God is trustworthy! 

The Psalm for today is the focus for reflection on this key component of our faith.  The selection begins with the response “the Lord hears the cry of the poor,” which also follows each stanza.  To me there seem to be two messages about trust here that are worth thinking about.  One is about the faithfulness of those who trust and call upon God.  The other is about the faithfulness of God to deliver us.  God is trustworthy!  When we trust in God, that is when our faith is strongest.  The fruits of that trust are obedience and repentance.  The blessings of that trust are God’s deliverance, justice, and saving grace.  

But why the continual reference to the “cry of the poor” when considering our relationship of trust with God?  Perhaps thinking of ourselves as poor, even if we aren’t materially poor, is a good way to place ourselves in an attitude of obedience and repentance.  It takes trust on our part to recognize that we need God.  A lot of people don’t trust God because they don’t think they need God.  But no matter who we are, we are without our own self-sufficiency and in need of God’s benevolence…..not just to meet our material needs, but our spiritual needs.  We are spiritually poorly clothed, homeless, and hungry in the eyes of God when we desperately seek refuge in the Lord for our troubles…and we all have plenty of troubles.  But the Lord hears us out of that poverty.  We are distressed by the evil that surrounds us when we cry out to the Lord to save us.  And the Lord hears us and rescues us from weakness.  And the greatest poverty we experience is when we are lost, alone and brokenhearted in this world.  Our spirits are so easily crushed to emptiness.  But the Lord comes to us and delivers us from this poverty of spirit.  The Psalm response today assures us that we can trust that the Lord hears the cry of the poor….we poor things….lost, alone, empty, guilty, frightened, brokenhearted, and in so many ways, in dire distress.  But in all of these instances of our poverty, God is trustworthy. 

As people of God we should pray with gratitude often each day, “God is trustworthy.”