SCRIPTURE: Psalm 144
OBSERVATION/APPLICATION:
LORD, what are human beings that you care for them, mere mortals that you think of them? They are like a breath; their days are like a fleeting shadow. [Psalm 144:3-4]
When was the last time you paid attention to an ant?
And have you ever loved an ant, cared for it’s well-being, made personal sacrifices to help it?
This is the question David asks, how can the everlasting God of the Universe have the time for mere mortals, here today and gone tomorrow (compared to Him)?
In light of this, the mystery and the wonder of Jesus’ message strikes home.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. [John 3:16]
God does care, for each one of us, and He steps into the world to help us.
He cares for our well-being, He makes personal sacrifices to help us!
The reason David prays to God for help in his personal struggle is because this is what he believers about God – that God is a God Who cares.
Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle. He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me. [Psalm 144:1-2]
We like most of these words, except the part about training for war and subduing people beneath him.
How can He connect these ideas with “He is my loving God!”
The answer lies in the overall story of the Bible.
There is a rebellion going on in this world, a ‘mother of all wars’, and we live in the battlefield – sometimes as the rebels and sometimes as the victims.
God so loved the world, and the mere mortals that live in it, that He steps into the battle to fight the good fight, to resist evil and restore Eden!
God equips us for this battle, for fighting sin, death and hell and overcoming them!
There have been times in the past where this included actual warfare, but since Jesus time our armour is spiritual.
For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. [2 Corinthians 10:3-5]
[For a description of our armour see Ephesians 6:10-17].
God does not delight in violence or bloodshed; everything He does in this world is designed to end violence and bloodshed.
But because this world is filled with it, He enters into the violence and bloodshed, experiences it Himself on our behalf, and breaks the grip of evil.
He equips those He loves with the hope, the strength and the wisdom to fight the good fight with Him – in the Name and in the power and in the way of Jesus.
Not with the weapons of this world, but with spiritual weapons, with spiritual power.
Because He loves us, each and every one of us mere mortals!
PRAYER:
Lord, help me to see the war that is raging all around me. Help me not to fight like the world fights, but to use love, joy, peace, etc. to overcome the armies of hell!