I cry out to the Lord; I plead for the Lord’s mercy. I pour out my complaints before him and tell him all my troubles. When I am overwhelmed, you alone know the way I should turn. Wherever I go, my enemies have set traps for me. I look for someone to come and help me, but no one gives me a passing thought! No one will help me; no one cares a bit what happens to me. Then I pray to you, O Lord. I say, “You are my place of refuge. You are all I really want in life. Hear my cry, for I am very low. Rescue me from my persecutors, for they are too strong for me. Bring me out of prison so I can thank you. The godly will crowd around me, for you are good to me.”
King David was looking back on the
time before he was king, and the reigning king, Saul (who was bordering on
psychotic at the time) was chasing him all over Israel to stamp out the decree
that God had made through the prophet Samuel, that David would be the one to
replace Saul on the throne. It was a king
and his army, the most powerful army on earth, against one young man, who had
taken to hiding in caves and pretending to be a lunatic to avoid being captured
and executed. In the words of the
Verizon guy, David is praying and cries out to God: I’m
LOW…can you hear me now? Considering the circumsances, to say that David was low, or severly
depressed, and that he was out of options with an empty tank, just seems a
little understated. The situation was as
critical as it gets.
J.D. Walt writes a devotional I’ve been
reading for awhile now, and in a recent post he shares about stumbling points
in faith; in his concluding prayer he states it clearly that, when it comes to his
faith, there
are gaps…
Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be your name. Your Kingdom come. Your will
be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. I confess it with joy—Jesus is Lord! I
want to mean it with all my heart, mind, soul and strength. There are gaps.
Come Holy Spirit and fill in the gaps in my own character and maturity. Thank
you for grace in the meantime. Train me to be so gracious with others. I pray
in Jesus’ name. Amen.[1]
I don’t know many people who won’t
admit to the dry times, when gaps in our faith bring us low. Let’s face it, the tank, if not attended to,
gets empty, and we get sidelined, unable to move forward; we feel depletetd,
deleted, and halted in our spiritual and emotional life. Sometimes it may be because the world really is
at odds with us and we’re up against it; at other times (perhaps most times) it’s
just that we haven’t taken sufficient self-care to keep the tank refueled. Either way, being down and out is not
fun. Waiting by the side of the road, empty
gas can in hand, on the chance some kind Samaritan will give you a ride to the
gas station, is not my idea of a fine way to spend a Saturday afternoon.
When your tank is empty the
tendency is to hide how foolish you were in running out of gas. When a Christian’s spiritual tank runs low, because
of self-inflicted sins, or just a lack of attention to keeping the worship tank
full, sometimes the game plan gets tossed.
Worship, prayer, ministry, fellowship with other believers, and being in
the place where (as David put it) …the godly will crowd
around me, is put aside in favor of staying in our four walls to
sulk, lick wounds, and generally wallow in our misery.
Do you recall that feeling you had one time (or a
thousand) when it was Sunday, and you just weren’t feeling it…just didn’t want
to go to church…but the “habit” took over, and you went anyway? Do you recall how you felt so much better
that afternoon? That’s what happens when
you make a decision that the momentary gap in your faith is
not going to rule the day. And God’s Spirit
gathers the godly around you, and focus returns; and your heart is glad.
Let’s
Pray Together:
Father, our gaps are too real, and too strong sometimes. Come, fill those gaps with the balm of Gilead; heal our stripes, and make us whole, so we can serve and honor your name.
For You Today
You
chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road today.
Have a blessed day!
Amen.so thankful for rich truthful words!
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