OUR ONLY TRUE SOURCE OF HELP

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

You have rejected us, God, and burst upon us; You have been angry — now restore us! You have shaken the land and torn it open; mend its fractures, for it is quaking. You have shown your people desperate times; You have given us wine that makes us stagger. But for those who fear you, you have raised a banner to be unfurled against the bow.

Save us and help us with Your right hand, that those You love may be delivered. God has spoken from His sanctuary:

“In triumph I will parcel out Shechem and measure off the Valley of Sukkoth. Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet, Judah is my scepter. Moab is my washbasin, on Edom I toss my sandal; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”

Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?

Is it not You, God, You who have now rejected us and no longer go out with our armies?

Give us aid against the enemy, for human help is worthless. With God we will gain the victory, and He will trample down our enemies.

Psalm 60

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Face it, we all need help from time to time, maybe more often then we admit. Life has a way of placing us in circumstances where we can’t handle things alone. And often times, these circumstances are trials and tribulations, times of difficulty and hardship that we try and get through.

Why do we go through these times?

Some people can reason that they cause their own difficulties and have to deal with the aftermath of poor choices. Others can blame others for the adversity they are under. Still others see misfortune as just a natural byproduct of life itself. They would say that “Trouble happens.”

But what if our troubles were divinely appointed? What if God is judging us and bring us into consequence for our sins?

If you believe God’s word (and you should), then you know that God does judge and pass penalty to the wicked or the sinful.

David certainly knew this as a possibility as we read these words from the 60th Psalm:

You have rejected us, God, and burst upon us; You have been angry — now restore us! You have shaken the land and torn it open; mend its fractures, for it is quaking. You have shown your people desperate times; You have given us wine that makes us stagger. But for those who fear you, you have raised a banner to be unfurled against the bow.

God has spoken from His sanctuary:

“In triumph I will parcel out Shechem and measure off the Valley of Sukkoth. Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet, Judah is my scepter. Moab is my washbasin, on Edom I toss my sandal; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”

Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?

Is it not You, God, You who have now rejected us and no longer go out with our armies?

Give us aid against the enemy, for human help is worthless. With God we will gain the victory, and He will trample down our enemies.

  

Looking closer, we see David as acknowledging God as being responsible for the perils that he and his people were facing:

You have rejected us, God, and burst upon us; You have been angry! You have shaken the land and torn it open. You have shown your people desperate times; You have given us wine that makes us stagger.

Is it not You, God, You who have now rejected us and no longer go out with our armies?

In both statements, we learn the following five things about the state of relationship between God and His people:

1. God had rejected them.

2. God was angry with them.

3. God had shaken them.

4. God had shown His people desperate times.

5. God had abandoned them.

Any or all of these things can happen to you and me as well if we don’t seriously consider the lives we’re living and the sin within them.

So what did David do in the midst of God’s judgment?

He turned to the only true source of help. He turned to God.

Now, you’ll say, “That doesn’t make any sense. God is the One who has convicted and penalized. Do you think He’s the right one to ask for help?” The answer to that would be in the form of two answering questions:

The first one is, “Who else would you turn to for assistance?," followed by, “How will you ever get back on God’s good graces if you don’t turn to Him?”  

Let’s see how David turned to God for help. Look at these verses:

You have been angry — now restore us!

You have shaken the land and torn it open; mend its fractures, for it is quaking.

Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom? Is it not You, God?

Give us aid against the enemy, for human help is worthless.

With God we will gain the victory, and He will trample down our enemies.

Yes, David knew God as a fair almighty authority who judged justly to include consequences administered.

But David knew God well beyond that. For the God that could easily destroy people, casting wrath upon them, was the same God who restored, mended, led, brought victory, and gave aid to His people who were in need.

Indeed, we serve a merciful and loving God, a God who does not wish us to suffer for a lifetime but rather for a season, a season where He can fully display His glory, teach us, and conform us to be the people He longs for us to be. We need just turn to Him in repentance, and follow His will in faith and trust.

Again, who else would we turn to, especially since God’s word here tells us that “human help is worthless?”

Friends, our only true source of help is in God, our very present help in times of trouble.

He’s always ready to deliver us and bring us to victory over our trials when we place our hope in Him and Him alone.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.

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