Reversing 1968


As we begin a New Year today, I’ve been thinking of another year: 1968. That was 44 years ago. I was sixteen, a student at Unaka High School. That was a year I’ll never forget, nor will anyone in my generation. In Vietnam, the Tet Offensive began. Public opinion turned against Lyndon Johnson, who announced wouldn’t seek reelection. In April, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot in Memphis. Two months later, Bobby Kennedy was slain in California. In August, riots exploded around the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Also in August, the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia and crushed the freedom movement of Alexander Dubcek. In November, Richard Nixon was elected President of the United States. What a tumultuous year!

What’s the point? I’m using 1968 as a mnemonic, a memory device, to remind me of a verse for the New Year. We can turn that year around. Instead of 1968, think 6819, as in Psalm 68:19.

Psalm 68:19 can turn around a bad year in advance. It’s a verse for every day, for it says: Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior who daily…

So the question is: What is He going to do for us daily this year? Check this verse out in three different translations:

  • Praise God Who Daily Bears our Burdens – The New International Version
  • Praise God Who Daily Bears Us Up – The English Standard Version
  • Praise God Who Daily Loads Us with Benefits – The New King James Version

As an advocate of Scripture memory, I think we should always be working on memorizing a verse of Scripture. But here’s a verse we can memorize three times. Let’s turn 1968 around, and have a good year. Let’s experience Psalm 68:19 on three levels: Praise be to the Lord who bears our burdens, who bears us up, who loads us with benefits… daily, daily, daily.

(For my entire New Year’s Day message from Psalm 68:19, visit the sermon tab at www.donelson.org.)