Psalm 88:10-11 “Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise and praise thee? Selah. Shall thy lovingkindness be declared in the grave? or thy faithfulness in destruction?”
I am glad that oftentimes we find ourselves in the Psalms that God inspired. And many times you’ll find that a psalm is a prayer to God for something or because of something; such is the case with Psalm 88. Verse 1 begins, “O LORD God of my salvation. . . .” You will never see God as your salvation if you do not see yourself sinking! Nobody is more apt to ask for help than a man who is sinking. We want to cry out to God to show how good we are, but God is not impressed because I ask for help. If I were impressive, I wouldn’t need to ask for help! In reality, we are all in bad shape–that is why we cry out to God!
Notice verse 10: “Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise and praise thee? Selah.” Did you know that Evangelist John R. Rice is buried here on the Ranch at Memorial Park? He hasn’t preached at camp recently, and no one here has heard him pray to or praise God. Do you know why? Because God gave John Rice life; he used it as a stewardship; and now he is in the presence of God. As far as this life is concerned, that is done. But you and I are still here!
Whatever God will do, He will do for the living. We do not believe in a place called purgatory (“. . . to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.” II Cor. 5:8); so whatever God is going to do, He is going to do for the living, not the dead. If I don’t see God work through me now, I will not see Him work through me when I’m dead. That means whatever we will pray for and whomever we praise, we will do so while we live.
Whatever I need to do, I need to do now. Whatever I need to see, I need to see now. Whatever I need to ask God for, I need to ask now. Whatever I am going to praise God for, I need to praise Him for it now.
God is good and gracious, and His time is always better than my own. But since I don’t know His timing, and I have a mouth, a mind, and problems; I am going to ask Him for what I need! We are in the land of living-God has given us life. If we are going to pray to or praise God, we need to do it in the time we have right now.
“Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise and praise thee? Selah.”