January 21 / Psalm 18:25-36

Psalm 18:25-36

Yesterday I noted that today David is moving from a focus on himself to bring in the rest of us. We see that particularly in today’s first three verses, almost an aside from the flow of the Psalm. Then the next nine verses, if we can stay with the “us” joining David in his plight, those nine verses sound like an army (or a platoon or a squad) in basic training preparing for the battle that begins tomorrow in verse 37.

Verse 36 struck me today: You gave a wide place for my steps under me, and my feet did not slip. I was noticing a very large tree yesterday all by itself in a large field. It was snow-covered but still majestic in the 25-degree weather. Even the limbs and branches looked strong. So today I’m thinking of its roots, that …wide place for my steps under me… Some roots go deep and some roots go wide. I was guessing that this tree must have had roots that went both deep and wide, roots that continued to absorb moisture and nutrients and continued to feed the limbs and branches, even with this adverse weather condition. We all need roots that go both deep and wide. For many of us that could be Scripture reading, both in small sections and in large chunks. I’m much better with the large chunks. Reading Psalms this year is helping me with the small sections. We need both, those small sections and the big picture!