August 21, 2008 - Acknowledging God's Punishment

Meditation on Psalm 79

Hebrews 12:3-12 tells us that God does discipline His own children. When we recognize His punishment for our sins, we should turn to Him like the psalmist and pray for His deliverance from our present trouble.

When the church has strayed from God's command like the Israelites did, God would leave us alone or even spill us out from his mouth. Then our suffering would be like those in the world who have no Savior.

The solution is the crying out to God like the psalmist in repentance and asking God's atonement and forgiveness.

As the psalmist asked, "How long Lord, will you be angry forever?" (v. 5 NKJV) We can pray in the expectation that God will not leave us alone for too long but will return to show His mercy upon us. We can learn from the psalmist to appeal to God's honor and the fact that we are His children and His sheep. He will see all our troubles and strike against our enemy even more harshly than we have been hurt.

1 John 1:9 says that "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (NKJV) When our relationship with God is restored, we will give thanks and show forth His praise to all generation!