The Overflowing Cup

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honour me by anointing my head with oil. My cup overflows with blessings. Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever”.
Psalm 23:5-6 NLT

We continue out journey through Psalm 23 with the thought about a cup. In this context, we’re not considering a tea or coffee cup, receptacles made of clay or something similar, an ornately decorated item with a handle glued to the outside and glazed and fired in a kiln. In my mind the cup used would have been more like a goblet, used for wine drinking, and with connotations of grandeur because of its contents. For fear of being poisoned, kings and royalty used someone they trusted to supply them with wine, employing them as cup-bearers. Nehemiah had this role, being engaged by King Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 1:11). The “cup” fits in well with the feast prepared earlier for David, food and drink supplied by the Lord, David’s “Good Shepherd”. We earlier read, “In Jerusalem, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world. It will be a delicious banquet with clear, well-aged wine and choice meat” (Isaiah 25:6). Our imaginations consider the plates full of our favourite foods with the best of wines to supplement the experience of being a guest at the ultimate banquet with the Lord Himself. 

However we consider the spiritual aspect of the cup, and why it is overflowing. To David, the cup wasn’t full of wine but instead overflowing with blessings. We look through Psalm 23 and we find that it is all about being blessed. Green pastures, peaceful streams, God’s presence as he journeys and His protection and comfort available through the dark valleys, and here we are at a banquet with an overflowing cup of blessings. The culmination of a poetic description of living a life connected to God.

The cup overflowed with blessings, and in the Bible there is sometimes an association made between the contents of a cup, normally wine, and the Holy Spirit. On the day of Pentecost, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit gave the impression of drunkenness.  Acts 2:13, 15, 17-18, “But others in the crowd ridiculed them, saying, “They’re just drunk, that’s all!” … These people are not drunk, as some of you are assuming. Nine o’clock in the morning is much too early for that. … ‘In the last days,’ God says, ‘I will pour out my Spirit upon all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams. In those days I will pour out my Spirit even on my servants—men and women alike— and they will prophesy“. What a blessing that day was! Not just a cup full for David, but many cups full for the believers there in that upper room. In those days of poor sanitation, an alternative was necessary, and wine was the commodity often suppled. Jesus drank wine, much to the embarrassment of teetotal Christians (“Mark my words—I will not drink wine again until the day I drink it new with you in my Father’s Kingdom” (Matthew 26:29)). Perhaps Jesus was alluding to the Heavenly Banquet yet to come. We also remember that Jesus’ first miracle was the turning of water into wine at a wedding feast in Cana of Galilee. 

We also remember another liquid that would have been drunk from cups – water. In John 4 we read about Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman, who had come to draw water from a well outside the village of Sychar. Jesus told her, “ … Anyone who drinks this water will soon become thirsty again. But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life” (John 4:13-14). Not long after, Jesus spoke out in the temple at the Feast of Tabernacles, “On the last day, the climax of the festival, Jesus stood and shouted to the crowds, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart’”” (John 7:37-38). 

But David wasn’t thinking about wine or water when he said “My cup overflows with blessings”. His heart was full of gratitude to the Lord, who had supplied all his needs, not in a grudging or stingy fashion, but so bountifully that the cup wasn’t big enough to hold all the blessings supplied. But that is our God. Most of the time the problem isn’t that God lacks supply, but that we lack demand. I’m not talking about physical blessings, financial or otherwise, but the spiritual blessings that continually pour from Heaven filling our cups and more. Ephesians 5:18-19, “Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts“. The Holy Spirit is ready and willing to fill our hearts, but how willing are we to allow Him? What is the state of our “cups” today? Are they full to overflowing or are they only a quarter or half full? Or even empty and dry, dusty with a lack of use. An infilling of the Holy Spirit will not cost us any money (although a man called Simon tried that, as recorded in Acts 9:18). But it cost Jesus everything, His life. We only have to ask, and keep on asking, because God is always willing to provide all that we need. Jesus made it all possible that day on Calvary’s hill, and God’s overflowing blessings of the Holy Spirit haven’t stopped pouring into the cups of believers ever since. 

Dear Heavenly Father. The cup You supply will never run dry. We drink deeply and hold it out for more. Thank You Lord. Amen.

