Today’s Reading:
Psalm 36: 5- 12
Character of God is portrayed. Unlike human beings, God’s character has remained unchanged, from the beginning till now and will never change. Prominent are his mercy, faithfulness, judgement, righteousness, loving-kindness and so on. In our Today’s reading, in Verses 5-7, the Psalmist not only highlights God’s character, but also qualifies it. He says that his mercy is in the heavens; his faithfulness reaches into the clouds; his righteousness is like the great mountains; his judgements are a great deep; his loving kindness is said to be excellent. The Psalmist goes further in Verse 7 to expatiate on the loving-kindness of God. He says that because of this, the children of men put their trust under the shadow of his wings. The result of this is that they shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of God’s house, and He shall make them drink of the river of his pleasures (v 8).
Loving-kindness is defined severally as: giving oneself fully with love and compassion; kindness or mercy which is based on, or which arises from love; tenderness and consideration towards others. In relation to the character of God, loving-kindness is usually used to describe God’s heart towards those who are his own. The word can also be split into two distinct action words -Love and kindness, which are two out of the nine parts of the “Fruit of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22-23). The love mentioned here is God’s kind of love known as “Agape”, translated to mean “Unconditional love”. This implies that it is constant/unchangeable, not based or premise on circumstances or conditions. It is God’s character in action! Kindness, which is a state of being kind (tender, affectionate, benevolent, caring and loving) when related to God, depicts his divine character as the Creator towards his creatures.
The word loving-kindness appears very many times in the Old Testament but said to appear in the New Testament many times (in the translation of the Hebrew word) as: mercy, goodness, love, kindness, brotherly love. In the Verse 7 of our Today’s reading, the Psalmist exclaims by saying “how excellent is your loving-kindness, O God!” This means, how extremely good or outstanding or magnificent or superb, is God’s loving kindness. This is evident throughout the Scriptures and even in our days and will be forever. No wonder then that the Psalmist further on in Verse 10, pleads with God to continue his loving kindness unto those that know him and his righteousness to the upright in heart.
As believers, the more kindness we show to others, the more we understand the loving “How excellent is thy loving-kindness, o God! Therefore, the children of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings” (v 7).Throughout the Scriptures, in both the Old and New Testament books, is the unmistakable kindness of God to us. His loving-kindness is indeed excellent.
CHRISTIE KUPOLUYI
Prayer:
Our Father in Heaven, we acknowledge your loving character towards us your creation.
Father, we declare that your loving kindness towards us is indeed excellent.
Precious Lord, thank you for manifesting the loving kindness of the Father to mankind.
O Lord, teach us to demonstrate the love you gave us to others.
Father, teach believers to love with your kind of love, demonstrated throughout our nation and the Church universal.
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