The Lord watches over
The Lord watches over the way of the just but the way of the wicked vanishes. – From Psalm 1
Vanishes! Lost! You can’t get there from here! This road’s closed. You will have to turn around and go back. In many of my dreams, I’m lost somewhere in a suddenly claustrophic building or a chaotic city I thought I knew, but then … don’t. The way of the wicked vanishes.
Some of us are legalists, and think “wicked” is defined somehow by actions either committed or omitted. I don’t think that’s me, but when I wake up from one of these dreams I’m not so sure. Just what is wicked, anyway?
There are days I don’t pray. My mind finds other things to do. There are days when my prayers are forced and bounce off the ceiling. But prayer is a little like golf; when you hit a good one, you can’t wait to go again. It just feels so good, the ball and the club and your hands and your whole body. Prayer just feels so good too sometimes, the flow between my thoughts and my words and God.
My friend prays best when he’s alone driving. His hands and feet are busy, and he can talk out loud as long as he wants. Invariably he feels like he’s talking to his dad, or his mom. He hides much less than when he’s with others. Much less.
Isn’t that true for me too? I sit on the side of my bed and just start talking. I like talking to Jesus; it firms up my sense of God’s presence here on earth, now, with me. Jesus reminds me to breathe deeply, slowly in and out. If I ask Jesus to respond to what I’m saying, he will. But he will also listen, quietly, and in a bit I’ll be quiet too.
Oh, yes, I am wicked. My thoughts are wicked, my choices too. I am selfish and secretive. I need forgiveness and don’t even know it, or refuse to accept it. There’s no end to the maze I run looking for my cheese, wrong track, wrong track, wrong track! I am a wicked boy.
But those ways vanish. And having been required to turn around, my whole perspective changes. The “way of the just” appears out of the fog. I have another chance on another day to walk a “watched-over” path. I can head without hesitation to the running water that yields its fruit in due season and whose leaves never fade. God calls, and he waits for my answer, listening for me.
And to think, I say to myself as I close my Bible, this is only Psalm One!
Lord, you have made me for yourself. All of us, Lord, you have made for yourself. When I go toward another without going through you, I get lost so quickly. I listen too closely to words not true. We both think we know more than we do, or less. Let my way toward others always go through you. Lead me in that way everlasting.
 http://www.davesandel.net/category/advent-and-christmas-devotions-2018/
http://www.christiancounselingservice.com/archive.php?year=2018