Anointing With Oil

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honour me by anointing my head with oil. My cup overflows with blessings. Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever”.
Psalm 23:5-6 NLT

The custom of anointing with oil was an important part of the Jewish faith, and the first mention of anointing oil appears in Exodus 25:6, “olive oil for the lamps; spices for the anointing oil and the fragrant incense“. In Exodus 30 there are detailed instructions supplied for how to make anointing oil, with choice spices to be added to the olive oil base. Its use was described in verses 30-32, “Anoint Aaron and his sons also, consecrating them to serve me as priests. And say to the people of Israel, ‘This holy anointing oil is reserved for me from generation to generation. It must never be used to anoint anyone else, and you must never make any blend like it for yourselves. It is holy, and you must treat it as holy“. But the oil David described in Psalm 23 was not of the priestly anointing variety. David will have remembered that occasion when he was anointed with oil, and we can pick up the story in 1 Samuel 16:1, “Now the Lord said to Samuel, “You have mourned long enough for Saul. I have rejected him as king of Israel, so fill your flask with olive oil and go to Bethlehem. Find a man named Jesse who lives there, for I have selected one of his sons to be my king””. We can read how David came to be selected as the future king in the intervening verses, but we then come to verses 12-13, “So Jesse sent for him. He was dark and handsome, with beautiful eyes. And the Lord said, “This is the one; anoint him.” So as David stood there among his brothers, Samuel took the flask of olive oil he had brought and anointed David with the oil. And the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David from that day on. Then Samuel returned to Ramah“. So perhaps when David wrote Psalm 23 he remembered that time when he was honoured before his father and his brothers. 

Olive oil was an essential commodity in Israel in those days, being used as a base for food as well as oil for lamps, but it came to be regarded as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. David was anointed as king of Israel and we are told that when that happened “the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David from that day on”. Jesus told a parable of ten virgins or bridesmaids in Matthew 25, with five of them having planned ahead for the wait for the bridegroom with an ample supply of oil for their lamps, and the others not having enough. For some reason the bridegroom was delayed and the oil for the five “foolish” bridesmaids ran out, meaning that their lamps went out as well. They had to go out and try and buy some but unfortunately for them the groom arrived back before they did and doors were locked. Their knocking at the door got them no where, because the groom denied even knowing them. It’s an important story because it reminds believers everywhere that they need to be ready for Jesus’ return, even if it is delayed. And if we add into the mix that oil is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, then it perhaps indicates that only those who are filled, and who are continually being filled, with the Spirit will be truly ready for the Second Coming of Jesus. 

The Apostle James made a connection between the Holy Spirit and prayer for the sick which we can read in James 5:14, “Are any of you sick? You should call for the elders of the church to come and pray over you, anointing you with oil in the name of the Lord“. Apart from that, there seems to be no clear reason why anointing with oil should be necessary in these years of our Lord. But the principle remains in spiritual planes, as the Holy Spirit anoints us with His presence. 

Are we pilgrims filled with the Spirit? There are some who minimise the presence of the Spirit and who fail to honour Him and His gifts in the way the New Testament describes. In John 1:32-33 we read about the anointing of the Holy Spirit, or as referred to in the Scriptures, the baptism in the Holy Spirit. “Then John testified, “I saw the Holy Spirit descending like a dove from heaven and resting upon him. I didn’t know he was the one, but when God sent me to baptise with water, he told me, ‘The one on whom you see the Spirit descend and rest is the one who will baptise with the Holy Spirit”. Jesus is the Baptiser, the One who anoints all believers with the oil of the Holy Spirit. In Acts 1:4-5 we read, “Once when he was eating with them, [Jesus] commanded them, “Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you the gift he promised, as I told you before. John baptised with water, but in just a few days you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit””. I firmly believe that Jesus still baptises us with His Spirit because He is still alive and working in the lives of men and women everywhere. I can find no Scripture verse that conflicts with this view.

So today, we believers, pilgrims on the journey to Glory, have an opportunity to once again receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit, as we reach out to God. Luke 11:13, “So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him”. Ask away, folks. God won’t say no.

Dear Father God. We pray for a fresh infilling of Your Holy Spirit in us today, and every day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Enemies

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honour me by anointing my head with oil. My cup overflows with blessings. Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever”.
Psalm 23:5-6 NLT

