Lord, I cry out to You. I say, "You are my protection! You are all I want in this life." Listen to my cry because I am helpless. Save me from those who are chasing me. Free me from my prison and then I will praise Your name. Then good people will surround me because You have taken care of me. (Verses 5-7)
I guess one good thing about being deep in a cave was that David could holler and not be heard. Cry out to God his torment and scream his need without worrying about who might hear it, other than God. I think what David is yelling is important. It's not self-talk. "God is my protection. He's all I need." No! It's an in-your-face declaration of absolute love and affirmation that his God is all he wants. When life is pared down to only the essentials, is that the cry of my heart? "God, You are all I want!"?
"I really want a pair of Guess jeans for Christmas," Vanessa begged when she was twelve. "If I get a pair of Guess jeans, my life will be complete." Yeah. She actually said that. Which is why Bill and I did without for a month or so to buy them for Christmas. We didn't have much money at the time. Our family had recently been through hell, though, with the arrest of my father and the death of my mother, so to be able to make Vanessa's life complete sounded like a great idea. I never understood the hype about Guess jeans. They are pretty much ordinary jeans with a triangle on the pocket. But Vanessa was ebullient when she opened them Christmas and her life was complete...for about a week. Longer than I expected, really. Our capacity to want seems insatiable.
I wanted not to hurt anymore. Not to feel the aching pain of the things that happened to our family. That want is a pit so deep there is no bottom. The potential to throw things into the depths of that darkness is without end. It's soul-burning, mind bending, body tormenting need. Too busy with life to acknowledge it properly and too angry at my heavenly Father to run there, you can imagine the torment my wanter put me through. The irony of what I discovered, though, is this: God is all I want...and need. Struggling to my cave after my crazy, in the darkness of solitude and in the retreat from the enemy of my soul, I found Him there. Waiting to deliver me from the original pain and from the consequent pain I'd dragged myself into. Nothing else mattered in that cave dwelling experience. I didn't want a new car, diamond rings, new relationships, a glass of wine, a trip to the Bahamas...no appetite for anything but the Presence of my Beloved.
When my father-in-law lay dying a couple of years ago, I was holding his hand and rubbing his forehead. He was getting farther and farther away. It was obvious. His breathing became shallow, the breath from his body trickling out in tiny puffs. Jesus close on the other side. Dad's family close on this side. And that was all there was. I have his watch. A jar of change he kept with a two dollar bill inside. The stuff of his life in his room. His hearing aids and false teeth. His bed and dresser. All his earthly possessions still here when he was there. And that was all that mattered. That he was there. With the One Who is all we should really ever want. Because what else is there that's eternal? That doesn't fill only a temporary need?
Maybe it takes a cave experience for us to examine the very core of ourselves to see if we really do love God. If, when it all comes down to our barest needs, our most precious desires, we find them wrapped up in the heart of God toward us. That in communion with Him, even if its origin is our fiercest desperation, we find the sweetest spot in our earthly lives. A preview of heaven and home. When we are stripped of all the former joys and sick of wanting what doesn't really satisfy, we are sated with the Presence of the One Who loved us first.
One thing have I asked of the Lord. That I will seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.
Psalm 27:4
I guess one good thing about being deep in a cave was that David could holler and not be heard. Cry out to God his torment and scream his need without worrying about who might hear it, other than God. I think what David is yelling is important. It's not self-talk. "God is my protection. He's all I need." No! It's an in-your-face declaration of absolute love and affirmation that his God is all he wants. When life is pared down to only the essentials, is that the cry of my heart? "God, You are all I want!"?
"I really want a pair of Guess jeans for Christmas," Vanessa begged when she was twelve. "If I get a pair of Guess jeans, my life will be complete." Yeah. She actually said that. Which is why Bill and I did without for a month or so to buy them for Christmas. We didn't have much money at the time. Our family had recently been through hell, though, with the arrest of my father and the death of my mother, so to be able to make Vanessa's life complete sounded like a great idea. I never understood the hype about Guess jeans. They are pretty much ordinary jeans with a triangle on the pocket. But Vanessa was ebullient when she opened them Christmas and her life was complete...for about a week. Longer than I expected, really. Our capacity to want seems insatiable.
I wanted not to hurt anymore. Not to feel the aching pain of the things that happened to our family. That want is a pit so deep there is no bottom. The potential to throw things into the depths of that darkness is without end. It's soul-burning, mind bending, body tormenting need. Too busy with life to acknowledge it properly and too angry at my heavenly Father to run there, you can imagine the torment my wanter put me through. The irony of what I discovered, though, is this: God is all I want...and need. Struggling to my cave after my crazy, in the darkness of solitude and in the retreat from the enemy of my soul, I found Him there. Waiting to deliver me from the original pain and from the consequent pain I'd dragged myself into. Nothing else mattered in that cave dwelling experience. I didn't want a new car, diamond rings, new relationships, a glass of wine, a trip to the Bahamas...no appetite for anything but the Presence of my Beloved.
When my father-in-law lay dying a couple of years ago, I was holding his hand and rubbing his forehead. He was getting farther and farther away. It was obvious. His breathing became shallow, the breath from his body trickling out in tiny puffs. Jesus close on the other side. Dad's family close on this side. And that was all there was. I have his watch. A jar of change he kept with a two dollar bill inside. The stuff of his life in his room. His hearing aids and false teeth. His bed and dresser. All his earthly possessions still here when he was there. And that was all that mattered. That he was there. With the One Who is all we should really ever want. Because what else is there that's eternal? That doesn't fill only a temporary need?
Maybe it takes a cave experience for us to examine the very core of ourselves to see if we really do love God. If, when it all comes down to our barest needs, our most precious desires, we find them wrapped up in the heart of God toward us. That in communion with Him, even if its origin is our fiercest desperation, we find the sweetest spot in our earthly lives. A preview of heaven and home. When we are stripped of all the former joys and sick of wanting what doesn't really satisfy, we are sated with the Presence of the One Who loved us first.
One thing have I asked of the Lord. That I will seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.
Psalm 27:4
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