May 8, 2022 - Psalms 71-75

The Psalmist declares, “For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother’s womb. My praise is continually of you” (Ps 71:5,6). He also looks to his last days: “Do not cast me off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength is spent” (Ps 71:9). And again: “O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come” (Ps 71:17,18).

Sometimes we hear these amazing testimonies of how God has redeemed people from the most awful conditions of unbelief and sin, and indeed, those are examples of God's amazing and powerful grace and ability to save even the most hardened of sinners. But how amazing when God calls a young man or woman to himself and keeps that person for an entire lifetime! And how great a blessing to that person! Old or young, our testimony must be:

Nothing in my hand I bring,

simply to the cross I cling;

naked, come to thee for dress;

helpless, look to thee for grace;

foul, I to the fountain fly;

wash me, Savior, or I die. –Augustus Toplady (1776)