Who are these enemies, and why are they worthy of mention in this otherwise God-focused Psalm? David’s Psalms make frequent mention of his enemies, For example, Psalm 3 starts, “O Lord, I have so many enemies; so many are against me“. We could be forgiven for thinking that David went about his life permanently looking over his shoulder in case there was some malign attacker coming after him. We know that there were nations around Israel who were hostile to David, nations such as the Philistines and the Moabites, and there were also enemies of David within Israel, people such as Saul and David’s son Absolom. So David wasn’t short of an enemy of two, and it caused him no end of distress. Often David was upset because the hostile words directed towards him maligned his Lord as well. Psalm 3:2, “So many are saying, “God will never rescue him!”” In his next Psalm David railed against enemies intent on destroying his standing in his community. He wrote, “How long will you people ruin my reputation? How long will you make groundless accusations? How long will you continue your lies?” (Psalm 4:2). At other times, David’s enemy would seem to be himself. The first three verses of Psalm 6, “O Lord, don’t rebuke me in your anger or discipline me in your rage. Have compassion on me, Lord, for I am weak. Heal me, Lord, for my bones are in agony. I am sick at heart. How long, O Lord, until you restore me?” In the light of God’s holiness, perhaps he was regretting his sinful humanity. Or he may just have been physically sick. But in it all, David had enemies, and he was looking forward to the day when God’s favour was publicly displayed for all to see. In a sense, it happened in his time on Planet Earth because David turned Israel into a strong and prosperous nation, in full view of the nations around him, the “feast” being a description of God’s blessings and provisions. Or perhaps David was also looking forward to another time when he would be living “in the house of the Lord forever”. But whatever the context, David was musing on the thought that it would be nice if he was vindicated in full view of all those who otherwise tried to do him harm, physical or verbal.

Today, we pilgrims look around and, at least here in the West, we don’t have enemies as such. There are no marauding bands of reprobates, intent on doing harm to us. The most we will experience is the occasional abusive or malign social media post, if we are stupid enough to engage with Facebook or similar. Or perhaps someone will shake their fist at us if our driving falls below an acceptable level of competence. But then we pause to think. Paul wrote, “For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12). We will find these “evil rulers and authorities” both inside and outside of ourselves. Paul addressed his internal “demons” in Romans 7, “So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. …  I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. … But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me” (Romans 7:14, 21, 23). Perhaps we get a picture of an angel perched on one shoulder and a demon on the other, warring with each other as they whisper in each ear. There is a battle going on inside of us as we try to live sin-free in God’s Kingdom but our “old man” still insists on climbing out of his coffin, causing us to sin once again. And of course we remember that the devil is out to get us as well. 1 Peter 5:8, “Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour”. We pilgrims live in a hostile environment, our sinful humanity pulling us down, and the devil himself making it hard for us to get up again.

So, how do we pilgrims deal with our enemies, whatever their origin, spiritual or otherwise. The first step is to identify our foe, because often we will rationalise or ignore a problem. For example, sometimes a particular temptation comes our way and our sinfulness prevails and tries to tell us that perhaps just a peep at a particular picture won’t really matter. Or, “it’s not really a lie, because I want to protect another person”. 1 James 1:14-15, “Temptation comes from our own desires, which entice us and drag us away. These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death”. As someone once said – you cannot stop birds flying over your head but you can stop them nesting in your hair. Sometimes, the devil will oppress us. For example, something will happen that seems just plain “bad luck”. A car accident or a falling out over something trivial. A series of events that seem inexplicably linked. At such times we pray and ask God for protection and remember what Peter wrote in 1 Peter 5:9a, “Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith ...”. And if the foe is a physical one, then we must exercise wisdom, avoiding situations that could be dangerous. For example, it makes little sense to walk in dark and lonely places late at night.

Paul helpfully wrote about the whole armour of God, in Ephesians 6. There he was in a Roman jail, chained to two Roman soldiers, and he couldn’t help noticing their armour, and from that he developed a word picture of the spiritual armour available to us. Ephesians 6:13, “Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armour so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Then after the battle you will still be standing firm”. And we mustn’t forget Ephesians 6:18, “Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere“.

We pilgrims have enemies. It would be foolish to think otherwise. But we mustn’t become complacent. Instead we must be diligent praying for ourselves and for our families and loved ones. One day we will indeed sit down to a wonderful feast, and all those who have maligned us, spiritually or physically, will only be able to look on. It will be too late by then for them to join us at the table, and so we do what Jesus asked us to do while there is still time. Matthew 5:44, “But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you!” It may be hard but until we release those who abuse us into God’s hands in prayer, we will be bound by their threats.

Father God. Please help us not to be complacent and fall into error because we forget about our enemies. We pray for Your protection for ourselves and for our loved ones. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Peaceful Streams

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“The Lord is my shepherd; I have all that I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honour to his name. Even when I walk through the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me. Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.”
Psalm 23:1-4 NLT

What an idyllic picture David paints, with his canvas containing green meadows and peaceful streams. We can all let our imaginations build our own versions of what he describes in our minds, personal pictures that would be largely based on our own experiences of farmland and the countryside. We can even visit an art gallery and there we will soon find a landscape or two that could have been lifted right out of Psalm 23. But David’s word picture was based on his own personal experience of the meadows and streams he visited while leading his sheep around the hills and valleys of rural Palestine. 

