Waiting on God's Name

"I will praise You forever, because You have done it; and in the presence of Your saints I will wait on Your name, for it is good."

Psalm 52:9

David compared himself to a green olive tree planted in the house of God, and that he would trust in the mercy of God forever.  David realised it was by faith in God he was thus established, having received favour from the living God of Israel.  He had an unshakable hope in the goodness of God presently and for the future because God is faithful, a deliverer and redeemer.

During the Friday night Bible study at Calvary Chapel Sydney, we discussed what it means to "wait on Your name" in relation to God.  In the Bible, God's names describe His glorious unchangeable attributes and good character.  I was led to consider the passage where God's presence was introduced by His name before Moses in Exodus 34:5-7:  "Now the LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. ⁶ And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, ⁷ keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation."  God's name does not only say what He does but shows us Who He is.

God introduced Himself by calling Himself LORD, the self-existent Creator Who is sovereign over all things.  He stands alone in majesty, glory and power over all, and without Him nothing has been made that is made:  all are beneath Him in every regard.  While He is awesome in power, He has revealed Himself to be merciful, gracious, longsuffering, abundant in goodness and truth.  He does more than show mercy, for God is fundamentally merciful.  Man may show mercy in an instance here or there, yet this is only because mankind has been created in God's image.  Because of man's fall into sin we are not gracious, patient or abundant in goodness and truth.  God is all these things and infinitely more--because He is the LORD God who is good.

God is good to show mercy by forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin.  He is willing to forgive those who repent and trust in Him who are exposed of having selfish motives, who willfully disobey and those who do their best and fail to measure up to His perfect standard.  God is also good to hold sinners to account, allowing sin's unpleasant consequences to draw them to Himself or to administer justice to the unrepentant so others will avoid sin.  God has revealed His goodness to sinful humanity in Jesus coming to earth to break the power of sin over people and their families so generations who would have been lost forever can receive His mercy for thousands of generations to come.

Waiting on the name of the LORD is patient expectation for the LORD God to be and do exactly as He has declared in His word, that He will keep His promises to redeem and save us forever.  Because God is good His love never fails, and we ought to praise God now and forever for being worthy of praise in Himself as David said in Psalm 34:1-2:  "I will bless the LORD at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. ² My soul shall make its boast in the LORD; the humble shall hear of it and be glad."  Bless the LORD, you His saints, for as Psalm 34:22 says, "The LORD redeems the soul of His servants, and none of those who trust in Him shall be condemned."  Lift up your heads, for even now your redemption draws near.