David's Cry: Part 5

David on the throne . . . a king who served The King!

Part 5 of 5 in a series on David’s cry to God in Psalm 89:26, “You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.”
The risk of error in our walk with God, or in our sharing of God, is great if we do not have a full picture of God. I touched on this in Part 1, showing how if we only know God as grace, or if we only know Him as King and Lord, we can react too far in one direction or another and miss the fulness of who He is, and our relationship with Him.

Of course, we will never fully grasp who He is, or the magnificent depth of our relationship with Him, but David’s cry to God gives us a very good starting place to begin to see the full picture of who He is and our relationship with Him. It makes sense to study how David saw God because David was, by God’s own praise, a man after God’s own heart.

So, if we take each of the three separate aspects of God David expresses in this cry, as we did in parts 2–4, we start to see how:

1) Each one describes a part of God
2) Each one magnifies and gives detail to the others
3) Each one helps us understand our relationship with God
4) Each one is accurate . . . but not complete

What kind of God is God? He is a God who is our Father, and a God who loves us so much He died in our place to become the Rock of our Salvation!

What kind of a Father is He? He is one who is God—holy and mighty and ferocious and worthy of our awe and worship and obedience . . . and He is one who dies for His children, who lays His life down for His own.

What kind of relationship does He save us into? One with a Father to a child. And what kind of a Father is He? He is a perfect Father who is perfectly capable and perfectly love . . . He is God.

Back and forth we could go, showing how each one magnifies and clarifies the other, and gives us the balance. Each one pulls the other toward the center, full picture of God. If we understand each one it will keep us from taking any one of them too far in a direction it shouldn’t go. It is truly and amazing and succinct cry from David to God . . . one that, when meditated upon, opens our eyes in new ways.

Back and forth, each aspect helps flush out both the full picture, and the other parts of it . . .

. . . and that is the balance of how we are to walk out this Kingdom life, declaring and representing and carrying the reign and rule of God, who is supreme, our Father, who loves us and has relationship with us, and our Rock solid Savior, who makes us secure and confident and filled with authority as we go in His name.

I hope that you have enjoyed, and been blessed by, this series. I know that it has been a blessing to me. I’d love to hear your thoughts and reflections.

Erick

David's Cry: Part 4

David finishes off Goliath, showing to all the power of the living God of Israel!

Part 4 in a series of 5 on David’s cry to the Lord in Psalm 89:26, “You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.”

My Father, my God . . . and the Rock of my Salvation! Wow, that last one is as laden with meaning and implications as the first two, and it gives tremendous completion to the picture of God, and our relationship with Him, that we see in this three-fold cry of David.

Salvation—to recognize this about God is to recognize that we need to be saved—that there is something to be saved from, and that we are not in a good place until we are. It is to realize that there is a chasm between us and God.

To recognize that HE is the Rock of our Salvation is to recognize that we can’t save ourself, and that there is nothing we can do of our own to present ourselves acceptable before Him. That recognition brings tremendous humility, and grace toward others who are just as flawed as we are.

Ultimately this recognition leads us to the cross where Jesus paid for our sins with His own life, and where God poured His wrath at sin upon His own Son in our place, satisfying His justice, so we might be united with Him forever through faith in that as enough for us.

United with Him in what kind of a relationship, though? If you only know Him as Savior you might not know how to relate to Him. But, that isn’t all we know Him as through David’s cry. What kind of relationship does He save us into? One with our God, who is our Father.

To meditate on God as the Rock of our Salvation reminds us that His salvation was a gift of His love, not earned of our performance, given when we were completely cut off and rebellious from Him. The implication of this is huge and the most freeing one we can have—if we didn’t earn that salvation, if it was a gift of His love, and He never changes, then we can’t lose it by messing up—it was a gift, not earned. If we’d “earned” it by our performance or religious duty—if we’d "saved ourself"—can you imagine the pressure and fear we would be under needing to continue to perform lest we mess up and lose our salvation? But, if we understand, as David did, that He saved us from His unchanging love for us, we understand the freedom and joy of that gift of salvation . . .

. . . and the realization of this brings us to a place of such gratitude to Him that we find our heart burning with love for Him and a desire to serve Him and give back to Him a fraction of what He has given us.

He is the ROCK of our Salvation—there is no more secure and firm word than that. In faith in Jesus as our Savior there is complete safety and security, and that is the rock we can confidently build our life upon and frame our joy and peace over.

