Fly Away

Clergy/Leaders’ Mail-list No. 1-061 Sunday 25 Mar 2001

Reading: PSALM 55 – ON THE WINGS OF A DOVE – I’LL FLY AWAY

(From ‘Encounter with God’ Bible Reading Notes)

Is God your refuge and strength? Reiterate your trust in him as you come into his presence.

This is another psalm inspired by the need of its writer. Troubled by his thoughts, by the enemy, by fear, and above all by the betrayal of a friend, his response is to say, ‘Cast your cares on the Lord’ (v 22).

This is good counsel, though it is easier said than done. What is it to throw our troubles on the Lord’s shoulders?

We shall need to begin with the understanding that God knows and cares about our individual circumstances, although we have to learn that he is concerned with our greatest good, and this does not always match our idea of it!

If we are surrounded by enemies we are most likely to wish with all our hearts that they would go away, but God may need us to meet them in battle and know the confidence that comes only through victory. He may even need us to learn humility through losing some battles. If our enemies are around us and we have asked God to deal with them, yet they still seem to flourish, then it will be faith which declares that God is still in control and will one day bring about justice for all. If he has not done so yet, then he must have his reasons.

I read recently of a Christian in Sierra Leone who, having witnessed at first-hand some of the atrocities of the war in that suffering country, said, ‘I realise that the only security we have is God’. (IFES ‘Special Report’, 1999) There is no guarantee that Christians will be protected from danger, though they may be. But we have the promise of God himself that we shall one day be raised in fullness and newness of life. The challenge is to live in the present with the final hope held clear.

In the fear, the cancer, the storms and the heartbreaks of this world, our God is real, and his power is as great as his love. Why not reaffirm today the last words of this psalm: ‘I trust you’?

– Ken Edgecombe

Copyright Scripture Union, 2001