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Reading: 1 Corinthians 11:27-34
27 Wherefore
whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of
the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of
the Lord. 28 But let a man examine himself, and
so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that
cup. 29 For he that eateth and drinketh
unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not
discerning the Lord’s body. 30 For this cause
many are weak and sickly among you, and many
sleep. 31 For if we would judge ourselves, we
should not be judged. 32 But when we are judged,
we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned
with the world. 33 Wherefore, my brethren, when
ye come together to eat, tarry one for another. 34 And
if any man hunger, let him eat at home; that ye come not
together unto condemnation. And the rest will I set in order
when I come.
It is clear that
the psalmist has come to the place where his views have changed.
He sees that God is ruling over human affairs and that the ungodly
are not in such an enviable situation after all. We come now to
see that he was not only put right in his thinking about the
ungodly and about God, but he was also put right about himself: "When
my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and
ignorant: I was a brute beast before you" (Ps.73:21-22).
What a different view he has of himself now compared to
previously, when he so evidently felt very sorry for himself: "Surely
in vain have I kept my heart pure; in vain have I washed my hands
in innocence" (1Cor.11:13).
Outside the sanctuary, he felt full of self-pity; inside the
sanctuary, he had an entirely different view of himself. This is a
moment when the psalmist honestly faces himself - something that
is very difficult to do. Most of us don't mind working our way
through our problems, but the moment we get relief, we want to
stop right there. We do not go on to face up to what caused
us to come to the wrong conclusions in the first place.
This is why we keep going through the same problems over and over
again - we fail to take an inside look. A schoolteacher claimed to
have twenty-five years of experience, but her head teacher said of
her: "She has just one year of experience twenty-five
times." She worked long but learned little.
PRAYER: Father, I see why it is that so often I go through
the same problems over and over again - I stop short of learning
why they happened in the first place. Help me today to think
through why it is that I get so tied up. In Jesus' Name I pray.
FURTHER STUDY:
1Chron.28:1-10;
Jer.17:10; 23:24; Ps.44:20-21
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What did
David reflect to Solomon?
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What
question did the Lord ask?
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