Remembering Twice

"I will remember the works of the LORD." Asaph had already tried remembering that night, and it went badly: "I remembered God, and was troubled."

That first time, he looked inward. "I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search," he says, and the search turned up question after question and no answers, such as "Hath God forgotten to be gracious?"

The second time, he looks somewhere else. What he tells over is the sea: "The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee; they were afraid." He was not there. That rescue belonged to people dead for centuries, and he tells it while his own trouble is still going on.

So before this day is over, tell God the story of a rescue that was never yours. Asaph's own story gave him nothing to hold on to that night, so he held on to the sea. The psalm ends with the God who led them: "Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron."

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 172 is For Mine Own Sake (Isaiah 43:25).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna, Year Two