Thursday, March 24, 2011

24-03-11 (Thursday) “Psalm 46”

Its been a while… And I haven’t been as motivated and inspired as I have, after reading today’s devotion passage, to post something. Its been quite a calamitous month for the whole world, to say the least. Queensland floods, Western Australia bushfires, Christchurch quake, Japanese quake and tsunamis. If the news is right, there was just another 6.1 quake again at the northwestern side of Japan just today.

God is our refuge and strength,

an ever-present help in trouble.

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way

and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,

though its waters roar and foam

and the mountains quake with their surging.

How amazing is that? Could this has come at a better time than this? Its hard to figure out where God is in all this and what to answer people in this time. But we are not alone in all this. We stand with many others in the midst of history gone. It has happened before. And God has proven Himself faithful. “Ever-present”. “Refuge and strength”. Have we been looking properly?

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,

the holy place where the Most High dwells.

God is within her, she will not fall;

God will help her at break of day.

Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;

he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

The LORD Almighty is with us;

the God if Jacob is our fortress.

Turn your cries to Him. He can take it. He won’t smite you just because you’re in pain and you need Him more. Tell Him your pain. Tell Him you wish things were better. Do you think He doesn’t think the same? Did you ever stop to wonder whether God ever had the thought of just removing man’s freedom to choose in the beginning when He created man? That way Adam and Eve wouldn’t have sinned and He wouldn’t have to have gone through HIS pain of separating from us, His loved ones! But would that be called ‘love’?

Come and see the works of the LORD,

the desolations he has brought on the earth.

He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth;

he breaks the bow and shatters the spear,

he burns the shileds with fire.

“Be still, and know that I am God;

I will be exalted among the nations,

I will be exalted in the earth.”

The LORD Almighty is with us;

the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Whether YOU choose to exalt Him or not, He will still be God. Its just a matter of whether He becomes the God of YOUR life or not. He WILL be exalted. Just because HE IS. Notice how the psalmist repeats the last line? He IS with us! He IS our fortress.

Sometimes a fortress is just so big that we can’t see its walls that are keeping out the rocks, arrows and fire being thrown at us by the enemies. We stand in the centre of it all, so secure but feeling vulnerable because we can’t see the protection all around and wonder what harm comes to us in the distance. Just because we can’t see that far.