Psalm 66:8-20 (NRSV)
Read Psalm 66:8-20 on biblegateway.com
Verse 8Bless our God, O peoples, let the sound of his praise be heard,
Verse 9who has kept us among the living, and has not let our feet slip.
Verse 10For you, O God, have tested us; you have tried us as silver is tried.
Verse 11You brought us into the net; you laid burdens on our backs;
Verse 12you let people ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; yet you have brought us out to a spacious place.
Verse 13I will come into your house with burnt offerings; I will pay you my vows,
Verse 14those that my lips uttered and my mouth promised when I was in trouble.
Verse 15I will offer to you burnt offerings of fatlings, with the smoke of the sacrifice of rams; I will make an offering of bulls and goats. Selah
Verse 16Come and hear, all you who fear God, and I will tell what he has done for me.
Verse 17I cried aloud to him, and he was extolled with my tongue.
Verse 18If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.
Verse 19But truly God has listened; he has given heed to the words of my prayer.
Verse 20Blessed be God, because he has not rejected my prayer or removed his steadfast love from me.
Devotion
The psalmist has been through the ringer. She has been thrown out of the frying pan and into the fire. She's seen it all. In other words, she has been "tested" and "tried as silver is tried" (v. 10). This image of metallurgy is meant to be intense. The image of the refiner's fire puts the authority squarely in God's expert hands. We might feel as though we are merely God's raw material, without agency, useful only for our basic input. But that's not the case with our God: "Truly God has listened; he has given heed to the words of my prayer" (v. 19). Sometimes life in Christ can feel like an incubator, a comfortable place where "God listens" and "gives heed to the words of our prayers" (v. 19). But sometimes life is not an incubator, but a crucible. The psalmist reminds us that, even at these times, our listening God is still with us, still receiving our input.
Prayer
Listening and refining god, help us to feel your presence when you are listening gently and when you are helping to shape us with forceful and loving hands. Help us to know your presence not only when we feel heeded, but also when we feel over-heated. In Jesus' name. Amen.