Anti-Psalm 131

Psalm 131 A Song of Ascents. Of David.
1 O Lord, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high; 
I do not occupy myself with things 
too great and too marvelous for me. 
2 But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother; 
like a weaned child is my soul within me. 
3 O Israel, hope in the Lord
from this time forth and forevermore

I have always been so intrigued by this psalm. And it has offered me real help in the day-to-day. Matter of fact, years ago, I committed this psalm to memory and I cannot even begin to express the ways I have benefited from its impact in my heart.
Don’t gloss over these words from David too quickly. If you really think about it, the type of “living” that David is calling us into is something many of us have probably never experienced. Even as professing Christians, our daily lives feel, in many ways, the exact opposite. David Powlison calls it the “Anti-Psalm.” It is more common for us to experience the “Anti-Psalm” reality than what David is describing. This is what Powlison says is the opposite of David’s words:

Self,
my heart is proud (I’m absorbed in myself), and my eyes are haughty (I look down on other
people), and I chase after things too great and too difficult for me.
So of course I’m noisy and restless inside, it comes
naturally,
like a hungry infant fussing on his mother ’s lap,
like a hungry infant, I’m restless with my
demands and worries. 
I scatter my hopes onto anything and 
everybody all the time.

I don’t know about you, but in some of my worst moments I resonate more with this description of my life than David’s.
But we know that this can’t be the kind of quality-of-life that Jesus has in mind when He calls us to follow Him if his “yoke is easy” and his “burden is light.” Here is a proposal for how we can change that:

Consistently, regularly, daily turn the eyes of your heart to the Lord.
The “shalom-type” life David is describing in Psalm 131  starts with fixing your attention on the Lord and not yourself. Notice in Powlison’s Anti-Psalm how he starts with “Self,”“proud,”“haughty” instead of Lord, humility, lowliness (Ps 131). Many of us would never say we are prideful, but it’s because we define pride as deliberately “disadvantaging others for your own gain” or “thinking too highly of yourself.” These are fair definitions. But I think the Bible is more aimed toward defining pride more generally as “centering on the self opposed to centering your life on who God is and His Word.” All of the problems in the anti-psalm are downstream from preoccupation of self. All the benefits from David’s psalm to include peace, ease, rest, contentment are downstream from David turning his attention to the Lord.

Simplify your life and find contentment in the Lord over achievement, fame, abundance, and riches. 
When we are preoccupied with ourselves over gazing at Jesus, we must elevate ourselves to become/do something that we are never meant for. Throw in other voices that tell us what success, flourishing, fulfillment looks like and we have created a life living for our own purposes, our own goals, our own strivings. What Jesus is offering us is a life that is fully content in Him over and above the strivings of the world. In this psalm, David is not restless. David is not striving to become something he is not. He is not expressing discontent with his station in his life. Those things are above his paygrade. David is content in the Lord. Like a weaned child with its mother. Not fussy. Not hungry. Not striving. Resting. Rejoicing. Abiding. He is coming to the realization that he is not lacking anything because of what He has in his overflowing, abundant, rich reality with God.

Aim for silence over noise.
I say this often and will continue to say it: Discipleship in the West is a decluttering project. Before we can begin to really listen and hear the invitation of Jesus to be His disciples, we have to silence the other voices calling us to their version of pseudo-discipleship. Western culture is noisy. But the way of Jesus is a lot quieter. He was on the mountaintop for prayer. He was in the Garden before the darkest moments. We identify with the Anti-psalm because many of us are noisy and restless inside. The strongest voices in our heads and hearts are often anything and everything but the Holy Spirit. That social media influencer. That blog about wellness/fitness. Those lies from mom and dad. But in the silence with God, truth cuts through the facade. Who you really are before God is who you really are. Full Stop. We must slow down and quiet down and let God love us so that we can live a life of love.

Love you Church! I am grateful to be your pastor.
Alex


P.S. - During the Easter season, we are doing a sermon series called “What We Believe” where we are reviewing and teaching through our Statement of Basic Beliefs. This past week, we looked at what we believe about God. This week, we will be looking at what we believe about God’s Word and “revelation” in general. I think this short sermon series is going to be fruitful for us over the next few weeks. Then starting in June, we will return to finish the book of Acts for the remainder of the year.

P.S.S. -  April 26th we are going bowling as a church and it’s going to be incredible. Here is a link to event page.