Wednesday, August 11, 2021
Like Bush and Trees
Standing Between Us and the Light
So Life Will Always
Challenge Us with
Trials and Tribulations.
Always,
Though,
God’s Light Shines
into Us.
1 Samuel 26:24
As your life was precious today in my sight, so may my life be precious in the sight of the Lord, and may he rescue me from all tribulation.
Acts 23:11
That night the Lord stood near him and said, ‘Keep up your courage! For just as you have testified for me in Jerusalem, so you must bear witness also in Rome.’
Words of Grace For Today
Paul, arrested by the Roman Tribunal (one man, not three), is released to stand with the chief priests and council (who had attacked him to kill him because he taught against their religious rules, faith and power). After Paul tells his story of conversion to follow Jesus and bring the Good News of God’s Grace for all people, the crowd seeks to attack him, so the the Tribunal arrests Paul again, and binds him to lash him. Paul protests that he is a Roman citizen and cannot be mistreated if he is not convicted by a Roman trial. Forty (or more than enough) Jews give themselves to not eat until they have killed Paul. They ask the chief priests and council to ask to question Paul again. They will kill him en route to them. The Tribunal hears of it from a relative of Paul’s and he is shipped off to Caesarea, the Roman capital for the region. That night, as the travel plans are put in place, and Paul waits for what will come next the Lord stood near him and said, ‘Keep up your courage! For just as you have testified for me in Jerusalem, so you must bear witness also in Rome.’
Dangerous times, dangerous message, dangerous travels on foot and sea, dangerous trials: the bring Paul to Rome. That’s the last we hear of Paul.
Yet Paul, imprisoned often for his sharing the Gospel of Jesus’ love, God’s Grace for all people, takes every opportunity to share what he has experienced and then studied to understand: God is gracious to all people. All people can be children of God. All people can follow Jesus’ Way.
…
David has angered Saul, the anointed King of God’s people. Saul has sought David’s death. David has run for his life. Saul has pursued him.
At night David and Abishai sneak under cover of night into Saul’s camp, and instead of killing God’s anointed (and suffer the real guilt that would bring on him) David takes Saul’s spear and water jug as proof that he was there and could have killed Saul, but choose not to.
The next day David yells into Saul’s camp, disclosing that he has spared Saul’s life. Saul relents, admits he has done wrong, and gives up his pursuit to kill David.
Then David utters to Saul these words: As your life was precious today in my sight, so may my life be precious in the sight of the Lord, and may he rescue me from all tribulation.
Mercy on David’s part gives David courage to beg God for mercy; that God would find David’s life precious and that God would rescue David from all tribulation.
Doch
God does not find David precious because of the mercy David has shown Saul. God finds David precious in spite of all the shenanigans and wrong and utter evil David does. God does protect David from some tribulation perhaps, but David brings all sorts of tribulation down on his own head. Such is the consequence of a thieving, conniving, murderous life that David chooses at times to pursue for his own benefit. It does not produce benefit, but great tribulation for David and his family … and God’s people.
Still God finds David precious. We remember him as a broken, sinful, God-made saint and leader. David’s story says less about David’s goodness, and so much about God’s grace, mercy and steadfast love toward David and all of God’s people.
If God can use David to bring this message to us, certainly God will use any and all of us to bring a message of God’s Grace told so well in Jesus’ story.
The price for us is not nothing.
Like Paul (once Saul who pursued, persecuted and killed followers of Jesus) and like David, we will suffer trials and tribulations, even at times unspeakable.
Yet always God will declare to all that God finds us precious, that God has adopted us as God’s own children, that we are blessed beyond all imagination with abundant life. Always God will walk with us.
We get to live filled with gratitude, humbly confessing our sins, courageously sharing the old, old story of Jesus and his love for all people, and responding to all evil done against us and around us with grace. We get to live, walking through life’s trials and tribulations, like a graceful dancer, to the music of God’s steadfast love.
There is no other music so beautiful and inspiring to be able to dance to!