Joel M Bradshaw

5He established a testimony in Jacob
and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children,
6that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children,
7so that they should set their hope in God
and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments;
8and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God.–Psalm 78

This psalm of Asaph reads like a tired, angry older man ranting at what his world had become. His people had lived in any manner they chose and had forgotten about God. The way things used to be had stopped being that way. People weren’t learning from the past. The nation had rejected God and though God at times showed tremendous mercy and grace, he punished and exiled them. Would the people ever listen? Would their hearts ever turn back? Would they remember this great God? Or would the new generations continue the rejection and apathy of previous ones?

This psalm also reads like a great, historical reminder. Asaph recalls the plagues of Egypt and the wilderness grumblings. He also remembers the high places and idolatrous pursuits that plagued the Israelites. All the intentional scorning of their faithful God who delivered them from Egypt and planted them in the land he promised to the patriarchs. Asaph even portrayed the destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel–sometimes called Joseph or Ephraim–and the saving of the southern kingdom of Judah as God’s sovereign choice. So when we read about the north being sacked by the Assyrians with only Judah remaining, we are not surprised. Babylon and the conquering of Judah was still in the future. But God’s people needed to remember and stay intentional about their generational pursuits of God!

So what three things should a generation of God followers intentionally pursue as they instructed and invested in the next generation?

1. SET HOPE IN GOD, NOT FORGET GOD, OBEY GOD.
2. DON’T BE STUBBORN, REBELLIOUS
3. BE STEADFAST AND FAITHFUL

What are you intentional about? Where are you investing? There are attitudes that need to change in each of us regarding God. Stubborn rebellion against God needs to end. Steadfast faithfulness needs to start or resume. Our hope and perspective needs to be in God. Seeing our broken and redeemed stories used for God’s glory. There are things we each need to stop and start. I myself have learned this on a daily basis or I will never see the necessary changes in me.

Asaph’s call to teach the next generation was warranted, but appropriate teaching starts with repentance and ending generational cycles in one’s own life. It requires hypocrisy to be faced, rejection to be repented, and lives to be submitted to God. Intentionality starts with the self.–JMB