Shade Tree Wisdom 9/16/09

“Why are you cast down,
O my soul?
Why disquieted within me?
Hope thou in God,
For I shall yet praise Him,
Who is My Savior and my God.” Ps. 42,5.

We all have moments described there, don’t we? Times and moments when it seems just too much, and we weary of the daily grind, the burden seems just too much to bear. But the psalmist points out that we shall “yet praise Him, our Savior and God” who IS. Therefore, he offers hope.

We might put it, “there’s light at the end of the tunnel”.

The Woodlands is on I 45, the stretch that is the busiest in all of the State. So the morning and evening traffic to get there is heavy. So, to offer some solution, the powers that be decided to add another lane to the Parkway which runs right behind our house. We pictured trees cut down, bushes destroyed, the roadway practically running through our bedroom. So they banged and worked and the trees are still there, the bushes still shelter, and it was not as bad as we expected. And traffic runs so smoothly we hardly notice it.

Humans worry and fret over stuff like that all the time because we are human. And we sing,

“Jesus, and shall it ever be,
A mortal man ashamed of Thee?
Ashamed of Thee, whom angels praise,
Whose glories shine through endless days?”

And why not sing, listen to Psalm 44, “1. O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old: 2 you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; 3 for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them”.

When those moments come, when we see no end to the problems that worry us, then remember what St. Paul writes, “Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.” 1 Cor. 15,3.

So sing with gusto and joy,

Ashamed of Jesus! sooner far,

Let evening blush to own a star.
He sheds the beams of light divine

O’er this benighted soul of mine.”

GPD 9/16/09