This for friends
overseas. Today is the groundhog day in America. The groundhog predicts the
length of the winter. If he sees his shadow it indicates that we will have six
more weeks of winter. Today it was reported that the groundhog saw its shadow.
It looks like we will have six more weeks of winter. One of the captions I
saw was a big German Shepherd that did not like the prediction by the Ground
hog, the so the big, ferocious German Shepherd killed the groundhog. Jesus
promises that there is a season for everything.
One of my favorite
Psalms is Psalm 91. In Psalm 91:4 it is written, "He will shelter you under
his wings." What a picture! Growing up in the village back in Orissa we raised our own
chickens. We had hens and roosters. Hens lay eggs and hatch them. When the
chicks are hatched the hen will bring them out in a parade and procession. It
was amazing to see the little chicks hopping around chirping, pecking, doing
chick stuff. All of a sudden, the chicks and the mother hen all become aware
that there's a predator in the vicinity, possibly a fox or a haulk. The mother
hen lifts both wings simultaneously, and within just a few seconds all the baby
chicks disappear under them. They hide there. They're sheltered there. They
regroup there. They are okay under the wings for a time. Eventually they have
to crawl out to face the real world, but for a time there's nothing quite like
being sheltered under the mother's wings.
This is very near the
heart of God, bound up in the very character and essence of God, to provide a
kind of hiding place for his children under his wings. Just as God provided
cities of refuge in the Old Testament, for those who were running from blood
avengers, today God delights in spreading his protective wings and enfolding his
frightened, weary, children under those wings. Then, when the time is right, when strength has
been renewed, when souls have been restored, He lifts his wings, and we venture
back out into the world a little calmer, a little stronger, a little more
secure.
Psalm 9:9 spells it out
clearly, when it says all who are oppressed may come to Him, and He is a refuge
for them in their time of trouble. Throughout the Psalms, there is an
invitation by God Himself to come under His wings. We need refuge. Oppressed people do. Troubled people do.
Weary people do. Grieving people do. Worried people do. Disappointed and
people do. Lonely people do.
Psalm 91:15 says, "When
he calls upon me, then I will answer him. When he calls upon me, I will be with
him in trouble. I will rescue him and honor him." The first practical step toward accessing
God's refuge is to call out and admit that something or someone is chasing us
down and wearing us out. It's admitting we need to find a city of refuge, a
hiding place. We have to say, " we can't outrun this one. My only hope is a
city of refuge."
These days, we don't
have to run to a city of refuge. We can access the refuge of God any time,
anywhere, but the first step is for us to move from independence to dependence
on God. We have to call out. That final city of refuge is open and available to any that
would choose to access it through Christ. Jesus is saying, "Come on
in." This is at the
heart of who God is, providing refuge for the lost and broken in this world and
total, absolute refuge for all of us in the next.
In Christ,
Brown
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