My flesh and my heart may fail,
    but God is the strength of my heart
    and my portion forever.

Psalm 73:26

But God showed His great love for us…

But God snatched me from the jaws of death…

But God intended it for good…

But God did not give David into Saul’s hands…

Goodness, I simply cannot get enough of these “but God” moments!

Let’s check out another one in Psalm 73:26.

Now, most of the time when we’re talking about Psalms, we instantly think of David and while David certainly had a lifetime of “but God” moments, the moment committed to song in Psalm 73 is attributed to Asaph the Levite, one of the Levites King David placed over singing in the Lord’s house.

If you’ve never read Psalm 73 in its entirety, I encourage you to do so, but the general idea is that the psalmist is upset by the earthly success of people who do not follow God’s commands, people who are wicked or corrupt. To add insult to injury, the psalmist is trying to live a life pleasing to God and instead of living the good life on earth, feels he is suffering for trying to do what is right. By the middle of the psalm we see that he is experiencing a moment of doubt and seems to be thinking something like, “Why do I bother to do right when people who do wrong are getting ahead?”.

Ouch.

Oh Brothers and Sisters, how many times have we looked around and wondered the same thing? How many times have we followed Christ’s teachings of love and grace and humility and been passed over in position or promotion for someone who is clearly, at least to us, in the wrong?

I get it. I really do.

So what do we do in the face of earthly injustice?

We do what the psalmist did. Check out verses 16 and 17:

When I tried to understand all this,
    it troubled me deeply
 till I entered the sanctuary of God;
    then I understood their final destiny.

What do we do? We get ourselves in the presence of God.

We read His Word and we pray and we praise His name. When we draw close to God, we understand that ungodly people may prosper here on earth, but the righteous, those redeemed by the blood of Christ, they will prosper for all of eternity (Romans 5).

Sweet friends, like the psalmist, our flesh and heart may fail us. We may look around at this old world and be upset by the success of people who are not seeking God or following His Word. We may wonder if the worldly way of doing things would get us farther in life too.

BUT GOD is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Our flesh may tell us to go low, to join the crowd and get ahead whatever way we can, but God – focusing on God for our strength and our portion – understanding that in Him and in Him alone is our success, our victory, this is how we come to the confidence of the final verses of Psalm 73:

Those who are far from you will perish;
    you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.
But as for me, it is good to be near God.
    I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge;
    I will tell of all your deeds.

Christian, don’t worry so much about what others are doing, or about how things are going for you. The Sovereign Lord is our refuge and we are called to tell all the world of His deeds, so it’s time to let the redeemed of the Lord say so!

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