Psalm 114
April 17, 2022
Lord God, how great was your deliverance of ancient Israel! How it showed your greatness and goodness! You are Lord—Lord of mountains, hills, and rock; Lord of seas and rivers and springs. You split the sea, you held back the Jordan River, you caused mountains and hills to quake. Sea and river and mountain were no match for you. Truly the whole earth ought to tremble before you. Teach us to tremble—in holy fear, in tender fear. You are the God of Jacob, the God of patient covenant love and faithfulness.
All this power and faithfulness, Lord, you directed toward blessing your people. You made them your sanctuary, the place where you dwell uniquely; you made them your dominion, the unique sphere of your desirable rule as King. And truly we are your sanctuary today, Lord, with your presence among us in your Holy Spirit; we are your dominion by your rule over us through our risen Head and King, Jesus the Messiah.
We praise you this morning for raising him from the dead and for what that says about his life, his teaching, his death. All were true, all were right, all were successful. As you delivered Israel from bondage in Egypt by your great power, so you have delivered us from bondage to sin, to death, and to the devil—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Thank you for such a great deliverance! Thank you for exhibiting your power in his resurrection—a power greater than that which you showed in delivering Israel. How blessed we are!
You, Lord, protected your people from waters that were life-threatening; you provided your people with water that was life-giving. And as you brought water from the rock so long ago, the rock that you tell us in the New Testament was a picture of Jesus, so you have brought to us, through Jesus, living water—life-giving, abundant, refreshing, transformative, everlasting. So much power, so much goodness, so much blessing—how great you are, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, God of Israel’s freedom, God of our freedom, God of resurrection.
As we learned in last week’s sermon, you have given us the Spirit of life. The Spirit of the one who raised Christ from the dead dwells in us. You will give life to our mortal bodies not only at the end of the age, but now—an experience of resurrection life for victory over sin. May we live out the resurrection life of Jesus, connected to our lives through your Holy Spirit, on a day-to-day basis.
As we confront the realities of our world, Lord, far and near—the war in Ukraine, the pandemic still at large, the clamoring, quarreling, competing voices of our culture, the prospect of a new pastor coming to us, the specific circumstances of our individual lives—as we consider and respond to these realities, we confess our sins of attitude, word, and action. We repent, Lord; we turn; we lean into your resurrection life with a view to representing you, reflecting you, displaying you to the world around us. Have mercy, Lord. May many in Ukraine and Russia, many in our own turbulent society, many in the networks of relationships represented by our own lives—may many hear and believe the good news of Jesus’ resurrection. May they enter into the life and the victory of the joyful cry, “He is risen!”
In the name of our risen Lord, all God’s people said, “Amen!”
And, “He is risen!”