How long................?
Psalm 13:1-4 AMPC
How long will You forget me, O Lord? Forever? How long will You hide Your face from me? [2] How long must I lay up cares within me and have sorrow in my heart day after day? How long shall my enemy exalt himself over me? [3] Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; lighten the eyes [of my faith to behold Your face in the pitchlike darkness], lest I sleep the sleep of death, [4] Lest my enemy say, I have prevailed over him, and those that trouble me rejoice when I am shaken.
Here I sit, in security on this still, serene spring morning, knowing that so many around the globe are beating the drum of "how long" in their nightmarish situations.... not just for an hour or a day, but on and on 'ad infinitum'.
I think of those young girls in Gaza being constantly abused by multiple strangers, indelibly blighting the sanctity of their most intimate parts...
And, those persecuted just because they follow Jesus.... taunted and tortured in some far off prison...
...those who are starving, homeless, hopeless and damaged by wars they didn't cause or want ..
The collective cry of "how long" rises from humanity...
This Psalm echoes those cries..
Where to turn when trials are unending and endurance is paper thin or resolve has broken?
At the moment of complete despair, the bankrupt soul turns the Lord, even the unbelieving one begs for some form of higher intervention.
There is only this in desperate times, when human help has failed.
They grasp out to touch the Hand of the Almighty and He will answer though it seems not...
In Revelation we hear similar cries:
Revelation 6:10 AMPC
They cried in a loud voice, O [Sovereign] Lord, holy and true, how long now before You will sit in judgment and avenge our blood upon those who dwell on the earth?
I need to join my prayers with their cries for help and not turn away because it's too uncomfortable.
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