David's Cry: Part 3

David, standing alone in faith in His God, slings the stone at Goliath.

Part 3 of 5 in a series on David’s cry to God in Psalm 89:26, "You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation."

If “Father” (see Part 2) is the only way we, as Christians, know to see, and relate to, God, we would have a partial picture of Him and our relationship with Him, but one that can lead us into error if we rely only on it as we can tend to ignore, grow casual to, or even walk away from a father. But, that isn’t the only aspect of God we see in David’s cry to Him—to this man after God’s own heart He is our Father, and our God!

According to Strongs this Hebrew word for God here means strength—as an adjective it is mighty, especially the Almighty.

God. Let that word roll around in your mouth and mind for a bit—God.

He is God. He breathes out stars and spreads the stars and galaxies out as a tent within which He dwells. He knits us together in our mother’s womb. He is holy—completely set apart from all evil or imperfection.

He is just, and He has wrath toward sin and evil. There is nothing that compares to Him, nothing we can compare Him to—He is indescribable, uncontainable, and nothing ranks above Him or even near Him.

He speaks and worlds are formed, and in His very word is the power of to bring it to life and to pass. He spans a universe, and yet knows our every thought and the number of hairs on our head. He strikes dead anywhere from 70 to 50,000 men of Beth-shemesh (depending on how you interpret the Hebrew and what translation you use—see 1 Samuel 6:19–20) for looking upon the ark of the covenant, causing the people of the village to cry out, “Who is able to stand before the Lord, this holy God?”

He is God—holy and pure and ferocious, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Alpha and the Omega, the One who descends upon the mountain in fire and smoke and a great dark cloud, and who causes the people of Israel to tremble in fear and to run from relationship with Him, preferring to let Moses do it.

He is God, and all this is true about Him, and He is worthy of our highest affection, our unashamed and unrestrained worship, our reverence, our service, our devotion, our deepest love. He is God, but . . .

. . . if that is all we know about Him we relate to Him only with fear, if we relate to Him at all. We do not draw close, but like Adam and Eve we hide from Him. If all we know of Him is as God, then we tremble and wait for His wrath to fall on us and to consume us in His holy fire.

But that isn’t all we know about Him, is it? What kind of a God is He? He is our Father. What kind of a Father is He? He is God. And thus, the picture starts to become a little more complete as we add another piece. This word “God,” like the word “Father,” is also worthy of hours and hours of our reflection and meditation upon, and as we do we will find that the word “Father” magnifies and gives detail to the word “God”, and the word “God” magnifies and gives detail to the word “Father.” Together they help us start to form an even more complete and accurate picture of both Him, and our relationship to Him, and it doesn’t end there. To David He is also the Rock of his salvation . . . and we will take a look at all of meaning and implications in that in Part 4.

Until then, may you find a renewed and awesome awakening to what it means to know Him as God. May you experience a deep and new realization of what He is like and what His glory and holiness are like. God bless you, and thanks for reading.

Erick

David's Cry: Part 2

David slaying a lion while protecting his father's sheep.

Part 2 of a 5 part series on Psalm 89:26   He shall cry to me, 'You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.'

Father . . . the word carries so much behind it. For many it is not a good word, bringing remembrance of maybe an absent father, an angry father, a father they were never good enough for, or . . . for others, like myself, it brings wonderful memories and associations to mind. But, whatever that word means to us in a human experience, when we consider a perfect father, we start to get a sense of how laden with meaning that word is when we identify it with God.

As a born again Christian, adopted through our faith in the work of Jesus in the cross as our salvation, we have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us and we are adopted by God as His own children. 1 John 3:1 says, “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

We see the remarkable (actually stunning!) complete work of Jesus in our place—a work that gives us our adoption, and His righteousness and acceptance and standing before the Father—when we see that Jesus’ very own words of relationship with the Father becomes ours in our adoption. Mark 14:36 records Jesus addressing the Father:   And he said, "Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. . . ." Then, Romans 8:14–17a (see, also, Galatians 4:4–7) says of us:  For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, "Abba! Father!"  The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ . . . .

Isn’t it stunning that Jesus relates to the Father with the same expression of love and relationship, “Abba, Father,” that we are given to relate to the Father with? That should give us such absolute, mind-rocking, comfort and assurance about how accepted we are by Him as His children.

