February 11 - Psalm 13:5

February 11 - Psalm 13:5

“But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.”

These words don’t give us the full picture of this Psalm.  David is in bad shape.  It’s a short Psalm so I’m just going to share the entire thing with you here.

Prayer for Deliverance from Enemies
To the leader. A Psalm of David.

How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I bear pain in my soul, and have sorrow in my heart all day long? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

Consider and answer me, O LORD my God! Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep the sleep of death, and my enemy will say, “I have prevailed”; my foes will rejoice because I am shaken.

But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, because he has dealt bountifully with me.

Sometimes we feel so guilty about questioning God when things go wrong.  We feel guilty when we feel as if He has pulled away from us. We don’t allow ourselves to have feelings of frustration with His response to our needs.

David’s words remind us that frustration and worry, anger that the enemy seems to be winning and wondering whether or not God is even paying attention are appropriate behaviors in our relationship with God. 

Because that is exactly what God wants to have with us – a relationship.  Those behaviors aren’t appropriate if we don’t walk with God, because we can’t balance the frustration with the complete trust that God also expects us to have in Him within that relationship.

The Lord deals bountifully with us, even in those moments of time when we don’t see it because of the pain that surrounds us.  We so quickly and easily forget the things that He has done for us in the past and we can’t imagine the things that He will do for us in the future.  When we are surrounded by pain and sorrow, all we can focus on is the here and now and right now it might not feel as if God is anywhere close.

David reminds himself and us that God is near.  He’s got it all.  He cries out to God in his pain and remembers then, that there is more to life than the immediacy of that pain.  God is to be trusted, even in pain we are to rejoice.  God will always care for us.