Psalms 138:8: “The Lord will perfect that which concerns me, thy mercy O Lord endures forever. Forsake not the works of thine own hands.”

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”   Charles Dickens   “A Tale of Two Cities.”

Charles Dickens started his novel, “A Tale of Two Cities” off with one of the major motifs of his novel.  Throughout his novel things came in contrasting pairs. England at relative peace, France in revolution.  Charles Darney the perfect gentleman contrasted to Sidney Carton as the loser.  In the end all the contrast tie together for a perfect ending.

In the Hebrew, Psalms 138:8  literally says: “The Lord will bring to an end or to completion that which is about me.” This is a picture of coming full circle.  It has the idea of starting something and finishing it.

There are various ways we can look at this.  We can look at it from the beginning of our life to the end of our lives, God will fulfill the purpose for which He has created us. But we can also look at it from the idea that during our lives God starts a work or many different works in our lives.   All the works that God starts in our lives will be brought to a completion.  God finishes everything that He starts, there are no abandoned projects.

Yesterday I was reflecting with my study partner of how some of the worst times of my life have now proved to be the best times of my life.  I look at some of the darkest moments of my life and realize that had it not been for those dark periods in my life I would not even be writing this blog today nor would I have that passionate love for God that I have today.  Like Charles Dickens wrote in the first sentence of his novel Tale of Two Cities, it was the best of times and the worst of times.  Every disappointment and every crisis is contrasted to God’s faithfulness and lovingkindness.  Everything for the believer eventually comes full circle.

One thing seems to be clear in Psalms 138:8 and that is God is the author of our life’s story.  He is designing us to be an adequate servant.  He will finish the story.  Whatever happens in our lives is not the luck of the draw, it is part of His overall plan and purpose.

The word in the Hebrew used to describe this process is gamar which means to perfect or to complete.  It is spelled Gimmel, Mem and Resh.  We learn some interesting things about this perfecting process from this word’s built in commentary.

The first letter is Gimmel which tells us this process is surrounded with the lovingkindness of God.   The Mem is a picture of water or the womb.   This process is a birthing process of something new and when completed we will be born into a new season of our lives.  Finally the last letter is the Resh.  One rabbi called the Resh a mini Rosh Hashanah or New Year.

When this process ends or is completed, it is not an end but a beginning. I hear a lot of talk of a breakthrough, a new beginning etc.   I believe David had a similar experience in his life and he is expressing it in Psalms 138:8.  Whatever we call it and we have many words for it, a season, a refining process, cleansing, etc. they all have in common the fact that this process was initiated by God and God promises in Psalms 138:8 that he will complete the process, he will not abandon us in the middle of the process and during this process we will find His lovingkindness as we go through it.  Finally, when the process is completed, it is not an end, but a new beginning.

I can truly say like David, that I was once young and now I am old and in all that time I have never seen the righteous forsaken.   So if you are going through a dark period of your life, I can tell you as one who has been there and now I see the other side, I know the Apostle Paul knew what he was talking about when he said in 1Corinthians 2:9: “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.”  I am not talking materially, or in earthly type blessings. I still remain relatively unaffluent and lacking in perfect health.  But coming full circle for me means that I have entered a relationship with God that I could not ever have imagined years ago as I went through that valley of shadows. To me this passage means only one thing and that is the relationship you will have with God when you complete the process of gamar (coming full circle) in one you could never dream or imagine and the best is yet to come.  In the words of an Old Persian proverb, This too will pass.