Sunday Morning Meds--Ordination

“If the LORD delights in a man's way,

he makes his steps firm;” Psalm 37:23

Thus saith the NIV.

The rough logic of verse 23 of Psalm 37 is not that difficult to understand: When—if, even—the Lord likes what he sees in me, he’ll give me a break. Sounds fair. That’s the kind of God I can deal with. He’ll love us if he determines we’re worth his investment. Fair.

Listen to this: “The steps of a man are established by the Lord,” says the New American Standard; “and he delights in his way.” Or how about the KJV: “The steps of a good man are ordained by the Lord, and he delights in his way.”

Seems a country mile different from the NIV. Correct me if I’m wrong, but in the gap that separates the translations, you could float a sea-going barge of a difference. In the NIV, something reciprocal is occurring—“you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.” That kind of thing, as if God almighty, watching us, is shopping for used cars—kicking tires, checking mileage, looking for dings. If he likes what he sees, he makes an offer. It’s that simple.

In the King James, God isn’t shopping. He’s turning out human beings, setting them on a charted course, and watching them move where he’s determined they would, like spinning tops. But even that’s a lousy analogy because, once spun, the top-spinner has no idea of direction. Maybe he’s like one of those old gents who loves model trains. Get the cars out of the box, assemble the tracks, and set ‘em on down a path that won’t change unless you reassemble the set.

In the KJV and New American Standard, God seems to know where we go, when we stand, and when we stoop, our ups and downs and all arounds. What’s more, he delights in watching us ambulate. He loves to watch us circle around the tracks he’s laid.

That’s a whole different God from the one who’s looking for used cars—or so it seems.

At bottom here is a pair of contrary ideas that are not arcane, ideas that have puzzled human beings for centuries. Are we free, or is everything about us pre-conceived, foreordained, predestined? Good folks, brilliant theologians, learned scholars have and will continue to disagree, I’m sure, as do—obviously—the linguists who work as Bible translators.

Who’s right? Good question, and worth considering.

But what did the poet/King say? Where would he come down? What did he intend? Whose translation is accurate?

Those questions don’t bother me greatly because this is, first of all, a song and not a conference presentation. Psalm 37 is about security, about comfort, about feeling rest and peace in the Popeye arms of the one who made us and who never leaves.

In the very next verse David will admit he’s an old guy, a fact which may well be key to our accepting the sheer joy of this line’s thickly upholstered comfort. I’m probably about as old he was when he wrote the song or offered the meditation. And I think I know why he wouldn’t care for the whole debate. Really, all he wants us to know is that when he looks back on his life—all of it—he knows, for sure, that the God who breathed His own breath into the child who would, astoundingly, become King, that God would never really leave him alone. That God was there always, and will be, forever.

Verse 23, no matter how you read it, is far less a proposition than it is promise.

And that's just fine with me.