Father—first, the word implies origin. If He is our Father we are from Him, and like Him, and that realization gives us great insight into the worth that we have, the value of each and every one of us. It also destroys the lie that our origin lies in a ancient pool of muck.

Then, the word “Father” implies we have a relationship with God and that He is not just some distant “force” or “it” or “person.” It implies we have relationship, and it gives form to that relationship—Father to child.

A father provides, protects, leads, counsels, corrects, and upholds his children. He is present in his children’s life and watches over them and guides them. David’s cry to God says that God is his Father, and He is ours as well as a Christian. It is an amazing, loaded, incredible word to describe God, and our relationship with God. It is a word, and a relationship, worthy of hours upon hours of our meditation and reflection on. But . . .

. . . if “Father” is the only way we know to relate to God then we run risks, because for many people there comes a time when they believe a father either “doesn’t know as much as them,” or that he is their equal. Or, there comes a time when he is taken for granted, or is seen with condescension, or is rebelled against without fear, or is not respected, or is broken away from to form one’s own life. So, if we know God only as Father, then we have a danger, and an incomplete picture of Him and our relationship with Him . . . but, that isn’t the only aspect of God we see in David’s cry to Him—to this man after God’s own heart He is our Father, and our God, and that is what we will look at in Part 3.

May the word “Father” excite in you, today, a wonderful new, or renewed, sense of His love for you and your relationship with Him.

Erick

David's Cry: Part 1

King David leaps and dances before the Ark of the Lord.

I would like to share, probably in five parts, some of what I shared with our youth group last week, and our fellowship on Sunday, about the need for proper balance and perspective in our view of God and His relationship with us. (See the note below about listening to it if you are interested.)

Proper balance and perspective in our view of God is, I believe, imperative if we are to walk out our unique place as His children, soldiers, and ambassadors in these days in which the Kingdom (or reign, or rule, or dominion) of God is breaking in around us, over us, and through us . . . but is clearly still not here in fullness, and won’t be until He comes back. Until it does, we are called to carry this good news of the Kingdom, to walk in its power, to share in His joy and the freedom of our salvation, and to bear His image, as citizens of one Kingdom in, and at war with, another.

Without proper perspective and balance in our view of God and our relationship with Him we can fall in to error and be crippled in our walk. If, for example, all we know is God’s grace, then we run the risk of taking that grace for granted, or not having reverence for God, and becoming like those Paul had to address who ended up using that grace and forgiveness as a license to sin. On the other hand, if all we know is His Kingship and Lordship and His holy attributes as God, we run the risk of living in fear of Him, feeling we need to always perform for Him, and maybe never feeling like we are safe with Him. We might, even, run from Him and not recognize the relationship with Him that is possible.

It is crucial that we have a balanced and Biblical understanding of God and our relationship with Him. To illustrate that to the youth, I had them break in to five groups and each describe a different aspect of the building we were in where our fellowship meets. One group described the outside, one the inside, one the activities that went on there, one how they felt there, and one the people who met and led there. I then showed them how any one or two or even three of those gave a partial picture and feel and sense of the building and what it embodied to someone who hadn’t seen it before, but it was only in the bringing together of all five that we got a true and full picture of the building and fellowship and what it meant.

Likewise, if we only know one aspect, or maybe two, of God then we have a partial, but not a full picture of Him and our relationship with Him. Granted we will never fully grasp God, but there is a verse which, I believe, captures the major essence of Him and our relationship with Him. It comes from David, a man after God’s own heart. With such a compliment given to him by God—one we would probably all love to have God attribute to us—I believe it bears studying how David saw God and related to God. The passage I refer to is from Psalm 89. Verse 20 makes it clear God is talking about David, and in verse 26 the Lord says of David, “"He shall cry to me, 'You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.' ' "

There is, in that one line, a beautiful and balanced picture of God and our relationship with Him, from a man after God’s own heart. My plan is to break each part of it down over the next three posts, and then to wrap it all together in a last one. I hope you enjoy it, and are blessed by it.

May you be deeply aware, today, of His love for you and nearness to you.
Erick

Note: If you would like to hear the teaching I gave on this whole subject, which will have, by far, more detail than this blog series, it should be up in a few days on our fellowship’s web page. You can click on the “About Me” link above, and scroll down to the link “Some Recent Teachings I Have Given (mp3)”. It will be called, “Kingdom of Heaven 15" and dated May 22, 2011.