May my cry come before you, Lord; give me understanding according to your word. Psalm 119:169
Going out the front door to get the mail, I caught swift movement in my peripheral vision. Turning my head, I saw about a 4’ black snake ‘hi-tailing it’ in the opposite direction. I smiled, but didn’t stop my mission, as there was no need! When I returned from the mailbox, he was long gone. I looked for him, but saw no trace. It is the way things are SUPPOSED to be!
I am not afraid of snakes. The sight of it caused no surprise or fear in me because I have LEARNED some things over the years. ‘Learning’ requires taking the effort and time to study, absorb, test and verify information. My years of experience had verified that snakes in the wild do not like people! When a snake is surprised by a human, its first reaction is to flee. If too close… then it will bite! And that is how it is SUPPOSED to be.
The 119th Psalm is 176 verses long and is written around only 1 subject… God’s Word, the Bible! Like the A,B,C song, each section starts with a letter from the Hebrew alphabet, presumably for the same reason we use the process to teach our kids. It makes it easier to remember. We are encouraged to REMEMBER ‘IT’ because ‘IT,’ God’s Word, is VALUABLE!
If you surf this Psalm you will find LOTS of trouble and problems. Side by side, interlaced with the author’s search for comfort, you will see words like wickedness, sin, persecution, fear, falsehood, hate, deceitfulness and… well you get the picture. It deals with the realities of life. Like snakes on my front patio, our mingling is inevitable. But FEAR is optional!
I have grown to despise even the THOUGHT of predestination! That ‘everything happens to me for a reason’ and is dictated by God is a Buddhist teaching… NOT a Christian one. Life and the things that happen in it are fluid. God, being God, can use anything that comes my way for my benefit or growth… even the bad stuff. So regardless from where things come, they can be a tool in God’s hand for our mutual good (Romans 8:28). That means God is even MORE awesome than the idea of His being a dictator of all life events.
It is a blessing to know that all the bad stuff that flows into my life, when placed against the backdrop of God’s Word, will have the natural reaction to flee or be temporary! But I can only SEE that when I KNOW that! Do you know God’s Word? Are you reading and learning it? God’s Truth, when learned, drives evil away naturally! He doesn’t even have to say ‘Scoot!’ And THAT is how it is SUPPOSED to be.
