Scripture For Today: Psalm 27:1 – 14
“I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.”
Psalm 27:13-14
Waiting for my desires and needs is not my greatest strength. Waiting when events are completely out of my control is even harder. The reason is because I have too long believed that waiting is passive. Waiting on God is a labor of seeking, asking, knocking, and trusting Him to deliver you at the perfect time because He is God your father who loves you and is always working for your highest good. If you face a difficult trial or circumstance today, learn with me how to wait on The Lord.
“There is a great difference dear Christian between believing that God can answer prayer in general, and believing that God will hear and answer our specific prayer when under the pressure of immediately overwhelming circumstances that are completely out of our control.”
Psalm 27 gives us a look into David’s heart when he is seeking The Lord for something in his life and while confident in God, he also fears that his prayer is not being answered and that if God does not answer as he needs he will be overcome by the present circumstance. Fear that we are not being heard or failure to see the answer as we expect can undermine our ability to trust God to answer our prayer His way in His time. There are times when the urgency of our prayer seems so obvious that we are certain God should do exactly what we are thinking and do it now. David begins this psalm by expressing his confidence in God. His courage as he faces his battles comes from The Lord through David’s confidence in Him. “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”, Psalm 27:1. This confidence in God is very real and sincere but it is also a general confidence in God. Notice in verse three that David is confident in God concerning a circumstance that could happen, did happen in his life at times, but was not in existence at the time he wrote this psalm. “Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear: though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident.”, Psalm 27:3. This was a situation that “should” or possible could happen. David was confident that when this situation came to pass that God will be His strength, light, and salvation. It is a general confidence in God based on what David absolutely believes God will do but not specific in that it is a real and present threat to David. It is relatively easy for a believer who knows God and walks with God to have this general confidence in God that leads to a fearlessness in the face of circumstances that might happen with the attitude that “If it does, I am sure God will take care of me in it”. But fearlessness can easily turn to fear when the circumstances become real and difficult and we find that only God can deliver us.
In the second half of this Psalm David expresses the fear that in this specific moment and circumstance he would not be the immediate recipient of God’s hearing his cry, and then God’s merciful answer to his cry. “Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me. When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek. Hide not thy face far from me; put not thy servant away in anger: thou hast been my help; leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation.”, Psalm 27:7-9. There is a great difference dear Christian between believing that God can answer prayer in general, and believing that God will hear and answer our specific prayer when under the pressure of immediately overwhelming circumstances that are completely out of our control. David’s solution for moving from the general confidence in God that is common to a sustaining faith that God will deliver from immediate circumstances is to acknowledge that you are lost if He doesn’t deliver you and then live expectantly, laying in wait for God to bring your deliverance in time to give you victory in the immediate specific trial you are immersed in.
Waiting on God is not passively sleeping until God does something but it is seeking His face, asking, seeking, knocking, expecting that at any moment the good man of the house will arise and give you the bread you desire to meet the need you are helpless to meet because He loves you. Don’t doubt God even in this present, pressing, immediate and urgent circumstance that only He can solve. “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.”