Psalm 101:1
I will sing of loyalty and of justice;
to thee, O LORD, I will sing.
When you play country music backwards, do you know what you get? You get your lover back, your dog back, your pickup truck back… The same could be said for most pop music because most pop music is about: a) falling in love (which in most current music is about falling in bed); or b) about breaking up. The subcategory of b) is: y) happy songs about how good it is to fall in love again and move on; or z) sad songs about how it hurts to be betrayed. Bottom line: the modern world doesn’t sing of loyalty and justice much. It’s much more expert at impulse shopping, faithlessness and the notion that our personal feelings of the moment trump all. And it is because there is a real alternative to this barren, wind-driven, soulless flux of hormones, impulse, mood, and whim that the psalmist sings. For the revelation of Christ is that it is really possible (not easy, not comfortable, not warm and fuzzy, but possible and deeply fulfilling) to live a life of real love, loyalty and justice. That life is given us in the one who endured the ultimate in betrayal and injustice himself and yet declared, “Forgive them.” It is given to us in the Holy Spirit, who enables us to be forgiven our own betrayals of others and who empowers us to start again in newness of life and to be steadfast in our love for those whom He has given us, be they family, friend, or enemy. Today, sing of the loyalty and justice of God.
