¹³ Your ways, God, are holy.
    What god is as great as our God?
¹⁴ You are the God who performs miracles;
    you display your power among the peoples.
¹⁵ With your mighty arm you redeemed your people,
    the descendants of Jacob and Joseph.

¹⁶ The waters saw you, God,
    the waters saw you and writhed;
    the very depths were convulsed.
¹⁷ The clouds poured down water,
    the heavens resounded with thunder;
    your arrows flashed back and forth.
¹⁸ Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind,
    your lightning lit up the world;
    the earth trembled and quaked.
¹⁹ Your path led through the sea,
    your way through the mighty waters,
    though your footprints were not seen.

²⁰ You led your people like a flock
    by the hand of Moses and Aaron. Psalm 77:12-20 NIV

Sometimes I just don’t understand what God is trying to accomplish through His works in my life. Who am I kidding? Most times I don’t understand what God is trying to accomplish through His works in my life! It seems like our whole relationship is one long series of God working and my misunderstanding what He is doing, my complaining to Him about his unfairness and His patience in bringing me around to an Aha moment and an apology for my blindness.

In that I am in good company with the Psalmist here, the Psalm starts out as a lament, a complaint.

 He writes…    “Has his promise failed for all time?
⁹ Has God forgotten to be merciful?
    Has he in anger withheld his compassion?”Psalm 77:8b-9

But then he writes a few verses later… “I will consider all your works and meditate on all your mighty deeds.”

I use to think that the Psalmist was trying to make the point that in stormy times it is good for people of faith to meditate positively on the power of God and encourage themselves with a walk down memory lane to think about the good old days.

For a while I interpreted Psalm 77:12-20 as “Remember! God showed up then, He will show up now. Don’t worry.”

It is that, but the Psalmist is also trying to say something more. He does talk about dwelling on the miracles of the past, but he talks a lot more about the context those miracles came packaged in…The clouds poured down water,
    the heavens resounded with thunder;
    your arrows flashed back and forth.
¹⁸ Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind,
    your lightning lit up the world;
    the earth trembled and quaked.
¹⁹ Your path led through the sea,
    your way through the mighty waters,
    though your footprints were not seen.

What the Psalmist is trying to say to us here is “Look folks every time God started a miracle it was in a time of confusion and turmoil. It was during a time when God’s people were absolutely sure they had lost Him…a time when they couldn’t find His footprints to follow. Every time God chose to show up the Heavens were brass, lightning flashed, and rain poured down on the people of God.”

The word of encouragement here is about the context. If your world is falling apart. If you feel like you are under God’s judgment. If you feel like God has forgotten you, take heart because you are ripe for an appearance of God. Just don’t stop looking for Him to show up!  He will show you His unseen footprints and lead you out!