Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
Let me introduce you to a friend with whom you can have fellowship: David, King David, the man who wrote many of the psalms, the man who was a sinner but was a deep-hearted repentant. God gave him the most unusual "gift" anyone has ever had--intimate fellowship with Christ in His sufferings (cf. Phil. 3:10 for the phrase). In other words, David was permitted to taste firsthand by prolepsis the experiences which the Son of God must go through in order to become effective as our Savior.
David, of course, was 100 percent human, and totally a sinner. He was as low a sinner as anybody, yet God permitted him to feel what Christ felt and to write about it so we can taste it too. The fellowship went both ways: David felt as Christ felt, and Christ felt as the lowdown sinner feels. Which simply means that Christ felt as you feel--guilty, polluted, condemned. The only sinless human Being can feel compassion and sympathy for someone who has made a mess of his or her life and feels guilty.
The sincere Roman Catholic may long to find a sympathetic priest to kneel before and pour out his or her heart in bitter, shameful confession; but the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, the world's Savior, the One who was "made to be sin for us who knew no sin" (2 Cor. 5:21), the One who alone has come from the bosom of the Father, He is your only true Father-confessor. As you kneel alone before Him and let the bitter tears fall, and wait before Him in quiet loneliness, your heart open, with David's psalms also open before you, the two-way fellowship happens.
Where can you find this fellowship with Christ in David's psalms? Scattered all through, but especially in Psalms 22, 27, 40, 69, 119, 142. And don't forget Psalm 23--we need that one too.
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: June 15, 2005.
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