My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:26 NIV

Hello Friend!🌹

In God’s Word, I love how the Psalmists felt comfortable to bring their complaints and raw feelings before the LORD.

I also love how, after unburdening their hearts, they always seem to re-center themselves back in the truth of God’s Word along with His love, faithfulness and protection for them. They were able to encourage themselves in the Lord by regularly remembering and reciting His promises over themselves.

They knew how to lament in a healthy way, didn’t they?

Today, lets meet the Psalmist who wrote our focus verse …

Psalm 73 was penned by Asaph, a Levite appointed by King David to serve as chief musician in the sanctuary (1 Chr 16:4, 5, 7). Asaph was a seer (or prophet) who prophesied under the king’s direction (1 Chron 25:2, 2 Chron 29:30). He is also credited with helping to dedicate the newly built temple during King Solomon’s reign (2 Chr 5:2).

If you have time, please read Psalm 73. If not, that’s perfectly ok! I will summarize it here:

Asaph was envious because he observed some wicked people who did not honor God but seemed to have lives that were free of all care (vv 4-12). This caused him to question his own faith (v 13) because he felt that he was being afflicted daily (v 14). Instead of bringing his complaints to God, he turns inward and tries to cope with the discouragement on his own. Because of this, his heart becomes grieved and his spirit embittered.

This troubled Asaph deeply (v 16) until he encountered God in the Sanctuary and remembered that his life was completely in the hands of his sovereign God. His future is secure compared to the true fate of the wicked (v 17). Despite having wandered, God was always with him, holding Asaph by his right hand and guiding him with His counsel (vv 23-24). The Psalmist remembers that, apart from God, heaven and earth have absolutely nothing worth envying (vv 24- 25).

Have you ever felt disillusioned because life isn’t going the way you thought it should? We look around and it seems unfair that those who do not honor God are seemingly living the good life while we struggle.  

During hard times, we can have questions of our own:

• Where is God in my struggles?
• Is God punishing me?
• What did I do to deserve this?
• Does God really love me?

In the midst of this, do we feel comfortable bringing our complaints to God?

Recently we listened as our Granddaughter Evie read a passage to us from my husband’s Bible. Afterwards, she sweetly tells us: “Sometimes I can’t talk to anyone about something in my heart.” Then her eyes lit up as she continued: “But I know I can talk to God!!! And when I talk to God, He takes it from my heart and refills my heart with His love. And my heart feels good again.”

Evie mentioned the word heart four times in describing her sweet and uncomplicated encounter with God. Several weeks later, I noticed the word heart appears six times in Psalm 73 (vv. 1,7,13,21,26). And just like Evie’s heart felt better after encountering God, Asaph received a fresh perspective on what was ailing his when he encountered God in His sanctuary.

Our God desires for us to trust Him with our whole hearts. But when it becomes injured or overwhelmed, we can tend to react the way Asaph did. We turn inwards to self protect and cope with what is troubling us in own own strength and understanding. We may even tell our friends we need some alone time until we can pull ourselves together.

But when we turn inwards, we turn away from God, the only One who can ever help us … 

Then when we draw near to God again and remember His beautiful promises to us, we always discover, like Asaph did, that God was with us all along.

He is always holding us with His right hand and guiding us with His sweet counsel. We truly are the blessed ones to be able to abide intimately with the Lord and nothing in all of heaven and earth can top or compare with that! 

It is at this point in this Psalm that Asaph declares: “My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever (Psalm 73:26 NIV).”

In addition to the word heart, the word strength stands out to me in this verse. Seeing these words in the original Hebrew helps to expound on what the Psalmist is saying here:

The Hebrew word for heart is ū·lə·ḇā·ḇî, which means: Inner man, mind, will, heart. And the Hebrew word for strength is ṣūr, which means: A cliff, a rock, boulder, a refuge.

Another word that stands out is portion. In ancient Israel, the Levites were denied land ownership. Instead, they enjoyed the privileged status of having the Lord as their portion (Num 18:20).

The New Living Translation makes this verse so much more personal to us:

“My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart; he is mine forever (Psalm 73:26 NLT).

I love how Asaph sandwiched his complaints between lots of praise. Psalm 73 begins with “God is good” (v 1) and finishes with “It is good to be near God” (vs 28). In this world, we will never have all the answers to why hard situations happen. But we can safely stand on the truth that God is good all the time and it is good for us to be with Him. Amen?

And when times are difficult, He invites us to have these heart-felt conversations with Him the way the Psalmists did. If your soul is troubled and the words escape you, open your Bible and pray the Psalms to your Heavenly Father. Release all your cares into His capable hands for He is the strength of your heart! 

Bring ALL your complaints and sorrows into the open with God, who is your safe place. Then encourage yourself in the Lord by remembering and reciting His goodness, His faithfulness and His extravagant love for you. Repeat as often as necessary …

We are privileged to have Almighty God Himself as our portion, aren’t we?

He will forever remain the strength of our hearts … 💙

Blessings,

God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever | Psalm 73:26 @freshgracefortoday.com

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