Tell Your Story!

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story—those he redeemed from the hand of the foe, those he gathered from the lands, from east and west, from north and south. … Let the one who is wise heed these things and ponder the loving deeds of the Lord. (Psalm 107:1-3, 43)   Have you been saved by the Lord?  Redeemed in Jesus?  Then tell your story!  There is a significant movement across churches in North America to move more deeply into faith storytelling.  Some Baptist traditions might call it "testimony time;" Pentecostals: "testifying."  But in the Reformed church and other mainline churches, we've not been so good at this.  Psalm 107 tells us to start practicing. The story of God's salvation—any story of God's salvation—is good news!  There is the big, first, primary story of how we have been saved in Jesus, yes.  But our God is in the business of saving and redeeming his people who cry out to him each and every day.  He saves us time and time again, no matter the mess we've gotten ourselves into, because "his love endures forever!"   Don't believe it?  Just listen to the psalm: there were those wanderers who were perishing from hunger and thirst—they cried out to the Lord, and he filled them with good things!  There were those imprisoned in darkness, enslaved to their labors—they cried out to the Lord and he broke their shackles, setting them free!  There were those sick and despairing, near to death—they cried out to the Lord and he rescued them from the grave by his word!  Others—merchants, business people, and trades people—were adrift in storm-tossed seas riding the markets up and crashing down to the depths where their courage failed, but they too cried out to the Lord and he stilled the storm and brought them to a haven of rest. Two of these stories are about God's salvation from sin, but the other two are about God's salvation from a peril that befell these people through no fault of their own.     Every one of these threads of God's saving work can be found in Jesus, yes, but every one of them is also unique to a personal situation.  So, what is your story of God's salvation?  Where and from what has God saved you, concretely, in the course of your own life?  We need to share and to hear these stories of "God sightings" so that we might all remember and believe that our God is alive and active.  So let all those that the Lord has redeemed—including you—tell their story so that all may rejoice in God's unfailing love and his mighty works of salvation!  And, may we all be made wise and faithful because of it.  The psalm finally declares that it is only the wicked who are silenced: those redeemed by the Lord always have a good word to share!  So, tell your story to someone today!  If you're not sure how, I've linked some prompting questions here in the notes from our denomination's Faith Formation ministries that can help you think about where you have seen God at work in your own life!