Has your life ever been turned upsidedown overnight?

11 - In Training

1 Samuel 30
1. Three days later, when David and his men arrived home at their city of Ziklag, they found that the Amalekites had raided the city and burned it to the ground,
2. carrying off all the women and children.
3. As David and his men looked at the ruins and realized what had happened to their families,
4. they wept until they could weep no more.
5. (David's two wives, Ahino-am and Abigail, were among those who had been captured.)
6. David was seriously worried, for in their bitter grief for their children, his men began talking of killing him. But David took strength from the Lord.
LB

This incident happened while David was in the wilderness season of his life.

God had arranged this stay in the wilderness - the place of uncertainty - so that David would learn the leadership skills he would need when he became king in the future.

But David was not aware that this is what God was training him for. All he knew was that the situation which presented itself this day was distressing both for him personally, and for the whole group which he headed.

He and all his men had lost their wives and children. As if that were not bad enough, their houses had been burned and their possessions plundered.

What is more, the men had come home tired from fighting and so their minds just could not cope with all this heart-ache.

All they could do was weep all their strength away.
Then they were too tired to pray and ask God for a solution to their problem, so they instead allowed their grief to turn them bitter on the inside, and they decided to blame somebody:
David was to blame, and they would stone him to death.

They were too grieved to understand that stoning David would accomplish nothing.
All that would happen then, was that they would have no leader to take them forward and they would be left more vulnerable to their enemies.

At some time in our lives, all of us experience this kind of sadness that can make us angry and bitter on the inside, and which can suggest unhelpful and sinful solutions to our minds.

When this grief happens,
we cannot let go of our faith as these men did.
Instead we need to have the inner resources of faith to do what David did:
"But David took strength from the Lord."

Prayer:
Father, today I ask that when I go through a season of grief, I will not become angry and bitter inside.
Instead, Father, I ask that I would have grown in love and faith towards You, so that I can take strength from You in my time of trouble, and find Your way out of my situation.
I pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,
Amen.  

Have a great day in Jesus,
Sol Wise.

LB stands for "The Living Bible", by Tyndale House Publishers NKJV stands for "The New King James Bible", by Thomas Nelson Publishers This free e-course is made available by SolWise.Net