When I Need Someone to Defend Me

Can you imagine a life where everything always went your way?  A life where no one ever took advantage of you, said bad things about you or made you look bad. A life where circumstances were always in your favor and happiness never faded. Where there was always enough money, always enough love and never a misunderstanding or miscommunication.

Just imagine if everything was always fair. Wouldn’t that be great? No sorrow, no grief, no sadness, no worry, no anxiety, no disappointment, no frustration, no anger, …. What a great picture it paints. A Utopian life.  Life all good, all the time. Wouldn’t that be a great life? Isn’t that what we want? Don’t we all want to just be in a good place where troubles cease to exist?

I must admit, if I look at my motivations, I do. I want to stop the struggle, leave the valleys of life behind and live on the peak of the mountain.  Even though I know that life is impossible while still here on earth, I still crave it. And while I’m admitting to things, my greatest struggle comes when I can no longer fight my own battles.  When I feel unfairly judged, I have words to say.  When health issues present themselves, I gear up and prepare to fight. When finances slow, my first instinct is job searching.

I know how to get back up and fight when you’ve been knocked down.  I’m a professional at starting over from scratch.  I know what it takes to reinvent myself.  My survival skills are honed from years of practice.  What I do not do well is stand down.  To me when life beats you up, you fight back.  You don’t just stand there and take it, waiting for someone to come to your rescue.  When you have defended yourself all your life with no rescuer in sight, being a damsel in distress isn’t your natural condition.

When God says, “let me defend you”, it takes everything in me not to take matters into my own hands.  To not act is the hardest thing for me to do.

Recently, our family experienced a number of unfair blows.  One of those circumstances is completely out of my control. I couldn’t act if I wanted to. My sons heart condition isn’t curable with out a miracle from God.  I can not act in some way, pay someone or take him to see someone that will solve the issue.  I must trust God with the situation.  The other situations center around the actions of others.  I can’t control other people and their actions.  But their actions and the circumstances it has caused for our family make the ugliness inside me rise up.  I have to fight the urge to defend myself and our family.  I have to fight the urge to allow my anger to rise up and cloud my judgement.  So I turn to scripture to curb my urges, to calm the anger and sooth my soul.

Psalm 18: 1-19 is where I go.

How I love you, Lord! You are my defender. The Lord is my protector; he is my strong fortress. My God is my protection, and with him I am safe. He protects me like a shield; he defends me and keeps me safe. I call to the Lord, and he saves me from my enemies. Praise the Lord!

The danger of death was all around me; the waves of destruction rolled over me. The danger of death was around me, and the grave set its trap for me. In my trouble I called to the Lord; I called to my God for help. In his temple he heard my voice; he listened to my cry for help.

Then the earth trembled and shook, the foundations of the mountain rocked and quivered, because God was angry. Smoke poured out of his nostrils, a consuming flame and burning coals from his mouth. He tore the sky open and came down with a dark cloud under his feet. He flew swiftly on his winged creature; he traveled on the wings of the wind. He covered himself with darkness; thick clouds, full of water, surrounded him. Hailstones and flashes of fire came from the lightening before him and broke through the dark clouds. Then the Lord thundered from the sky; and the voice of the Most High was heard. He shot his arrows and scattered his enemies; with flashes of lightening he sent them running. The floor of the ocean was laid bare, and the foundations of the earth were uncovered, when you rebuked your enemies, Lord, and roared at them in anger. 

The Lord reached down from above and took hold of me; he pulled me out of the deep waters. He rescued me from my powerful enemies and from all those who hate me – they were too strong for me. When I was in trouble, they attacked me, but the Lord protected me. He helped me out of danger; he saved me because he was pleased with me. 

Here is what I see when I read these words.  Our great God protects us like a loving Father protect his child. Our Father God is angered when his daughters and sons are in pain and feel harmed. He comes to our rescue, he takes no prisoners, because he loves us.  Then when he has dealt with our enemies, he reaches down into us for our bruised and broken souls to mend them.

This Psalm paints a picture of a love so great by a God that cares with everything he is.  He is our great rescuer even when we don’t consider ourselves to be a damsel in distress. When we feel we need to defend ourselves, we don’t, he will do it for us. We are not required to take on the world, he will do it for us.

The deep waters are not to deep for God to reach us no matter how big our enemies might be.