Psalm 107—message for today from 1936

Yesterday morning the Psalm selection in Magnificat was Psalm 107—titled, "A Psalm with a message for America Today." Erling C. Olsen is so good at going back in history and explaining what was going on in Israel when the psalm was written, what its significance is for the life of Jesus, and then our lives. Except. He was speaking/writing in 1936. That was the Great Depression. The book is based on his radio broadcasts. He comments about the warnings God had given Israel--the people would taste the goodness of God, they would back slide, he would warn them, they would get in great trouble, then cry out and God would save them. He was merciful. Then it would start all over.

By 1936, when he gave this broadcast about Psalm 107 the U.S. had been in depression for 7 years, and in 1934 and 1935 there were serious droughts (the people on the east coast barely noticed because is was happening in the wheat belt and plains). The Americans blamed everybody and everything for our circumstances, he said, except our own sins. The government had ordered the farmers to plow under their fields and slay their livestock. Olsen said he didn't wish to get political but from the president on down, these were godless, wicked doings.**

"Just as God will turn a fruitful land into barrenness because of the wickedness of the people that dwell therein, so upon their repentance He will turn the wilderness into a standing water, and the dry ground into water springs so that the people may sow the fields, and plant vineyards, which may yield fruits of increase. . . . That kind of blessing only comes when a nation bows itself before God and repents of its wickedness. Would to God Americans would do that!"

Maybe he's waiting for the churches to open.

**Note: Olsen is referring to the Agriculture Adjustment Act of 1933 (sort of like "Cash for Clunkers" under Obama) when the elitists in government decided prices were too low and the production too high, so herds were slaughtered, and food destroyed, even though people were starving. The farmers had to cooperate or they would get no aid from the government. Is this ridiculous plan beginning to sound like 2020?