After the “green meadows” David moves on to the “peaceful streams” that make them green in the first place. Water, pure and clear, bubbling into a steady stream of peace, providing precious water for his flock to drink in a dry and dusty land. But David wasn’t writing about his sheep and their provision. He put himself into the position of being like a sheep with the Lord Himself being his Shepherd. The description of the meadows and streams provides a picture of a journey through a countryside that wasn’t all green and lush, a journey that David would have know well as he travelled with his flock. And here he is, walking along beside a stream of water, peaceful and pure.

We pilgrims are on a journey as well. There are times when we rest in a place of refreshing but other times when we journey onwards, never far from the life giving water that flows from God Himself. The Lord provides for us, body, soul and spirit. These days in the West it is unusual to find physical hunger, with most people having the wherewithal to be able to feed themselves. But spiritual hunger and thirst is a national disease of epidemic proportions, with most people unable to find the Source for which their souls and spirits yearn. There is something within each one of us that longs to be satisfied. God provides all that we need but most people try and satisfy themselves from a source that is man-made and ineffective. A source like alcohol or drugs. Sex or the occult. Sin has so twisted and screwed up people, and the world on which we live, that most will never find the way of true provision, the lush “green meadows” and the “peaceful streams” supplied by God for all to enjoy.

David knew all about the importance of being rooted in a “peaceful stream” somewhere. About God’s people he wrote, “But they delight in the law of the Lord, meditating on it day and night. They are like trees planted along the riverbank, bearing fruit each season. Their leaves never wither, and they prosper in all they do” (Psalm 1:2-3). God has supplied water for us to drink to satisfy our bodies, and He has supplied His Word to satisfy our souls. David could see the connection between people and trees, with those that are planted where they can access His life-giving water functioning just as He designed. Back in Genesis 2 we read about God’s plan, “The Lord God made all sorts of trees grow up from the ground—trees that were beautiful and that produced delicious fruit. In the middle of the garden he placed the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed from the land of Eden, watering the garden and then dividing into four branches” (Genesis 2:9-10). One of the trees was the “tree of life” that supplied everything Adam needed for his existence. But that tree reappears in Revelation 22:1-2, “Then the angel showed me a river with the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. It flowed down the centre of the main street. On each side of the river grew a tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, with a fresh crop each month. The leaves were used for medicine to heal the nations“. David could see God’s provision for him and he knew that he had to stay close to the “peaceful streams” because otherwise his spirit would soon shrivel and die, like a tree planted in the middle of a desert. 

In a sense we pilgrims are living between two trees. The tree of life in the garden of Eden and the trees of life planted either side of the “water of life” that flowed from the very throne of God. God has never stopped the water flowing. It flowed in Eden and it will flow from His very presence in the New Jerusalem that we read about in Revelation 21. We pilgrims know all about God’s life-giving water because of Jesus. In John 7:37b-39a He said, “ … Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’” (When he said “living water,” he was speaking of the Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him. …)“.  God promised His supply through a prophetic message brought by Isaiah, “For I will pour out water to quench your thirst and to irrigate your parched fields. And I will pour out my Spirit on your descendants, and my blessing on your children. They will thrive like watered grass, like willows on a riverbank” (Isaiah 44:3-4).

On the Day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came with a mighty roar and His presence has never left us ever since. We pilgrims each have living within us God’s Spirit, a Source of living water that Jesus first introduced us to in John 4:10, “Jesus replied, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water””. So in this period of living between the two trees, we pilgrims are the Source of the living water that mankind so desperately needs.

Where is God leading us today? Are we walking besides a “peaceful stream” or have we camped somewhere dry and barren? Perhaps we need to get up and get moving. We may be tired, perhaps resigning ourselves to a dry and waterless existence away from any thought of life-giving spiritual water. We may go through the motions of Christianity but denying its power, as Paul wrote. But there is something in God’s hands that will flow into our souls, empowering us and commissioning us for His Work. We can’t produce the fruit that God requires in a waterless desert. That’s the place where the God-deniers live, a place full of sin and evil. But we can walk by the “peaceful streams”, drinking our fills, and then visit the dry places to tell the inhabitants about Jesus. There is a world out there dying of thirst, but we know where there is water, the water that will refresh their souls.

Dear Father God, thank You for Your life-giving water, so freely given. Amen.

God is My Strength

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“O Lord, do not stay far away! You are my strength; come quickly to my aid! Save me from the sword; spare my precious life from these dogs. Snatch me from the lion’s jaws and from the horns of these wild oxen.”
Psalm 22:19-21 NLT

It is almost as though David has suddenly woken up and has now realised that God is there for him, able to save him from whatever caused his terrible vision of crucifixion. In distress and under attack he must have been, but he knew that God was his strength. But what did he mean by that? David spent much time with God, during those years looking after his father’s sheep. Instead of wiling away the time in pointless ways, David pulled out his harp or whistle, and worshiped God in the long hours. In those formative years, David learned much about God and how He helped him in times of need. We read the story of when Goliath was taunting the Israelite army and David ended up in front of King Saul. We can pick up the story in 1 Samuel 17:32, ““Don’t worry about this Philistine,” David told Saul. “I’ll go fight him!”” Saul’s response in the next verse emphasises David’s youth, ““Don’t be ridiculous!” Saul replied. “There’s no way you can fight this Philistine and possibly win! You’re only a boy, and he’s been a man of war since his youth.”” But the next three verses were very telling, “But David persisted. “I have been taking care of my father’s sheep and goats,” he said. “When a lion or a bear comes to steal a lamb from the flock, I go after it with a club and rescue the lamb from its mouth. If the animal turns on me, I catch it by the jaw and club it to death. I have done this to both lions and bears, and I’ll do it to this pagan Philistine, too, for he has defied the armies of the living God!” (1 Samuel 17:24-26).‭‭ David knew all about his capabilities because God had repeatedly been his strength in a time of need. David knew that when faced with a seemingly overwhelming and fearful opponent, such as a bear or lion, God was his strength, and his relationship was such that he knew God would help him defeat this Philistine. He said to Saul, “The Lord who rescued me from the claws of the lion and the bear will rescue me from this Philistine!” Saul finally consented. “All right, go ahead,” he said. “And may the Lord be with you!”” (1 Samuel 17:37).

Psalm 22, however, paints a picture of a different enemy to that of a bear, lion or even a Goliath. In Psalm 22:12-13 he wrote, “My enemies surround me like a herd of bulls; fierce bulls of Bashan have hemmed me in! Like lions they open their jaws against me, roaring and tearing into their prey”. And while facing this terrible situation, David had a vision of what his enemies would do to him. He did what we all do – get bogged down in imagining the consequences and what might happen, before we think of God. And isn’t it amazing that even when our enemies or difficult situations haven’t yet appeared, we start imagining what might happen if they did. The “wee small hours”, while we are supposed to be asleep, can become an imaginary battleground, where we stand in a place of potential danger, like the carpet in the boss’s office, or before the bank manager, and it is there that we generate various scenarios in our minds of the worst possible outcomes, and before we know it, we are living every terrible moment as if we have lost our jobs or are having to face into the consequences of bankruptcy.

There is another Psalm that I have turned to in times of distress in the past – Psalm 91. we read, “Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day” (Psalm 91:3-5). A picture of God’s all-encompassing protection and salvation. But it was verse 7 that God revealed to me one day when the company I was working for had announced the necessity for redundancies. It reads, “A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you“. How that promise of God encouraged me, and I indeed was kept safe from losing my job.

The Apostle Paul, like David, also knew about God being his strength. We read in Philippians 4:12-13, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength“. 

We pilgrims are convinced of God’s strength in every aspect of our lives. In fact, we know that God is so strong that He will bring us home one day regardless of our challenges and circumstances. What is there to fear? Yes, our fleshly nature sometimes rises up and gives us grief, but in the end God will prevail over all the odds. We are on the winning side, forever.

Dear Heavenly Father. You are a strong tower and we can always run to You in times of attack. We thank You today. Amen.

Trust In The Lord

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Your victory brings him great honour, and you have clothed him with splendour and majesty. You have endowed him with eternal blessings and given him the joy of your presence. For the king trusts in the Lord. The unfailing love of the Most High will keep him from stumbling.”
Psalm 21:5-7 NLT

Just a simple statement lacking drama, almost written as an aside – “For the king trusts in the Lord”. It stands as the tip of an iceberg, with much implied explanation and background information hidden beneath it. The sentence doesn’t include the how or why of David’s trust. It’s just a statement of fact. But David’s journey to the point when he could state that he trusts in the Lord began at the moment when Samuel anointed him in front of his father and brothers – “So as David stood there among his brothers, Samuel took the flask of olive oil he had brought and anointed David with the oil. And the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David from that day on …” (1 Samuel 16:13). In those pre-Messiah days the Holy Spirit didn’t live in each of God’s people all the time; instead He visited and empowered chosen people for certain tasks when the need was there. So, for David to experience the indwelling Holy Spirit was remarkable. From that moment forward, David learned through his life experiences how to trust in the Lord. Day by day, battle by battle, crisis by crisis, and David went on to write that “the unfailing love of the Most High” would keep him from ever stumbling.

But what does it mean to “trust in the Lord”? Proverbs 3:5 provides a clue, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding“. Our own understanding is flawed because so much of our humanity gets in the way. Our sins, wrong choices, lack of wisdom, and many other factors can all combine to skew our understanding and put us on a path that is far away from what God has planned for us. And, sadly, it is often the case that when we find ourselves in a place of difficulty, there through our own choices, we then turn to God for the guidance that we needed right at the beginning. Proverbs 14:12 reminds us, “There is a path before each person that seems right, but it ends in death“. 

To be able to trust in someone, we need to get to a place where we can find something in that person that inspires that trust. I trust in my wife of many years because I have come to know her and have experienced her wisdom on many occasions. I know her Godly ways and her willingness to spend long hours in prayer to find God’s will. So before any important decisions are made, I trust her to have the wisdom needed. But can I say the same thing about our politicians? But we won’t go down that rabbit trail today. There is only one way to say, as David did, that we trust in the Lord, and that is through spending time, a lot of time, with God, and trusting Him with everyday matters, in the process building up a relationship on which we can depend. We make sure that we honour and treasure our “Quiet Times” in God’s presence, reading His Word, and engaging Him in prayer. We bring before Him all the hassles and problems, the decisions to be made, our difficulties and stresses, that we face in the day ahead. 

God has made many promises to us. Let us consider one from Philippians 4:6-7, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus“. In another Psalm David wrote, “Once I was young, and now I am old. Yet I have never seen the godly abandoned or their children begging for bread” (Psalm 37:25). God said that He will supply all our needs and, as David said, if we look around at our fellow believers we see that this is indeed a true statement. But we do see those suffering around us as the result of choices influenced by their own understanding, tainted as it is by sin and a lack of wisdom. We pilgrims search out God’s promises in His Word and apply them in our daily lives, finding that God is indeed unchangeable and true to His Word.

When we trust in God, we are handing control of our lives to the One who knows what is best for us. God sees the End from the Beginning, and when Jesus asked His disciples if they wanted to leave Him, Peter replied, “ … Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life” (John 6:68). There is no other way to complete our journey through life. There is no other ideology, or doctrine, or religion, that will assure us a place in the Home our spirits desire. Only God knows the way we need to take in our lives and we trust Him in the process.

Dear Father God. We proclaim our trust in You today and every day. We praise and worship You. Amen.

Pleasing God

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”
Psalm 19:14 NLT

David ends his Psalm with a lovely prayer that, although few in words, contains essential advice for any pilgrim on the road to Glory. David once again acknowledges and affirms that God is his Rock and Redeemer, after a journey through initial thoughts about God and His creation, His commandments that “make wise the simple”, and dealing with sin. And here he is winding things up with a prayer that must have warmed God’s heart. And there is also a prophetic indication that the coming Messiah will be the Redeemer. But it’s a prayer that, if we apply it to our lives, makes us feel a bit uncomfortable. Do what we speak and think really please God? All the time?

There is a connection between what we think and the words that come from our mouths, as Jesus pointed out to the Pharisees in Matthew 12:34, “You brood of snakes! How could evil men like you speak what is good and right? For whatever is in your heart determines what you say”. The Pharisees were a good example of the human tendency to rationalise behaviour to a place where what is thought feels right, and then a Scripture or two is found to back it up, with consequent actions following. Jesus saw right through them, and their house of cards came tumbling down when God’s spotlight showed them up for what they really were. Later in the same passage, Jesus warned the Pharisees about the words they spoke – Matthew 12:36-37, “And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak. The words you say will either acquit you or condemn you”. So before we feel a bit smug because we aren’t Pharisees, can we really claim that we have never spoken an “idle word” or had thoughts that were wrong?

Yesterday we considered the words of James, “And among all the parts of the body, the tongue is a flame of fire. It is a whole world of wickedness, corrupting your entire body. It can set your whole life on fire, for it is set on fire by hell itself. …  And so blessing and cursing come pouring out of the same mouth. Surely, my brothers and sisters, this is not right!” (James 3:6, 10). But what we say starts with a thought in our minds. That would be bad enough but to then verbalise that thought can cause untold damage to others. The advice in Proverbs 21:23 is blunt and to the point, “Watch your tongue and keep your mouth shut, and you will stay out of trouble“.

The secret to wholesome speech starts with getting our thinking aligned to God’s thoughts and ways. David wrote about the “meditation of [his] heart” and that is the centre of the problem. What do we meditate on? A blunt question but the answer is one that could make us feel quite uncomfortable. The purification of our thoughts is something we will never really achieve in this life, no matter how hard we try. But we can get better and better in thinking God’s thoughts and getting His perspective on what we think about, as the Holy Spirit guides us into all truth. So do we pick up a media report and meditate on that, or do we pick up the Bible instead? The world events that can cause us so much distress become less troublesome when viewed through the lens of Scripture. We behave in response to what we meditate on. We pilgrims must look beyond our circumstances to the Kingdom yet to come, and in the meantime we pray that God will help us clean up our thoughts and speech. A final word from Paul. “Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them” (Ephesians 4:29). Before we say anything we must stop and think. 

Dear Father God. You know our predisposition to say what we shouldn’t. Please help us to follow Paul’s advice and analyse what we say before we say it, to ensure that it is only a blessing to others. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Sparkling Eyes

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Turn and answer me, O Lord my God! Restore the sparkle to my eyes, or I will die. Don’t let my enemies gloat, saying, “We have defeated him!” Don’t let them rejoice at my downfall.”
Psalm 13:3-4 NLT

David, once again, is giving God a hard time. Is he getting frustrated with God for a lack of answers to his prayers, or a lack of action to sort out the problems he is having with his enemies, whoever they are? But whatever the issue, David does seem to be trying to twist God’s arm, by telling Him that unless He does something about the situation then He will lose the “man after His own heart” that He had already installed as King, or, if the Psalm was written in the days when David was on the run from Saul, who was the King designate.

David prays that God will “restore the sparkle to [his] eyes, or [he] will die”. It has been said that our eyes are windows into our souls. And it is true that when we look into someone’s eyes we see life. We see a living person with eyes that tell what is going on within them. If someone won’t look us in the eye then we know they have something to hide. In their eyes, we see their mood, be it happy or sad, anxious or self-assured. David obviously suspected that his eyes were giving out signs of worry about his enemies, or stress about the situation in which he was in. And, understandably, he wanted to return to that state of health and vitality, where his eyes sent out a message of positivity to those around him. 

In Matthew 6:22-23, we read what Jesus taught about our eyes. He said, “Your eye is like a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is unhealthy, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is!” What Jesus was saying was that someone with a healthy eye was a person who understood the things of God and who could discern right and wrong, and knew all about living God’s way, saved by His grace. Conversely, a person with an unhealthy eye represents most people around us, who know nothing about God and don’t want to know anything about Him either. They want to continue to live in their sin, effectively living with unhealthy eyes in a world of darkness. These are spiritually blind people and, sadly, we can even find them in our congregations and fellowships, people who Paul warned Timothy about, “They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that!” (2 Timothy 3:5).

So, dear fellow pilgrims, how are your eyes this morning? Sparkling or dull? Bright or dark? David seemed to imply that it was God’s responsibility to make his eyes sparkle. But is it? We can obviously pray as David did, for restoration, and God will indeed answer our prayers, perhaps by taking us to a cross at a place called Calvary. There His Son died for our sins, taking on the punishment that we deserved instead. And as we stare into His loving face, we feel “the things of earth [going] strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace”. We will find that our eyes are sparkling again, our spirits revived, perspectives restored, sins forgiven.

Dear Heavenly Father. Thank You that we can look forward with sparkling eyes, to a life with You for all eternity. We pray that those around us can see in our eyes a reflection of the Heavenly shores, twinkling in the distance. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Anguish In My Soul

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever? How long will you look the other way? How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart every day? How long will my enemy have the upper hand?”
Psalm 13:1-2 NLT

David starts the thirteenth Psalm with a lament concerning the “anguish in [his] soul”. It was almost as though he was outside of himself looking in and sees a condition in his soul that was causing him acute distress. So, in a semi-detached sort of way, he was able to write about his feelings and apportion the cause to God forgetting that he was there. He was in a place of discomfort, unease, stress and anxiety and he asked the question “How long?”. “How long” is this going to continue? Will it continue “forever“? And who was this enemy David was referring to anyway? A physical foe, armed and ready to end his life? Or were there gremlins in his head, causing his distress?

