Heart’s Cry

On March 29, 2021   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Psalm 142: 1 – 2

I cry out with my voice to the Lord; with my voice I implore the Lord for compassion. I pour out my complaint before Him; I declare my trouble before Him.

I shared with you Friday that God called David, “a man after My heart,” (Acts 13: 22). That declaration further resonated with me when I read this passage. I was moved at how David poured out his heart to God. You can hear the emotion and passion in David’s cry. Perhaps this is one of the reasons I admire David so highly. He was able to express himself with fervor and meaning. Perhaps I like him because he expresses for me what I am unable to say for myself. I can read this psalm and agree, effectively taking David’s prayer to the Lord with my name on it.

I am moved and impressed by the honesty of emotion with which David addresses the Lord. The situation was that Saul and his army scoured the land in search of David to kill him even though David had been a loyal servant to Saul.  So, David and his followers fled and hid in a cave.  They were desperate and frightened. While hiding in that cave, surrounded by his enemies, David literally cried out to the Lord.

There is another element of David’s relationship with the Lord that beckons. It shows in verse 5 where he wrote, “I cried out to You, Lord; I said, “You are my refuge.” David had an ability to cast his care upon the Lord and put his entire trust in God’s ability and willingness to rescue him. In verse 6 he wrote, “Rescue me from my persecutors, for they are too strong for me.” His full faith and his confidence were in God. That is not to say he was not frightened. He cried out in desperate fear. None the less, he believed that God would not forsake him.

I believe this trust and confidence in God, along with the intimate familiarity he expressed in communion with Yahweh are some of the key factors which caused God to call David a man after His own heart. David didn’t stand afar and shout at God. He cried out to his Father. He poured his emotions out to the only one who could help him, and even if he cried out in desperation, it was with a desperate faith. He believed God would rescue him. David believed God.

Still, there is more. David shared his heart with God. He bared his soul to God. Many people would find that hard to do, but I believe it was a key element in their relationship. David’s belief and confidence were so strong, his faith so resolute that it drove him into an intimacy that most of us can only dream of. He cried out to his Father, divulging all his deepest emotions and fears because he trusted his Lord. He trusted God from the depth of his soul, and he gave God the care of that soul believing the Lord would never let him down. And he was right. God didn’t let him down. That heart that cried out like a little child is what moved the Father. The love and trust of a child for his father is what ministered to the heart of God such that they became knitted together in an unbreakable bond.

I want that and I hope you long for such a relationship too. We can have it, you know. We just need to break free of the fetters which restrain us. What are those manacles? Pride, perhaps; self-reliance, ego, coolness, guilt, unworthiness, sin. The list goes on. Anything which we allow to restrict our movement towards God or blocks His path to us creates the chains of bondage.

Prayer:

Dear Lord, loose us and set us free. Draw us closer to you today and answer our cry of desperation. Reach out to us, Father, and help us to relinquish any tie which has bound us; any barrier which has prevented pure and uninterrupted communication between us. Help us to give you our hearts. Give us a faith strong enough that we may surrender all of who we are in complete confidence that you will bear us up and protect our emotional as well as our spiritual wellbeing. Father, as many as who will pray this with me today, give them the strength to be weak and the courage to show vulnerability. For this, Father, I humbly pray and offer you thanks. May you be blessed in your children. Amen.

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Fallible

On March 26, 2021   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Luke 6: 37

Do not judge.

Simply said, not so simply done. It is easy to be judgmental. Why? Because people are fallible. Look at even some of the great Biblical heroes. Take David, for example. God said of him, “I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My heart, who will do all My will.” (Acts 13: 22). What better testimony can one have? God has never said anything like that about me. None the less, we find it pretty easy to judge David. He messed up big time and, for some, that sin has become David’s legacy more than the years and years of trusting God and doing his will. Is he remembered as the man who wrote most of the psalms or as the man who sinned before God and country?

What of Moses? Here is another great heroic figure. He essentially created a new nation out of a group of slaves. He rescued his entire nation, millions of enslaved Jews but, he, too, was fallible. In the end, he failed and, subsequently, didn’t get to go into the Promised Land. He rose to prominence in his own eyes rather than trusting in God’s power and God forbade him entrance to the Promised Land. Wow! Are you kidding me?! This is the guy who parted the Red Sea, who got water from a rock, and more. He, too, had faults, and in the end suffered a major failure.

The point? People are fallible. It is easy to be judgmental because every person you know has faults and weaknesses. The harder thing is to be the instrument of grace. Grace is the opposite of judgment. “For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ,” (John 1: 17). The problem is, like the Jews of the New Testament, we get stuck in the law. Jesus told us if we live by the law, we will die by it. That is not what any of us want. We all want God’s grace and that is a major reason we should live by grace.

