Grace and Glory Given

"For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly."

The psalm names two things in one breath, and they do opposite jobs. A sun pours out. When you stand in it, you receive without doing anything, and it reaches you whether you asked or not. A shield holds back. When you stand behind it, it keeps something from reaching you, and if it is doing its job, you will mostly never know what it stopped.

The psalm puts both in the same sentence about the same God, and then it makes its promise: "no good thing will he withhold." If you read that with only the sun in mind, it is the promise everybody wants. But the shield is still in the sentence, a few words earlier, and with the shield in mind it says something harder. Holding back is what a shield does, and the shield is one of the two things God is said to be. So when God holds something back, that is part of His goodness. And it is His judgment about what is good that counts, not yours. That is the part that stings, but it is also the only kind of promise worth having. A God who had to hand over whatever you labelled good would be a dangerous God to worship.

The last phrase guards against a different misreading. "Them that walk uprightly" does not mean people who never stumble. It describes the direction a person is travelling. Someone going the right way, even badly, is still going the right way.

So take the request you gave up on and pray it again today, in words. Then add the sentence you have been avoiding: "If this is not good, tell me what is." God has promised grace now and glory later, and He is your shield. On this side of heaven you will not get a full list of what He stopped, but you can trust the One who stopped it.

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 295 is The Second Week (John 20:29).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna