LEARNING DAILY

 

1 Samuel 30:6, Now David was greatly distressed, for all the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the Lord his God.

 

David was in many difficult situations while being chased by Saul. In the situation above David and his men came back from a campaign against the Philistines to find the Amalekites had burned their settlement at Ziklag and taken captive all the women and children. At this point, those who were with David grumbled and blamed him for their family’s captivity.

 

When life is difficult or tragedy happens, it is easy to allow discouragement to grow in our life mind and heart. It becomes easy to look for someone to blame for the situation being faced. In sports, when a team is not winning, the head coach gets blamed and is fired. In business, the store manager is fired for a poor bottom line. There are many examples, but you get the idea. For the situation described above, David was the blamed and those with him considered stoning him. I wonder what that would have solved!

 

Be sure that you do not miss that David was “greatly distressed” because his two wives had also been taken. He was grieving just like those with him; he must have felt terribly alone. He, along with his mighty warriors, “lifted their voices and wept, until they had no more power to weep”. And then, they discussed amongst themselves about blaming David and stoning him. David not only wept for his family, he had this to deal with.

 

Have you been in David’s situation, rejected and feeling alone to face your difficulty? Have you been in that place where you have started to think you are the only one who has faced being blamed for the problem or faced being fired because of negative results? Or are you just going through a difficult situation? Can I tell you as one who has faced situations like this, that there is always hope and that God’s grace is always sufficient to take care of you and the situation you face. It is situations like David faced, the hopelessness of his situation, that show you to not trust in yourself but to trust in the Lord alone.

 

“But David strengthened himself in the Lord his God.” All of us who walk the narrow way to eternal life in God’s kingdom need to come to the realization in difficult times, times of uncertainty, and times of tragedy, we must turn to the Lord for His guidance, His strength, His joy and His peace. We must be in the habit of worshipping Him not only when all things are good, but in those times when struggle. Worship is an act of the will and not just when people, especially God’s people, feel like it! To “strengthen himself” implies David was consistent and continual in his pursuit of God.

 

Getting out of his despair was not something that would just happen; no, David needed to be diligent in “strengthening himself in the Lord his God”. David knew God personally. To David God was not just the God of Israel, God was David’s personal God. That is extremely important in all of this. One can know about God but not know Him. Just attending a church or using religious words does not make one know God. David had learned to trust God through experiences in his life and always turned to Him in every situation and when forgiveness was needed. Today, we come to know Him through the forgiveness offered by Jesus Christ, through repentance. Then, we learn to trust Him and are strengthened by Him in every situation we face. We submit to Him because we know He loves us and desires the very best for us.

 

Will you surrender to Him today and be strengthened by Him in your situation? There is no other way when we face despair, discouragement and tragedy. Let Jesus carry your burden today and tomorrow and the next day!