We can look at a person and see their flaws or we can see the work of God. We can cover them with a mantle of grace such that what we see is through the veil of Jesus’ work in us and them. I do not say this is an easy thing to do. In fact, I believe it can be quite challenging. The easiest thing in the world is to focus on the many flaws each of us presents. The grace of God is acceptance in full view of our shortcomings. If Moses failed and didn’t get to go into the Promised Land because of it, what is the likelihood that many of us will fall short of God’s best? Thus, we are all easily judged as failures and miscreants. We don’t show the fullness of Christ’s love. So, if you want to judge me, or most others, it’s just not that hard. What Christ is looking for, though, is the for the love he has poured out on us to be used to spread grace, forgiveness and understanding for others. I think his instruction is pretty clear, “Do not judge.”

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Bless the Lord

On June 6, 2019   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

2 Samuel 7: 1 – 2             NLT

When King David was settled in his palace and the Lord had given him rest from all the surrounding enemies, the king summoned Nathan the prophet. “Look,” David said, “I am living in a beautiful cedar palace, but the Ark of God is out there in a tent!”

One of the most outstanding things about David is that God calls him a man after His own heart (Acts 13: 22). When I read passages like this, I understand why. David had God on his mind.

Picture, if you will, David sitting in his palace. He has the finest home in the entire land, not just in Jerusalem, not only in Israel, but as far as the eye can see there is no finer home. He is surrounded by every luxury, the finest clothes drape his body, priceless jewels are plentiful, goblets of gold and a servant for every need. What more could a person want? None the less, David had another want, another desire. While sitting on his throne, he was thinking of Yahweh, his friend and God. Clearly, though, Yahweh had become much more to David than a remote deity. David loved God and love makes you want to do things for the one you love.

God took a young shepherd boy and turned him into a king. God vanquished all his foes and gave him riches beyond measure. So, which came first, the chicken or the egg? Did David love and honor God because of all God did for him or did God prosper David because of the love and trust David walked in. I believe it was the latter.

David showed remarkable faith in God’s willingness to deliver him and indeed, all Israel from a young age. Remember how incensed David was that Goliath insulted the God of Israel? There is also a great story from 1 Chronicles. David was to build an altar and make an offering to the Lord. He offered the man that owned the land full price, but the man offered to give David the land and a bull and wheat for the offering. David refused, though, saying that he would not offer to the Lord that which cost him nothing (1 Chronicles 21: 24). Wow! David showed honor and respect for the Lord. And God was faithful to David. They had (and have) a wonderful relationship and when I say God prospered him beyond measure, it is a literal truth. David passed on so much wealth to Solomon that Solomon didn’t even count the silver. There was too much too count so he only concerned himself with the Gold.

So, let me ask you this? Do you ever have the feeling that you too would like to do something for God? What would you do? He doesn’t need a new temple to house the Ark of the Covenant. What is within your power to bless God? I think you might have fun thinking through this. I hope you find something to do for God because I know it will be fun and bring joy to your heart. Have a great day!

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Longing, Yearning and Seeking

On March 21, 2017   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Psalm 63: 1

You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.

Here are the words of someone who loves God, I mean who really, really loves God. Who do you think wrote these words? If you said, “David” you are right. One of the things I love about David is his passion for the Lord. He inspires me but also shames me a little. Another thing I appreciate about him is his willingness to express his love and devotion to the Father. I also am impressed with his ability to express these ardent emotions.

For those of us living in the western world, the expression of emotions is almost a lost art. We have learned to spurn emotions themselves, how much more the expression of them? God, though, is emotional. He is love which is more than an emotion but certainly involves the emotions. He also hates. Did you know that? Run a search on that and you will see. He and David had a love relationship with each other and neither was afraid to admit or express it. David was so demonstrative of his love for God that he made his wife mad. Maybe she was a bit jealous.

I admit that David embarrasses me a little with his confessions of love. Here is today’s verse as it appears in the Amplified version, “O God, You are my God; with deepest longing I will seek You; My soul [my life, my very self] thirsts for You, my flesh longs and sighs for You, In a dry and weary land where there is no water.” His longing for God is palpable. You can feel the deep yearning in his soul for the touch of God, for God’s presence. I find David’s desperate need for communion challenging but God says of David that he, “is a man after my own heart” (Acts 13: 22). David longed for the Father, trusted Him and sought to follow His ways. Some people talk about David’s sins but until God recognizes me as one after His heart then I will refrain from judging David. In fact, I look forward to meeting him and telling him how much his songs inspired me. Oh that I might be like David and yearn for the Father will all my being as he did; with a desire so strong for fellowship with the Father that he ached in his emotions and even in his body.

We are blessed that David shared his emotions and his relationship with God with us. We, like peeping Tom’s, get to peer inside and gain a new perspective on the depth of relationship we can enjoy with the Father even while we are here in the earth. “Bless the Lord oh my soul: and all that is within me, bless His holy name” (Psalm 103: 1) and teach me to seek Him as fervently as did David.

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