The Lord is my strength and shield; in Him, my heart trusts, and I am helped; my heart exults, and with my song, I give thanks to Him.
Psalm 28:7
Well, this morning I woke up to pouring rain and a very chilly outside temperature. And when I say pouring, I mean pouring. This second day of the semi-quarantine is another day to decide how I’m going to deal with the threats of illness and the challenges of being a pastor.
I have a son in Orlando who is safe but waiting on Disney to make some decisions. I have friends who are in the middle of job crises issues already. At this point I have to choose how I’m going to live with this virus threat. What am I going to do. What will be my response?
The exciting thing about the Psalms is that they are so practical and written out of dramatic personal experiences. When you read them you can feel the emotion, the pain, and the excitement. This prayer is a response to answered prayer. So it should encourage us to trust the Lord with our prayers.
The Lord is our Help and Shield
The Lord is our strength and shield. What a great promise. When our strength is small, His strength is perfect and powerful. I imagine that is a difficult thing to understand, but I remember seeing a father pushing his son in a cart in a marathon across the finish line.
His son’s strength was nothing, and his father’s strength was everything. That’s the way it is. The Lord is not only our strength but our shield. He protects us. He shields us from danger and harm.
The Lord Receives our Trust
“What a friend we have in Jesus. All our sins and griefs to bear.” That’s what we do. We have the great privilege to love, serve, and TRUST God with everything. Even the virus that surrounds and captures so many countries and people is not as strong as our Lord. We trust Him in every situation. Even in the day 2 of our semi-quarantine.
The Lord Responds by helping
He helps. That’s it. That’s really what we need. He helps. When we cry out to the Lord He helps us. We trust Him and He helps us. Is it that easy? Yes. It is that easy. Will there be difficult times ahead?
Certainly. Are there going to be times we feel like giving up? Absolutely. But Trusting God because He helps us is something we can do that will help our frame of mind and the way we approach life and others.
The Lord Receives our Worship
Our hearts should respond with rejoicing! We should be incredibly excited about who the Lord is and what He is doing for us. How do we do this in the middle of a worldwide pandemic? We trust what He says in Scripture. We lay behind the shield He set for us. Then we sing songs of thanks to Him.
I know some of you would say that you don’t sing. But at this time you might want to give it a try. Make sure no one is around, turn the worship music up loud, and worship the Lord. Thank Him. Love Him. Bow before Him.
A prayer…
Lord, I’m worried, scared, apprehensive, and not sure what is going to happen over the next months. The only place I can turn is to You. So, Lord, I turn to you. I turn to you to help me with my worry and apprehension. Will you please help me as I have so many things capturing my attention and causing my mind to wander to places that are causing me harm. Lord, I trust you, my heart rejoices in Your care for my family and me, and I praise You. Thank you, Lord, for helping me, and I love you so much.