Song of Deliverance

And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, "Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God the Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations!
Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed."

Revelation 15:3-4

This is a song unique to all those who have conquered the beast that had risen against God and persecuted His people. They sing the song of Moses (the first great leader who knew what it meant for God to save His people) and the song of the Lamb (the great King of the nations Who is our deliverer). They rejoice in God’s great deliverance.

Of course, in order to be around God’s throne in this worship service, one cannot be on earth any longer. These delivered saints have died for their faithfulness to the Lamb of God. But that is not even a consideration for them. They just go on rejoicing in God’s goodness. All the cares and pains of their persecution on earth are quickly forgotten in the joy of the worship of God.

They praise God for His deeds, amazed to be with Him. They praise God for His just dealings and truth. They extol Him for His pre-eminence among the nations. The worship Him for His holiness. They call the nations to worship Him in His revelation of Who He is. This is pure recognition of the greatness of the God that all His people know, love, and serve.

My takeaway from this passage is simple: praise should come from my pains. That is what happened with these former suffering saints who have been relieved of their pains in the presence of God. They see heaven and the presence of God as the great deliverance that it is, because their viewpoint is not limited to earthly life. And I should view my life, and my difficulties, from this eternal perspective.

Technorati Tags: Revelation,Worship,Suffering

The Answer of the Almighty

Then Job answered the LORD and said:
"Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth. I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but I will proceed no further."
Job 40:3-5

God answered Job's prayer. He gave Job an unprecedented audience with the Almighty. But it was not the kind of thing that Job had envisioned. He had hoped to defend himself and protest his circumstances. But God arrives on the scene with bracing questions. He warns Job that he had better be a man when answering God's questions.

The first reality that struck Job comes in God's clear statement that Job spoke and questioned only with a finite and limited knowledge of the ways of God. God then elaborates on what it is to be God by spending the bulk of His questions on mankind's inability to deal with the natural world and the forces of the universe. All of which are neatly in the control of Almighty God. Job cannot deal with even one of the questions that God brings to him, let alone the barrage of ever more complex natural processes about which God reminds Job.

Job's response is to make a simple promise: he would in human humility not say a word because he was so miniscule compared to God. He promises silence as God continues to drive home the point of His power. That was the lesson God had for Job in this trial: God is awesome in power, even in our losses.