Psalm 67

Divine distraction... Not that God would be distracted, but that He would distract us from our unproductive struggling by calling us to focus on something that is important to Him... This divine distraction is a most wonderful blessing. We listen to the voice of the Lord in His Word, and our minds are kept for a moment from being conformed to this world, we take every thought captive, and we are renewed.

There are two ways to focus on the world. You can focus on the world with the world leading the way, or you can focus on the world around you with heaven and heaven's God leading the way. This psalm demands the latter.

We start with God's grace to us which has come through His own engagement in the world. The Lord did what only He could do, not only in creation but in redemption. He saved. Those who imagine that man can rescue Himself are allowing the world's thinking to lead their way. God saves, from beginning to end. Even all our doing, if there is good in it, comes from the fountain of the perfection of Jesus Christ and His cross. This one blood sacrifice, anticipated in the Old Covenant and realized at the beginning of the New Covenant, has brought life to light through the gospel. In Christ, God has been gracious to us, He has blessed us, He has made His face shine upon us.

He has done this for the glory of His Name, that His way may be known on earth, His saving power among all nations. Do you see the divine distraction for you in these words? God intends you to focus on Him. He directs you to the great project of the glory of His Name going to all the nations. It is His determined plan, and it should be our earnest desire, that all the people groups on the earth should worship God.

This is not to be achieved through abusive compulsion. The God of Israel is a great God. When people of the earth see what He has done through His Son, the Jewish Messiah, they will praise Him. They will be glad and will sing to Him with joy in their hearts. This has happened and is happening now. From Jerusalem to the jungles of Irian Jaya and back to Jerusalem again people all over the earth are praising Jehovah God through the name of the Lord Christ. This Psalm is being fulfilled now. Through centuries of gospel preaching the world has been brought to see the truth of the Hebrew Scriptures which so amply testified to the plan of God to save the world.

God loves the earth. He made it. He made the peoples that populate it. He has a plan for its complete renewal with Christ at the head. You are a part of that plan today. Look up to Him with the joy of worship. Look out upon the fields of human endeavor and life. They are more than ready for harvest. Be engaged all over the earth on God's terms.

He alone will win. The testimony of all the centuries since the cross and resurrection should make it abundantly clear that the King has come. Look at the facts: The message of Messiah could not be killed. The more the messengers were persecuted, the more the message has thrived. It first spread throughout Judea and Samaria, and then quickly throughout the Mediterranean world and the rest of Europe. Because of zeal for the God of the Jews and the message of the Jewish Messiah, a missionary force from Europe and the United States have sent so many messengers all over the earth. Now places like Korea, China, and the rest of Asia, together with Africa and South America are sending messengers with the love of Christ to every tongue and tribe. All of these diverse peoples who have been touched with what was originally seen as a troubling sect of Judaism gather together every Sunday and celebrate their union with Christ in true worship before the Lord of heaven. This is the Pentecost harvest. It is undeniable. It is time for all, Jew and Gentile, to see the undeniable victory of the love of the God of the Jews in the salvation of the earth and the peoples of the world.

As of 2012, there are about

     13,000,000 Jews in the world and approximately

2,500,000,000 followers of the Jewish Messiah.

That means that for every 1 Jew in the world, there are about 200 people that follow the Jewish Messiah. 


The Jewish Scriptures were right:

All the peoples of the earth are praising God! 


They have heard the good news of divine distraction that draws us lovingly away from fruitless self-preoccupation. Victory is at hand, though persecutors may even still increase in their zeal against Jesus and His flock in their last blind gasp, but even among them the blind are being given sight. God, our God, the God of the Jews, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, shall bless us. Let all the ends of the earth stand in awe and worship Him!