Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - The Gift of Transformation | Psalm 30 | The Writings

Episode Date: February 9, 2024

When you look back at your life, where do you see ways God has changed you? Whether you realize it or not, God is at work in your life. In today's episode, Jeff looks at Psalm 30 to realize God's gift of transformation. Read the Bible with us in 2024! This year, we’re tackling a group of Old Testament books traditionally known as “The Writings”— Psalms, Chronicles, Proverbs, Daniel, Ruth and more! Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Psalm 30

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jeff Parrott. There's a new therapist helping people all over the world, growing in popularity. And it's not someone you'd expect. It is, however, someone you're probably already familiar with. The lovable Muppet from Sesame Street, Elmo. Elmo reached out to the world over social media with this post recently. Elmo's just checking in, how's everybody doing? Now, at first, the responses were both humorous and playful. You'd expect that. But as Elmo's question was reposted on various outlets, the responses turned from humorous to heartfelt. People expressed stress and anxiety over really specific scenarios, but also they shared a general

sense that things in life just aren't okay. If life is a roller coaster ride of ups and downs, people were clear that they are not loving the ride. The people running Elmo's official social media account responded to as many posts as they could with mental health resources and words of encouragement. The response was overwhelming. At the time of recording this, Elmo's question, how's everybody doing? It's been viewed over 200 million times. The journalist Bill Chappell from NPR recognized that Elmo is functioning as a kind of therapist

for millions of people around the world. From Sesame Street to social media, Elmo has a gift for connecting with people who need comfort. The phenomenon surrounding Elmo's role as an online therapist is interesting and heartwarming, and it also tells us a lot about ourselves. As we navigate life's ups and downs, the rollercoaster of emotions and circumstances,

we need someone who can hear us, be with us, who can connect with us. Psalm 30 addresses the roller coaster of life as David explores the up and down experience of his emotions and circumstances. David's words in this Psalm illuminate the significance of our stress, our struggles, and our suffering, and yet he goes a step further in showing us how our challenges lead to change. Let's begin our time by acknowledging our need for God and his truth as we're encountered by Psalm 30. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the gift of life and breath. Thank you for your word. Jesus, help us abide in you as we engage with your truth today. Holy Spirit, we ask you to move in and through

this time in Psalm 30. As we read these words, let these words read us and change us. In Jesus' name, amen. Let's start with the first three verses of Psalm 30. I will exalt you, Lord, because you have lifted me up and have not allowed my enemies to triumph over me. Lord, my God, I cried to you for help and you healed me. Lord, you brought me up from Shiole. You restored me to life from among those going down to the pit. Verse one begins with David exalting and praising God. He quickly moves into the reason for that praise.

And notice the verbs that David uses here. you've lifted me up, healed me, brought me up, restored me to life. These actions are carried out by God as the primary actor with David as the recipient. And these actions, they're oriented around movement and change in David's life. And we'll come back to that theme of movement and change. But for now, let's just recognize that when David cries out to God, he begins by remembering God's track record of graciously creating transformation. This is why Psalm 30 begins with a word of praise.

If David's life is a story, he's crying out to God as the author and the main actor who's worthy of praise. Where can you, like David, look back over your life and see God's gift of transformation? How has he lifted you up, healed you, restored you? How can you praise him for that today? In verses four and five, David calls on. on God's people to praise the Lord together. He says this, sing to the Lord, you his faithful ones,

and praise His holy name. For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor, a lifetime. Weeping may stay overnight, but there is joy in the morning. David gives us a reason to praise God by putting his challenges, his struggles and suffering into a bigger timeline.

Yes, God's anger against sin is very real. but it's temporary compared to the favor he has toward his people, which lasts a lifetime. David's trying to help us look at the long game, at the whole story that God is weaving into reality. His words remind me of Paul's words in 2 Corinthians 417, for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. The forces of sin, death, and God's enemy, they try to limit our perspective to the here and now. to make us believe that weeping is our forever reality. But David is saying that the weeping, the pain, it is very real.

It's not ignoring it. But he is saying that it's just an overnight visitor. Suffering does not have a permanent home in God's creation. That place of permanence belongs to joy. After expanding our timeline to better match God's timeline, David works to cultivate a dependent posture in our lives, especially when circumstances are going well. Let's pick up in verses 6 and 7.

