-- Psalm 91: 1-10 --
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust.
Surely He will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence.
He will cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you will find refuge;
His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plagues that destroys at midday.
A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.
If you make the Most High your dwelling - even the Lord who is my refuge - then
no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent.
The story of Jim Elliot (an American missionary to the Waodani tribe in the Ecuadorian Amazon) has always struck me as an incredible story of the power of what God can accomplish in the light of what seem to be impossible situations, however today I learned a little more about the story that proves that God works deeper than we know.
In the 1950's, Jim Elliot, his wife Elizabeth, and 5 other men and their wives made the choice to try to contact a tribe that had never been reached before (and was known to be hostile) and share the Gospel with them. Jim and the 5 other missionaries had been flying over the tribe's territory and dropping supplies and gifts for some time. After an initial successful contact, one Sunday afternoon they decided it was time to return to the territory. As they arrived on the banks of the Curaray River, the tribe men came running up with spears, and ended up spearing all 5 of the men to death. Their wives never got a radio signal back that day. Later though, Elizabeth Elliot and another one of the missionaries wives decided to continue trying to make friendly contact, and eventually led many of the tribe to the Lord. Mincaye, the Waodani who speared Jim Elliot to death, came to Christ by these woman, and is now a missionary himself. (If you haven't watched End of the Spear, look it up on Netflix because it tells the story way better than I do.) Apart from the incredulity of what these missionaries went through to share the love of Christ to these people, pastor Matt Heard of Woodmen Valley Chapel shared in his sermon today that he had gone to visit the Waodani a couple of years ago. After giving him the hilarious nickname of Giant Red Match (he's a redhead hahaha), Mincaye told him that although "our spears went through those missionaries that day, our evil ricocheted - it could not penetrate them. Jesus protected them from our evil."
The pastor's point in telling us that story was that, according to Psalm 91, even though we may suffer physical harm, the covering of God's refuge and presence goes way deeper. Though those 5 missionaries were murdered, God was with them. It is tempting to believe sometimes that when we experience physical suffering or want on this earth that God has forgotten us; but God says our reward is in heaven. Seeing as everything, good and bad, in this world is passing, this makes a whole lot of sense eternally. Why would a good God reward us with things that are just going to rot away? Instead, he promises us that we are the heirs of his kingdom, which will never pass away. After all, 2 Corinthians 4;18 says "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."
The second point of his sermon was that to receive this covering of God's protection and blessing and find rest, we must choose to dwell in God's presence.
God's promise to be with us when we accept his forgiveness and grace is irrevocable, undilutable, and unchangeable. I think a lot of times we don't exactly get this. At least I know I don't. When you think about it though, this promise is profoundly fundamental to our lives as Christians. Over the past few months I have been thinking a lot about the fact that "the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is the same Spirit who lives in us and is at work in us." Do we truly believe this? If we don't, then what is our hope even in? And if we do, are we truly living it? What the heck does it even mean to live this out on a daily basis? Hearing this story about Jim Elliot and the Waodani, I couldn't help but to be challenged on this question. It is so gosh dang easy to get tied up in measuring our lives by our resumes, accomplishments, acceptance from other people, and outward appearances, but ultimately when we look back on those things we have strived so hard for, we are never fully satisfied. And we never will be, because those things were never meant to satisfy us fully. I can't help but feel this aching need for something more. Something bigger, something deeper, something more adventurous, spontaneous. To escape the monotonous pursuit of routine and LIVE. Can you deny that you too have this feeling?
The only answer I have come up with so far to the question of how to live this out daily, is: by the grace of God. The tough thing about this is knowing how to allow God to teach us how to live in his strength in pursuing More. I often find myself getting intermittent bursts of energy and motivation to "get out there and do epic things", but ultimately my willpower and strength peter out and I am back at square one. I think God has figured out by now that we are easily swayed and suck at being obedient all the time, and He gets it. He doesn't require that we don't fall, He just requires that we allow Him to pick us back up when we do. So my prayer this season is that I would experience more, but by his strength. That I would see him do phenomenal things in my life and the lives around me, but all to his glory. That I would comprehend how to surrender to Him and how to love deeper and experience more people in my daily life coming to Christ, being healed, experiencing joy, dreaming big, living big, adventuring big, going deeper, finding love; but so evidently by the grace of God that I can't help but look back when I reach the end of my life and see that the moments I was the weakest but looked to Him were the moments He accomplished the most incredible things.
The same God who raised Jesus from the dead and who worked through great Christians like Jim Elliot is the same God who came to live with us when we accepted Him as savior in our lives. And according to his irrevocable promise not to leave us, we have his spirit living in us until we enter heaven and into the fullness of his presence and are made new. So if God is already in us, are we choosing to dwell in his presence? And are we living life adventurously by His strength so He can do incredible things on this earth? Because, "greater is He who is in you, than he who is in the world." (1 John 4:4)
