Reliance

Psalm 33: 18 – 19

But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love, to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine.

When you rely on the Lord, when your dependance is upon Him, He is faithful to defend you, protect you and to meet your needs. This scripture says the Lord keeps His eye upon you. What does that mean? If you have children, there have undoubtedly been many times when you kept a watchful eye over them. Why? Was it not so you could protect them or intervene should something threatened their well-being? Sometimes the greatest potential harm to children is themselves, such as putting objects in their mouth they shouldn’t. Parents watch and move to correct potentially harmful situations. So your heavenly Father does for you. The reason it is important for each of us to recognize this is because it alters our sense of confidence and hope. If you actually believe the Father is watching over you, you are also likely to enquire of Him more frequently and approach life and the world with greater confidence. We can have hope in His unfailing love. Although this does not seem like an earth-shaking revelation, I believe it is a key difference in how some people can tolerate stress better than others. They are truly plugged into the Father’s presence daily. When stress touches them, they recall His presence around them.

There is another crucial message in today’s passage. Verse 19 reveals that Father is present to deliver us and meet our needs. Keeping us alive is just that, meeting our need. Therefore, those people who have a continuing awareness of “God with them” understand that Yahweh provides for them. Famine needn’t rule in their house because the Lord God does.

Admittedly we are living in stressful times, but we have a God, indeed a Father, who is watching over us each minute. This passage encourages us to depend on Him, to put our hope in Him and to live under His protective gaze. We mustn’t, like some children do, run away from the cover of His protection. Instead, we are to depend on it, to lean on it. There have always been times of trial. The best thing we can do when faced with them is to draw closer to the Lord, trust in Him and pray with an earnest heart.

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