God on our side!

The Waters are divided James Tissot

A song of ascents. Of David.

Psalm 124

¹ If the Lord had not been on our side—
    let Israel say—
² if the Lord had not been on our side
    when people attacked us,
³ they would have swallowed us alive
    when their anger flared against us;
⁴ the flood would have engulfed us,
    the torrent would have swept over us,
⁵ the raging waters
    would have swept us away.

⁶ Praise be to the Lord,
    who has not let us be torn by their teeth.
⁷ We have escaped like a bird
    from the fowler’s snare;
the snare has been broken,
    and we have escaped.
⁸ Our help is in the name of the Lord,
    the Maker of heaven and earth. N.I.V

One thing the faithful Christian is to prove in the midst of suffering and trial is that God is a very present help in time of trouble (Psalm 46 :1).

To suffer as an individual is one matter but to surrounded by sufferers and empathising with them as well multiplies the effects upon ourselves.

It is in times like these when Believers are involved in the common lot of fear and the temptation to panic that we should be able to stand out as hopeful and give a reason for that hope.

Christians are subject to all the human frailties that surface when fear and panic are rife in difficult circumstances. That we are not always what we should be as believers makes our ‘witness’ less effective to those around us.

Jesus told us that in the World we would have tribulation but instead of preparing ourselves for it with storing our spiritual ‘larders’ with truth and grace we feather our beds and take our ease.

To those who understand something of the sufferings of the Apostles and those throughout the history of the Church it is astounding and humbling to realise that the unexpected fruit borne in it was joy.

To rejoice in trouble and pain is completely opposed to the common experience of humanity. Even the Christian finds the conception nigh impossible to grasp except as an article of faith, hoping we need never prove it in reality.

Nevertheless, we all come to the point like the foolish and wise virgins we resort to our store of spiritual oil, if we have any.

While we would all wish for the quiet trust that the great Saints often exhibit when worse comes to worst we may find that the experience of Job is closer to the truth.

However, the way it pans out the root of the matter is that God hears us and while he permits trials and tribulations to come upon his people He is not deaf to their cries and is ever and always their deliverer!

Our faith may be the ‘weak link’ at times, but it is its reality and the One in whom it is placed that matters most. Christ upbraided the disciples with their lack of faith after the storm, but this was after He had calmed the waves and brought them safe home.

We may not always ‘feel’ as if God is with us and think we have been deserted. Indeed, we can almost count all the reasons why God could leave us to our ‘just deserts’. May be if we had kept a clearer conscience this would not happen as much to the Christian, but again God is knows those who are His. It is not to his glory to desert those whom Christ has purchased with His’ blood.

Bush Tucker!

I have been reacquainting myself with a series from the eighties called ‘The Bush Tucker Man’! While travelling through parts of the country that I may never see he shows foods that grow in what are otherwise, to Western eyes inhospitable.

He shows that among the native foods that long sustained the indigenous people there are some far healthier than what are generally eaten by most of us today.

Kakadu plum: It contains 3000mg of vitamin C per 100g of fruit – over 50 times the concentration found in oranges.

The difficulty is to find it available in the appropriate season and time of year and it is often necessary to do as the locals did and act as ‘hunter-gatherers’.

Foodstuffs if left uneaten go rotten and mouldy, they do not keep for long periods and in the days before refrigeration it was necessary to salt and smoke meats to make them last longer. Fruits were made into preserves and jams etc. but many things had to be eaten as soon as possible to avoid spoilage.

Modern man has gone a step further in adding processing and preservatives to food to extend its ‘shelf life’ Whether this is the ideal way of doing things is best answered by the health and diet statistics.

27They all wait for You

To give them their food in due season.

28You give to them, they gather it up;

You open Your hand, they are satisfied with good. Psalm 104

What is true in the physical world has its similarities in spiritual things.

God has a great store of blessings to meet His’ people’s need but He does not give it to them all at once and for what he gives it is usually required of us to gather it and ruminate on it. The children of Israel gathering the Manna in the wilderness is a picture of the daily life of the believer. Many Christians treat God like the fabled ‘cornucopia’, requiring little more of them but to put it in their mouth. The manna came day by day but the Israelites went and gathered it and then took it to their tents and prepared it.

It is true to say that the things of God seldom fall into our laps rather they are to be diligently sought considered and appreciated.

The depressed state of Christianity at the moment may be because God is indeed giving us all we need for our life and service, but we are dilatory in gathering what he has given.