My daughter-in-law told me about how she was in the salon and the hairdresser was chatting with a client who said they can’t believe in God because of all the horrible things going on…so much hurting and destruction.
Another customer got up from the waiting area and walked out, seemingly disturbed by the conversation. A minute later the customer returned with a haggard, messy, and somewhat ‘scented’ person, and said to the beautician, “This person is a mess and you are a hairdresser. How come someone is sitting right outside your beauty shop in this wretched condition!?” The astonished and wide eyed hairdresser replied, “I’d love to help this person but he never came to me. I’ve actually tried to talk to him, and he refused.”

Vs 12 is in contrast to vs 11; those at emnity with the righteous.

Those who belong to the Lord – Born Again Believers (because none are righteous apart from Jesus’ sacrificial blood) who God , Himself, declares righteous, shall flourish and grow.

Our church family encourages each other in hope (not a doubtful-wishing kind of hope, but a ‘now we have hope’ hope) of the promise that one day the devil and his agents that worked so ruthlessly and tirelessly against our goals will be put down and we will see it! The word shall indicates a promise, and you can mark it down – God did!

vs.  10  Blessed Assurance – Heaven

We will feel like kings, exalted – The Bible says we will “reign with Him” Rev. 20:6. That’s a promise!

Anointed with fresh oil – like a new day, fresh and clean from the shower; but far, far cleaner that we can understand, now with  new and fresh relationship with the Oil , which is the Holy Spirit.

Seeing how He wants to bestow such blessings and honor on us, should we not consider what honor we are giving Him each day ?

vs. 8-9    Praise and exultation to our Great Everlasting Lord who will rid the earth of sin.

Praise because God is most high forever.

Forever- From before He created “time” and the “In the beginning” which He designed for us to exist in, He was and is and will always be. It’s hard to wrap my head around this, because I am a creature of time and space.

Most High– Greatest and most powerful.  Controller of everything and the orchestrator of all wisdom.  His power and promises, His plans and His Person shall never be broken.  He has authority, ownership, and the ability to accomplish all He desires, and there’s nothing that can stand in His way.

I must praise this Almighty One that chose to love and care for me.  He has showered me with His favor and special blessings no one else could understand, and time and time, again rescued me (sometimes even from situations I caused), only because He chose to…I don’t deserve Him.

vs 7  When the wicked and the workers of iniquity flourish, the world nurtures and encourages them, but we must come together to to be encouraged in righteousness.  More needful, however, we must come together to pray for families of children killed at school by schoolmates, or daycare centers attacked, or even other so-called Christians desecrating funerals.  We must come together to pray!

Here it says, “they shall be destroyed forever.”  That is God’s decree.  I do not say we should pray for people’s destruction, but we must pray for people’s salvation.   God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:9)

vs. 6  We need to get together with our brothers and sisters in Christ who understand these things.

We walk everyday with those God calls foolish, not stupid; a fool is one who doesn’t perceive God or accept His hand in the working of their life.  A fool says, “there is no God” (Ps 14:1).  The world outside the church door is filled with brutish people – uncivilized and irrational.  When  I see naked heinies,  brawls, and women using filthy, foul language at their children, they are uncivilized; and if we cannot ‘reason together’ as Isaiah invites us to do, people are irrational.

We need to come away, apart, to our church family, where we find civility, reasonable people without foolish perceptions, that are on the same page – and it’s a page out of our Good Book!

vs. 5  The Lord’s works are so great and amazing.  It also says the way He thinks is “very deep”.  We can only stand in awe when we glimpse or get a small taste of His wisdom and orchestration- His sovereignty.

First, to think that YOU are concerned for me, and the things YOU do are specially specific to me and my life right now and are connected with the lives, and specific to the lives of all the people around me that YOU love, too; that is awesome, but then to know YOU are also keeping the universe together.

“By him all things consist.” (Col. 1:17)  The universe is spinning, from the smallest atom to the grandest galaxy, in synchronized, scientific perfection, to laws calculated so we can notice them and know HE is in control. He can do all this free from the “laws of science” (He is not bound by them as we are) he created the laws to show mankind that he is there.

Lord, You are so  GREAT and Your thoughts truly are very deep. You are WONDERFUL!

vs.  4 …is still the psalmist testifying why we get together for – Thou, LORD, – and the the psalmist is now talking directly to God, telling Him that he is certain that what God has done in his life will give him the victory, and how happy he is to have the Lord working in his life.

Many of the psalmists experienced hard life lessons. I can relate to the painful, Christian muscle-building, character strengthening and testing times when God, as a true and faithful, loving Father does what’s right and needful and “hurts Him more than it hurts hurts me”.  But I can also attest to God’s overflowing blessings as a result!