarcely a single day is allowed to God to gratify them. For should he not immediately satisfy them, we at once become impatient, and are in danger of eventually falling into despair. This, then, was the fault of the people, that they did not cast all their cares upon God, did not calmly call upon him, nor wait patiently until he was pleased to answer their requests, but rushed forward with reckless precipitation, as if they would dictate to God what he was to do.
As the rest of the Psalm explains, we tend to want to rule God rather than allow ourselves to be ruled by Him according to His pleasure. We must be taught repeatedly that this is not wise. For us to walk in the fullness of His blessing, we must allow Him to lead us, despite what we see and experience through our unbelieving fallen nature.
God bless you.
Bruce Billington