When I was secure, I said, I will never be shaken. Lord, when you showed your favor, you made me stand like a strong mountain. When you hid your face, I was terrified. David's humility here is really striking. His security is based purely on God's favor, period. Do you have that kind of view of God when life seems to be going well? when work or relationships, things at home or other circumstances are favorable? Do you recognize God's favor?

What would it look like for you to adopt the humble perspective of David here when you reflect on your life? And before we keep reading, let's remember the overarching theme of Psalm 30. This is a Psalm about a kind of transformation that God brings about in his people as they navigate the rollercoaster of life. These two verses are really important structurally in Psalm 30. These verses about David's humility and dependence on God. They're found at the very center of the Psalm. It's David's way of putting a highlighter over our need to be dependent on our creator. When looking at the structure of Psalm 30 overall, humility is literally of central importance.

And that's because it's hard to experience the formative power of God's grace. if you're more concerned about singing your own praises instead of his. That's convicting for me. Thanks, David. In the next two verses, verses 8 through 10, David reflects on the reason for God's favor in his life. Lord, I called to you. I sought favor from my Lord. What gain is there in my death?

If I go down to the pit, will the dust praise you? Will it proclaim your truth? Lord, listen and be gracious to me. Lord, be my helper. As David pleads for his life, he doesn't do so for his own sake. This is a big deal. The goal here is not his personal pleasure or his version of the good life. David seeks God's favor, God's presence,

so that he can proclaim God's truth and praise him, so that he can be a part of God's kingdom mission. When we make our happiness the goal of God's transformation, we end up diluting the power of the gospel and completely missing the point of the gospel. This is especially true in the context of exile. God is moving in the life of his people, the people he loves, with the goal of cultivating life and love throughout the world. So before we go to the end of Psalm 30, let's pause and reflect.

Are there ways that you're prone to make God's favor and presence about your own personal mission? your glory? How is Psalm 30 giving you a bigger picture of what God's movement, what Christianity is all about? As we go to the end of Psalm 30, we'll revisit the theme that we encountered at the beginning. The words of David here are poetic and memorable. You turned my morning into dancing. You removed my sack cloth and clothed me with gladness so that my glory, my heart, my life, may sing your praise and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever. We see again that God is both the author and the main character here, and his presence creates

a process of change. Mourning is transformed into dancing. The sackcloth of mourning is replaced with gladness. David places this theme of God's gracious transformation at the beginning and at the end of Psalm 30, and that's an intentional literary technique that scholars call Inclusio. It's a way of amplifying the big point, the big takeaway of the entire message. David honestly acknowledges the up-and-down rollercoaster of life, the joy and the weeping. And in the process, he's trying to help us not just see the ups and downs themselves,

to not just focus on ourselves, but to see the God who's with us and restoring us along the way. And verse 12 so clearly indicates the purpose for that restoration, so that my glory, my heart, my life, may sing your praise and not be silent. I love the way that Henry Nowan describes this dynamic of God entering our suffering and bringing about restoration that changes us and changes the world around us. He says this in his book, Turn My Morning into Dancing. For in our suffering, not apart from it, Jesus enters our sadness, takes us by the hand, pulls us gently up to stand and invites us to dance.

We find the way to pray as the psalmist did, and here he quotes Psalm 30, You have turned my mourning into dancing. Because at the center of our grief, we find the grace of God. And as we dance, we realize that we don't have to stay on the little spot of our grief, but can step beyond it. We stop centering our lives on ourselves. We pull others along with us. and invite them into the larger dance.

We learn to make room for others and the gracious other, God himself, in our midst. And when we become present to God and God's people, we find our lives richer. We come to know that all the world is our dance floor. Our steps grow lighter because God has called out others to dance as well. Man, I love that.

When we cry out to God, he doesn't just hear and respond with a word of affirmation advice. He draws us into a process of restoration with him, mourning into dancing. Now that's a truth that will change your life. It will change the lives of other people around you. It's contagious. That truth is the difference between dead religion and a relationship with the living God. He is inviting you and I into the dance of gospel renewal. And as we participate in it with him, will come to find that he's working through us so that others can dance with the God who loves them and renews them. Amen.