Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
What is the source of a nation's joy? Is it their economy? Is it their military power? Is it their elected officials—the right people in the right places? Well, according to Psalm 33, it's none of those things. True joy, the kind that lasts, belongs to the nation whose God is the Lord.
We Are His Inheritance
The psalmist gets even more specific by saying, "whose people He has chosen as His inheritance." That is wild—something the psalmist says there—because usually we think of the Lord being our inheritance, our prize, our reward. But in this particular Scripture it says that we are His inheritance. He claims us as His own prize, His own precious possession.
There are two things in that I want to draw your attention to. Number one is God's initiative in this text. Notice that God is the one doing the choosing—we're not doing the choosing, God is. We didn't try out to be His inheritance. He didn't wait for us to get our act together before He set His heart and affection on us. He just chose us.
The second thing to see is God's ownership. Because to be someone's inheritance means that you belong to them. As Christians, we belong to God. One of the catechisms—the very first question—is: what is your only hope in life and death? The answer is: our only hope in life and death is that we are not our own, but we belong body and soul, in life and death, to God and to our Savior, Jesus Christ.
Joy That Cannot Be Shaken
Put this all together—what does this mean for you today? It means that your joy is not resting on the sand of current events, or poll numbers, or the economy. No, it means that our joy sits on the bedrock of God's sovereign choice. Even if the national house around us shakes, the people who are God's inheritance remain secure. Charles Spurgeon wrote, "God's choice is the very fountainhead of all our mercies. If He had not chosen us, we should never have chosen Him. What joy, indeed, to know that the Lord has set His heart upon us. It is a joy that no man takes from us." The next time you are feeling anxious—maybe anxious about your circumstances or the direction of the culture around you—remember that your citizenship is in God's Kingdom, and you have every reason to have joy. As our text says, Psalm chapter 33, verse 12: "What joy for the nation whose God is the LORD, whose people He has chosen as His inheritance."