The Everlasting Arms: Our Refuge
Where do you go when your life turns upside-down? What happens inside your soul when you are shaken with uncertainty and fear? What is the anchor that preserves your sanity?
In a time of trouble, children in a healthy home know they can run to a parent for comfort. When they gain the empathy of a parent, they are learning a basic life skill: "I can get through this with the help of another, bigger person who loves me and whom I trust."
By the time we reach adulthood, chances are we have somehow, at some time lost, or lost trust in a significant life relationship. For relief, or at least, to numb ourselves from pain, we may turn to pleasure, entertainment, drugs, alcohol, self-harm, or unhelpful relationships. These crutches are only temporal, and can never provide lasting comfort. Still, we often "default" to fleeting, visible things or people instead of our eternal God, for shelter in stormy times.
If we know the truth about God--that He is loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, and gracious--why is He not our first resort? Why can we not trust Him? Why do we think we need something or someone we can physically see in order to get help? Often, it is the desperate times of life that get our attention and cause us to look to something or someone more stable for answers, when all else fails. It's not surprising that we rely on our senses first, until God graciously develops in us a spiritual awareness of His Presence. God's eternal nature, though invisible, provides permanent shelter and comfort:
The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Deuteronomy 33:27
For thus says the high and lofty one who inhabits eternity, whose name is HOLY, I dwell on a high and holy place, and also with the contrite and lowly of spirit in order to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite. Isaiah 57:15
We tend to think of eternity in terms of chronology; we resign ourselves to the fact that our minds simply can't reconcile the concept of "always was and always will be". However, eternity is much more than time: it includes space and matter. God Himself saturates all of His creation! (See Exodus 3:2: Moses encounters God in the burning bush; Job 38:1: God speaks from the whirlwind.)
We do have a trusted, secure, dependable, never-failing refuge--one much better than what we can see! God's invisible, eternal nature is the very means by which He provides His Presence, permeating our very existence:
Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your Presence? . . . When I awake, I am still with You. Psalms 139:7, 18b
God includes us in His all-encompassing Presence, wrapping His big, strong arms around us--we are IN Christ:
In Him we live, move, and have our being. Acts 17:28
Believers cannot possibly remove themselves from God's Presence. He is here with us, our refuge and strength, our present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1). Rehearsing His words in our minds assures us of truth, that invisible fortress of protection. May God give us the grace to trust Him in troubled times, in troubled circumstances, in our fallen (but redeemable!) state, and for an uncertain future by the help of His everlasting arms, His eternal Presence, and the love of our brothers and sisters in Christ.
My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest. Exodus 33:14
We have not far to run to God's wide-open arms of comfort and safety, displayed so vividly on Christ's cross!
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©2020 Julianne Knapp. First published 4.11.20
In a time of trouble, children in a healthy home know they can run to a parent for comfort. When they gain the empathy of a parent, they are learning a basic life skill: "I can get through this with the help of another, bigger person who loves me and whom I trust."
By the time we reach adulthood, chances are we have somehow, at some time lost, or lost trust in a significant life relationship. For relief, or at least, to numb ourselves from pain, we may turn to pleasure, entertainment, drugs, alcohol, self-harm, or unhelpful relationships. These crutches are only temporal, and can never provide lasting comfort. Still, we often "default" to fleeting, visible things or people instead of our eternal God, for shelter in stormy times.
If we know the truth about God--that He is loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, and gracious--why is He not our first resort? Why can we not trust Him? Why do we think we need something or someone we can physically see in order to get help? Often, it is the desperate times of life that get our attention and cause us to look to something or someone more stable for answers, when all else fails. It's not surprising that we rely on our senses first, until God graciously develops in us a spiritual awareness of His Presence. God's eternal nature, though invisible, provides permanent shelter and comfort:
The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Deuteronomy 33:27
For thus says the high and lofty one who inhabits eternity, whose name is HOLY, I dwell on a high and holy place, and also with the contrite and lowly of spirit in order to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite. Isaiah 57:15
We tend to think of eternity in terms of chronology; we resign ourselves to the fact that our minds simply can't reconcile the concept of "always was and always will be". However, eternity is much more than time: it includes space and matter. God Himself saturates all of His creation! (See Exodus 3:2: Moses encounters God in the burning bush; Job 38:1: God speaks from the whirlwind.)
We do have a trusted, secure, dependable, never-failing refuge--one much better than what we can see! God's invisible, eternal nature is the very means by which He provides His Presence, permeating our very existence:
Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your Presence? . . . When I awake, I am still with You. Psalms 139:7, 18b
God includes us in His all-encompassing Presence, wrapping His big, strong arms around us--we are IN Christ:
In Him we live, move, and have our being. Acts 17:28
Believers cannot possibly remove themselves from God's Presence. He is here with us, our refuge and strength, our present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1). Rehearsing His words in our minds assures us of truth, that invisible fortress of protection. May God give us the grace to trust Him in troubled times, in troubled circumstances, in our fallen (but redeemable!) state, and for an uncertain future by the help of His everlasting arms, His eternal Presence, and the love of our brothers and sisters in Christ.
My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest. Exodus 33:14
We have not far to run to God's wide-open arms of comfort and safety, displayed so vividly on Christ's cross!
Subscribe to free weekly articles in your inbox HERE; your information will never be shared. :-)
©2020 Julianne Knapp. First published 4.11.20