Have any of us pilgrims been in such a place a David was? Where the heavens seem impervious to our prayers? Where everything seems to be falling apart? Where we wake up depressed and tired, dreading the day ahead? And we cry out as David did – where are You God? Are we facing enemies, real or imagined, that always seem to put us down and who we seem unable and powerless to stop? 

Such conditions will also cause “anguish in [our] soul[s]”, as they did with David. Daily “sorrow in [our] heart[s]” speak of a continued battle with the causes of depression and anxiety, something which many never seem to overcome. The bottle of pills seems to be the only remedy for many and a drug-induced calm takes over lives. The anguish in our souls is a human condition that threatens to take us down an ever-deepening spiral that dulls our minds and takes away our potential for a spirit-filled life.

There was a prophet called Elijah who had made a stand against the prophets of Baal and won, but he too succumbed to “anguish in [his] soul”. Following threats against his life from Jezebel, the queen at that time, he ran away, as we read in 1 Kings 19:4, “Then he went on alone into the wilderness, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors who have already died””. After being refreshed with food and drink supplied by an angel, he journeyed to Mount Sinai, where God asked him “What are you doing here Elijah?”. He response in the next verse was, “Elijah replied, “I have zealously served the Lord God Almighty. But the people of Israel have broken their covenant with you, torn down your altars, and killed every one of your prophets. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me, too.”” (1 Kings 19:10). Was Elijah experiencing “anguish in [his] soul”? God answered with a miraculous demonstration of His power through wind, fire and an earthquake, and then came the “still small voice”.

God is always there for us. He was for David and He still is for us today. Like Elijah, it may take us forty days of journeying in dark places of sorrowful anguish. It may be that we are looking for the miraculous when all we need is that “still small voice”. But however we feel just now, God is right there beside us, reaching out to us through the self-imposed walls that we have hidden behind. We analyse our feelings but draw the wrong conclusions. The enemies we face are powerless before God and He lives within us. 1 John 4:4, “But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world”. So today we take down the walls and stride into the day, assured of God’s presence within us through His Spirit. 

Dear Father God. By Your Spirit we are overcomers – please help us never to forget that. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Foul Talk

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“My enemies cannot speak a truthful word. Their deepest desire is to destroy others. Their talk is foul, like the stench from an open grave. Their tongues are filled with flattery. O God, declare them guilty. Let them be caught in their own traps. Drive them away because of their many sins, for they have rebelled against you.”
Psalm 5:9-10 NLT

The smell that emanates from a rotting corpse is disgusting, and it is just as well that bodies are buried today in a box or cremated and not left to decompose where there are people. However, in his day David was obviously aware of such a smell and he compared it to the “foul talk” that comes from the mouths of his enemies. But who are these enemies? There is nothing to say that they are foreign forces or nations on Israel’s borders. David’s enemies are probably those within Israel who don’t like the way he rules the country. You will always find a group of people, usually a minority, who think that the only important thing in life is their own particular ideology and anyone who disagrees with them, especially the governing authorities, then become an “enemy” of the state. Or there may have been a political party who disagreed with David and were intent on stirring up trouble in the hope that a new government could be formed, more sympathetic to their politics. And in David’s days, as in our modern societies, truth becomes a scarce commodity. But David wasn’t fazed by such people. He knew what they were about, their lies, their flattery, their plotting and scheming. If only, he thought, God would get rid of them, and then he would’t have to put up with them.

But David somehow associated what came out of their mouths with the “stench from an open grave”. The Apostle James had another view of “foul talk” In James 3:5-6, we read, “ ... the tongue is a small thing that makes grand speeches. But a tiny spark can set a great forest on fire. And among all the parts of the body, the tongue is a flame of fire. It is a whole world of wickedness, corrupting your entire body. It can set your whole life on fire, for it is set on fire by hell itself.” In David’s day, in James’ day and even in our 21st Century societies, what comes out of the mouths of human beings can, and often will, be “foul”. Jesus put His finger on the problem in Matthew 15:18-19, “But the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander“. The tongue is just a tool that expresses what is happening inside someone’s head, because it is here that the “foul talk” originates.

“Foul talk” has no place in a pilgrim’s life, and the Apostle Paul wrote about the remedy in Ephesians 4:21-23, “Since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes.” Our minds, soaked and renewed in the power of the Holy Spirit, will find it more and more difficult to generate the lying thoughts that irritate the nostrils of those around us. Instead, truth will emanate graciously from our lips, pleasing our wonderful Heavenly Father.

Dear Father God. We pray David’s prayer in Psalm 19 before You today, “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.” Amen.