Alius

When going through today's Psalm (37), I saw a verse that PS used to needle me. I mean, it seems to give us single guys in church hope, even though I would personally think that would be taking the verse out of context, and I was somewhat amused that this verse was in my reading this morning.

However, while this is usually something that makes us feel slightly better, I realized that the verse prior to that, Psalm 37:3, actually had more impact on me this morning. It says "Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture." And it kind of speaks to you on a different level than verse 4. That verse seems to imply some sort of exchange of services/rewards or something of that sort. Verse 3, on the other hand, simply tells us to remain on the safe side, and that we will be there if we do what God wants us to do, and to trust in Him.

And then, when you see verses 23 and 24, it gives you even more confidence to simply focus on what God desires, not what you desire.

So in a strange way, even though many times we scan through the Bible to find Psalm 37:4 as a form of encouragement to people, I actually feel more encouraged by other parts of the Psalm.

And sometimes, in a strange way, I find the greatest joy during QT can be from different sources. Sometimes, it's the Bible passage. Sometimes, its in the understanding I find when I read a commentary. Just the other day, I found that one of the songs on my iTunes list (Sanctus Real's I'm Not Alright) spoke to me more than the Bible passage.

It's like in Japan, when I mentioned that we had to keep our senses open so that we would be able to see God in different things, in small things.

I don't know. I just had to put that down in words.

Anyway, last night was the semi-meeting of the JMT. Some of the team managed to go down to Orchard Road to meet D&J who were in town for a short break. Then we went to OMF building for the prayer meeting. Not so good, for me, because I don't know why, but I was so sleepy that I heard only half of what HC was saying there. But when we were praying, more of it made sense, since we had gone through some of the stuff, and knew quite a bit about what was going on in Tokyo region.

So anyway, they flew back to Tokyo early this morning on the Northwest flight, to Portland via Narita, if I remember correctly. It was nice being able to see them again, even though it was really rather a short time.

Gonna head out and do some random stuff soon. Supposed to eat lunch out, but lunch has been cooked at home, so guess I'll have to eat some here. Oh well.

Cheerio.