This blog has been a long time in the making, I felt compelled for awhile now but personally it just never felt right, it felt like concluding a story in the middle before the ending unfolded but if I can’t wait then perhaps its not my own desire it be written.
SUN AND SHIELD
Part 1
David writes in Psalm 84:11 that….
” For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor. No good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly. ”
This is more then mere flattery on on David’s part, this is a man who has tasted the most bitter cups life has to offer looking past it all and seeing God unhindered by his sorrow, rejection, pain and fear, how many of us can say that, how many of us today are suffering on one spectrum or another but are bitterly cutting apart God’s character in our minds and hearts?
Perhaps these sufferings of David’s are what led him to make these claims about God. Lets explore the two symbols David has likened to God and how they reflect God’s acts and status in our lives.
#1 The Sun….
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| God is a sun to his people… |
It would be easy to say that “God is the light our lives” and point to a bunch of other bible verses likening God to light and that just might work but thats not going to work, lets cut into the fat of what Daivd was thinking here.
God told David he was going to be a king, thats big, for God himself to hand pick you and tell you he is going to make you king of his people, his most valuable and prized possesions. God’s words were fertile ground for David to start planting dreams and expectations in, God himself declared it, what could go wrong?
But David had not counted on the fact that he himself was a seed and God had work to do on this little seed that was going to become a mighty king before it was done. The life of a seed is quite hard if you stop and think it through, your buried alone deep into the cold earth and packed tight, all you can see is darkness…
Have you ever felt like that in your life, under pressure crushing you from all sides, alone and in the dark, not a single ray of sunshine to help you grow? Yes, that is what it SEEMS like doesn’t it but the truth is even when the seed can’t see or feel the light the light is shining down none the less, the cold crushing dark can’t keep the nourishing light away and while the seed in in the ground it is being nurtured into the next stages of life, it is not beyond the light’s reach at anytime of it’s life.
The seed is torn apart next, the cold, crushing darkness is smothering but the light beckons and strengths it and the little seed heeds it’s beckon until it splits apart and takes root after gaining strength from the light and from drawing nutrients from the earth around it. In the same way despite God’s calling taking us to times of trial in the wilderness and God’s face seems hidden when he use to feel so close you felt like you could have reached out and touched him his grace and love beckon us and strengthen us to keep moving upward to him as we also draw lessons and experiences for our good from the world and situations we find ourselves in, all working together to help crack the shell around us and grow into something far better.
The struggle for the little seed does not end here however, no in fact the fight gets harder, now the seed can’t be content where it is at anymore, it knows it ca reach the sun even if it can’t see it and it no longer desires to be contained by the earth, now its struggling against the dark but the cold, dark earthen prison won’t yield to the little seed easy. I am sure you can relate, I know David could have, his time running from Saul, hiding in caves, fighting for his life against impossible odds against a foe so much bigger then he himself was in the form of saul and his army.
But despite the crushing odds, fear and despair David kept following the call of God upward to his destiny, even when he himself despaired, God never stopped helping him just as the sun never stops shining down on the little seed deep in the dirt, this went on for years though I am sure to David it felt like eternity.
Can you relate yet, either way picture this next part for me.
One day, tired, bruised, broken apart and fighting tooth and nail……The light sudden breaks through as the earth gives way and the sun hangs over you, beaming and illuminating the world where once there was nothing but darkness but now there is nothing between you and the one that was calling you upward. The seed is a sprout now, a new being and in direct contact with the sun it becomes a plant that will go on to produce a harvest and seeds for years and years to come.
This is what God was doing for David, its what he is doing with you and me, he is breaking us down and forcing us to grow the closer we strive to get to him, David could never have been king the way he was, even after this David was not without fault but the lessons he learned striving to reach God, growing under him like a seed is what was needed for him to be one of the greatest men to ever serve God.
This is how God is a sun to us, he nurtures us, strengthens us and enables us to strive upward, even in our darkest days.
TO BE CONTINUED
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