Linking up with #fiveminutefriday today. Five minutes of uninterrupted writing...no editing. No overthinking. Just write! Today's word is: SING.
I've always been reluctant to"change my tune" as the saying goes. If I were to change my tune on any number of topics, that would suggest that I could possibly be wrong about something? No. That's not possible. Me? Wrong? Nah.
In fact, I'm such a perfectionist that I can't recall a time in recent memory that I changed my tune, or even considered doing so.
Five years ago in the midst of my heart-wrenching, soul-sucking divorce- Someone changed my tune FOR ME.
Psalm 40:1-3- I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord.
When God put a new song in my mouth, it didn't mean that my circumstances miraculously improved with the blink of an eye. It didn't mean that I was perpetually spewing out praise to God for every blessing, in every torturous moment.
But it DOES mean that my heart direction had changed.
Suddenly I'm singing something entirely new in the depths of my wounded soul. A song of trust. A song of hope. A powerful song of faith and confidence that God has got this all under control. No matter how horrible the moment is, the new song consumes those feelings of panic and begins to soothe and bind my desperate heart.
When David praises God for the new song in Psalm 40 he was still being actively pursued by Saul:
Psalm 40:12-14- For evils have encompassed me beyond number; my iniquities have overtaken me, and I cannot see; they are more than the hairs of my head; my heart fails me. Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me! O Lord, make haste to help me! Let those be put to shame and disappointed altogether who seek to snatch away my life...
David already had the new song in his heart, but it wasn't because he was as perfectly and incandescently happy as Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice. Nope.
David was singing the song of praise from the most sincere part of himself IN SPITE of where he was at that moment. God put a new song in his heart at the very moment that he needed it the most. The moment of necessity. The moment of David's acceptance. His realization that he is not the star the entire world revolves around. That was the moment God gave David a new song.
An outlook vastly different from his former, couch-soaking days, David was moving into a new space. A season of clarity.
A resonating song of praise to our great God.
And that is absolutely a new tune that I can get on board with!
If you missed my last post, you can read it here: Growth By Trials? No Thanks God!