1 I will extol thee, O Lord; for thou hast lifted me up,
and hast not made my foes to rejoice over me.
2 O Lord my God, I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me.
3 O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from the grave:
thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit.
4 Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his,
and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.
5 For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life:
weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.
6 And in my prosperity I said,
I shall never be moved.
7 Lord, by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong:
thou didst hide thy face, and I was troubled.
8 I cried to thee, O Lord;
and unto the Lord I made supplication.
9 What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the pit?
Shall the dust praise thee? shall it declare thy truth?
10 Hear, O Lord, and have mercy upon me:
Lord, be thou my helper.
11 Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing:
thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness;
12 To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent.
O Lord my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever.
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Comments by Joan Boney
As we go through this life, we realize more and more that God has done all these things ... things that seem good to us and things that seemed bad to us ... Everything is done to form us into the image of Christ ...
The many problems we go through change us to HIS image as we call on God and do what HE shows us.
We know we are very different now than we were before because of that which God showed us. (Yet we who are alive on this earth are not yet finished ... for we are continually made into the image of HIM.)
Phil. 2 ... 5 Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
At the end, the thing that matters is that we believed HIM when HE spoke to us by HIS Spirit and we obeyed HIM and thereby acted in faith in the matter.
Solomon saw this and spoke:
Eccl. 12 ... 13 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter:Fear God, and keep HIS commandments:for this is the whole duty of man. 14 For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.
Therefore Paul says we glory in tribulation (Rom. 5) ... We see that tribulation gives us an opportunity to turn to God, to hear from God, to obey God, to trust in God and to be conformed to God's thinking on the matter, thus to be formed continually in this present life to the image of Christ.
And most of us probably feel we haven't done so well so far ... But it is not over yet for we are still alive on this earth.
Turning to God ... believing God will hear us ... believing God can make us understand what HE is saying ... obeying HIM ... trusting in HIM ...
For whatsoever is not done in faith (believing we have heard from HIM in the matter at hand and acting in obedience to what HE has said in this issue) is sin. Romans 14:23
And hearing from God on the matter is an anchor for our soul when people question us... being established in each trial on this earth by God.