June 5, 2025 - Psalms 81-85

Hear, O my people, while I admonish you!

      O Israel, if you would but listen to me!

“But my people did not listen to my voice;

      Israel would not submit to me.

So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,

      to follow their own counsels.

Oh, that my people would listen to me,

      that Israel would walk in my ways! (81:8,11-13)

God’s voice has spoken, time after time, over the generations.  Some have listened, others have not.  Furthermore, many have mistaken other voices for God’s voice, seeing in the proclamations of priests, holy men, religious books of all sorts, and even subjective feelings revelation from God.  Many, especially among our young, believe that God speaks to them through “angel numbers,” mysterious and esoteric combinations of numerals, often repeated and which must be rightly interpreted.  Paul, along with all the other writers of Scripture, however, got it right:  “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).  God has spoken to us, and he has spoken to us in the Scriptures.  We need to listen.

Holy Bible, book divine,

precious treasure, thou art mine;

mine to tell me whence I came;

mine to teach me what I am:

Mine to chide me when I stray,

mine to show a Savior’s way;

mine art thou to guide my feet;

mine to judge, condemn, acquit.   --John Burton (1803)