Timing

Have you ever felt like you are drowning in life?  I have. That horrible feeling of life caving in around you, a million bad things swarm around you, satan whispers lies in your head and it just seems like you are never going to be able to come up for air. It feels like this horrible weight pulling you down with no hope for escape. I am not feeling that way right now, but I know that there have been times when life just seems like it's too much. It's too hard to keep treading water, too hard to keep your head up and fight.

David felt that way too, and if anyone had a reason to be overwhelmed, it was David. At various times in his life he was being chased and hunted. I think many times when we tell the story of David we skip right from little Davey killing Goliath to David being king, and forget that he was on the run for most of his life in between that. What I love about the Psalms is that they really show the internal thoughts of David in a way that you don't get to see with many of the other people in the Bible. David spends a lot of time telling us, and God, how he feels, and it's not always pretty.

I read Psalm 69 today and the first few verses say this:
1 Save me, O God!
    For the waters have come up to my neck.
² I sink in deep mire,
    where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
    and the flood sweeps over me.
³ I am weary with my crying out;
    my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
    with waiting for my God.

He goes on to say that his enemies are getting the best of him and it is really frustrating. His enemies are pursuing him because of his zeal for the Lord and he is just about done with all of this nonsense. 

Then in verse 13 he says something incredible:

But as for me, my prayer is to you, O LORD. At an acceptable time, O God, in the abundance of your steadfast love answer me in your saving faithfulness.

Even in the midst of this horrible feeling of drowning, He trust's in God's timing. He knows that he is praying to the Sovereign Lord, who has the right, wisdom and power to do WHATEVER he wants to David, and this His timing is absolutely perfect.

This was convicting to me, because I don;t always pray like that. I get so consumed with worry about the future, about what is going to happen when, that I fail to see the Sovereignty of God in all things.

In his book, Finally Alive: What Happens When we are Born Again? John Piper says,  “My feelings are not God. God is God. My feelings do not define truth. God’s word defines truth. My feelings are echoes and responses to what my mind perceives. And sometimes - many times - my feelings are out of sync with the truth. When that happens - and it happens every day in some measure - I try not to bend the truth to justify my imperfect feelings, but rather, I plead with God: Purify my perceptions of your truth and transform my feelings so that they are in sync with the truth.”


David didn't let his feeling of drowning change his perception of God's sovereignty. He knew that above all else, God's timing is perfect. He didn't bend truth to justify his feelings. My prayer is that when confronted with those very feelings, I will trust in the sovereignty and greatness of God, and not in what my feelings tell me is truth.