Brown's Daily Word 6-10-10

Good morning,
Praise the Lord for this new day in His Kingdom. He blessed us with a wonderful Wednesday gathering last evening. Praise the Lord for those who come faithfully to share and rejoice.
The good news that the Bible declares is that the Lord specializes in accomplishing His extraordinary purpose through very ordinary people. The heroes of the Bible are not held up on some unreal pedestal - they are completely unlike our comic book and movie super-heroes. There is never any attempt on God’s part to win our favor by portraying them as being always saintly. Abraham lied; Noah got drunk; Moses lost his temper and committed murder. God paints His people just as they are. No matter how dignified or high their calling they are fully human. I think God lets us see the true nature of each biblical hero for 2 reasons: First, by doing so He tells us that these are real people. (If we were doing a biographical sketch on people of faith we might be tempted to leave their skeletons in the closets). God wants us to understand that these people really lived, that they had imperfections, and that God used them anyway. Secondly, when we see these real people, we have no trouble identifying with them. When we see their sometimes marred character we can say, "If God can use them with their flaws, maybe He can use me too."
David had refused to take revenge on Saul by sparing the monarch’s life. David had expressed no doubt that God Himself would provide deliverance. He said to Saul in I Samuel 24:15 - “May the Lord judge which of us is right and punish the guilty one. He is my advocate, and he will rescue me from your power!” He kept that attitude for the next two chapters. In 26:24 he said, "The LORD will reward any person who is righteous and faithful. The Lord will rescue me from all trouble." There was not a word of doubt or vacillation there. David had fully given his trust to God to rescue him from Saul’s murder attempts. And Saul responded to David’s faith by seemingly giving up on his desire to kill him. But something happened between chapter 26 and 27. Saul, even though spared by David, apparently did an “about face” and began once again to hunt him down in an attempt to kill him. Suddenly, in chapter 27, we read, “But David kept thinking to himself, “Someday Saul is going to get me.” As so often happens, when external situations don’t clear up the way we think they should, David became depressed, questioning "why is this still happening?" In his doubt, he lost his spiritual equilibrium.
In 1 Samuel 27 we read about David’s life at a time when his faith faltered. Up until this point, David has been almost flawless in his character. He was an obedient shepherd, a submissive servant, a courageous warrior and a forgiving enemy. But in 1 Samuel 27 we come to a period of time in which David went into a "spiritual slump" and made a series of drastic mistakes. For instance, he moved to Gath (yes, the home of Goliath), where he became a "thug" for the Philistine king.
His loss of spiritual equilibrium is evident in vs:1 when “David kept thinking to himself.." And his thoughts took him from “God will rescue me from all trouble,” to “Someday Saul is going to get me." Had God backed out on His pledge? No! But because things did not work out as expected, David quavered in his faith and was filled with doubt & fear. Interestingly, not one time in this entire chapter does it say that David prayed, not one time does it say he called on the Lord, but just that he "thought to himself." That’s what happens when you exchange spiritual reliance on God for self-sufficiency.
Doubt can be produced when a person goes through a long period of problems or a time of extreme difficulty. Adversity begins to wear on us and we begin to doubt that God is really in control. That is precisely what David was going through. His doubt was a direct result of continued difficult circumstances. For 8 years he lived the life of a fugitive, constantly in danger. Imagine the pressure of escaping death day in and day out. Eventually, David began to feel sorry for himself. After all, he was innocent. He had spared Saul’s life, so he deserved better. Where was God in all of this? Why didn’t He do something?
All we have to do is read some of the Psalms that David wrote during this period, in order to understand just how low he was. Psalm 10:1- "O Lord, why do you stand so far away?" Sometimes it is very difficult to come up with answers. For instance, how do you answer the questions someone who has just found out that he or she has cancer? What do you say when asked, "Tell me, why is this happening to me?" To see some loved one that has Alzheimers and yet lingers on and suffers so and you wonder, "Why does this have to be this way? What purpose could God have for this?" Time and time again we run into people who are struggling with doubt because of such times of extreme difficulty. Now, we need to know that in times like that God has promised He will not desert us and He has a plan! And I believe that many times in our lives when we go through difficult times and we begin to doubt, that’s when Jesus is the nearest to us. Though David came to a time in his life when he felt alone and rejected, and so he doubted God, God never gave up nor stopped working out His plan.
In His Faithfulness,
Brown

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8HgAVenbUU