Run To God

Psalm 55:4-8 - My heart is in anguish within me; the terrors of death assail me.  Fear and trembling have beset me; horror has overwhelmed me.  I said, "Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest--  I would flee far away and stay in the desert; "Selah"  I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm."

 

David’s pain was so great at times that he wanted to run and hide forever from the weight of it. He was tired …his energies drained…his emotions spent…he just wanted to rest in a place where he was sheltered from the worry and conflicts around him.

 

If I had a dollar…no…if I had just a penny for every time I have wanted to run from a problem…I could retire a rich woman. For it is the natural reaction of our brain…to just evade dealing with it at all. We envy that turtle…who can just pull itself into its shell…and wait out the enemy.

 

It’s okay to run…if we run into the arms of God…and let him carry our burden.  That is what David tells us in verse 22.   It says… “Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall.”

 

Problem is…for me anyway…that I don’t always run straight to God with what is bothering me.  I let it fester a bit first….thinking it will just go away.  Or I let myself be tricked into thinking that the small problem I have will right itself on its own…and let it get so big that I have no other option but to take it to God. Guess I had better start asking God to help me from the first signs of trouble…he already knows what I need anyway.

 

Father…thank you for the reminder that you want me to ask you for your help in every thing that bothers me…great or small. Help me to stop thinking that running away and hiding from a problem will make it go away.  Show me how to face the things that trouble me head on by asking you to help me.  Be my shelter from every storm that blows into my life from now on.  Amen.