Set your face towards God’s blessing
by Pastor Tim Castle-Schmidt
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Come and see what God has done: he is awesome in his deeds among mortals (Psalm 66:5).
We’ve been doing a lot of setting our face towards things this week. And yet, ultimately, we can only do this because God has set his face towards us.
Psalm 66 is written by what we can only describe as an anonymous psalmist. I think this is a bit ironic but quite fitting.
This ‘no-one’ composes this Psalm that calls on the nations to praise God for the blessings all creation lives by. God speaks through the most unexpected means!
Ironically, when we can see God in our everyday moments, be they good times or trials, we set our face towards God’s blessing. God’s blessing is not our feeling of being blessed but God’s good intentions to lead us in his ways. It is nothing we have done; it is all God has done in and for us.
Set your face towards God’s blessing. See it and receive it in your ‘food and clothing, home and property, devoted family, orderly community, good government, favourable weather, peace and health, a good name, and true friends and neighbours’ (Luther’s explanation of the fourth petition of the Lord’s Prayer). Not because you have to, but because our God ‘is awesome in his deeds among mortals’.
Thank you, O Lord, for the many blessings of life. Help me see you active in all I see and experience in this world. Amen.
Tim Castle-Schmidt is the pastor of Onkaparinga Lutheran Parish in the Adelaide Hills. After spending many years as a teacher in Lutheran schools, he says he finally listened to God’s call to pastoral ministry. Tim is passionate about social justice and engaging the church with contemporary society. Tim shares his life with Fiona, daughter Miranda, a Jack Russell called Otto and 10 chooks.
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