"Come and hear..."

Psalm 66:8-13,16 “Bless our God, O peoples; let the sound of His praise be heard, who has kept our soul among the living and has not let our feet slip. For You, O God, have tested us; You have tried us as silver is tried. You brought us into the net; You laid a crushing burden on our backs; You let men ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; yet You have brought us out to a place of abundance. I will come into Your house with burnt offerings...Come and hear, all you who fear God, and I will tell what He has done for my soul.”

On the other side of heartache, still a little burnt from the scorching sun of a long walk through the desert, beginning to regain sight as the wide-eyed shock of life wanes...I find my heart calling out, “Come and hear, all you who fear God, and I will tell what He has done for my soul.”

It is not because the crushing burdens have been lifted from my shoulders, my feet untangled from the net below, or my clothes yet dry from the treading water or patched from where the fire sought to devour me...but instead it is the reality of the Strength that supports my bowed back, the Grace that lifts my feet that I may move slowly forward, and the Faithfulness that brings me through the flames and waves.

“Bless our God,” I can say, as my roots hold firm.
“Let the sound of His praise be heard,” I can proclaim, as I hold to the promise of the abundance to which I will be led.

Tested and purified
I cry,
“Come and hear
of the Faithful One that strengthens faith
in weakness.”