Wednesday, January 13, 2010

White Space

“Lord, how long will You continually forget me? How long will You hide Your face from me?” … “But I have trusted in Your faithful love; my heart will rejoice in Your deliverance.” (Psalm 13:1, 5)

On a tombstone you will often see the name of the person buried below, followed by a birth date year and a death year with a dash between the dates. That “dash” represents an entire lifetime.

In a similar way, sometimes the white space on a page, the space between verses of Scripture, can contain a silent but important message.

David began Psalm 13 with a strong complaint to God about what seemed to him to be hesitation, or distance, or apathy on God’s part with regard to his life situation. It seemed to him like God had forgotten him or turned His face away, leaving him to wallow in his anxiety and discomfort. He felt that God was letting his enemies dominate him. David spent the first 4 verses of Psalm 13 voicing his complaint to God.

Then comes verse 5. “BUT I have trusted in Your faithful love; my heart will rejoice in Your deliverance.” Obviously, something important happened between verses 4 and 5. That white space between the verses is silent, but like a jigsaw puzzle with a piece missing, we pretty much know what happened, and probably because we’ve done the same kind of thing.

Between verses 4 and 5, some time elapsed, and in that time David obviously experienced a change of heart and attitude. This change came as a result of a time of reflection. As David “stewed in his juices,” so to speak, the Spirit of God came gently to remind him of his past history with Him, a history that began in the sheep pens of the Judean hills around Bethlehem. Probably the Lord reviewed one event after another in David’s mind, like a movie being shown on a screen, and that brought a conviction of sin, and a conviction of God’s grace, followed by a change of focus from “me” to “You.”

It might do us all some good today to take the time to do a little personal reflection before the Lord about the history of our walk with Him. It might help to change our focus and our attitude of heart.

Lord, We thank You that we in fact have a history with You, and in our walk with You through the years, we have experienced one blessing after another. Remind us of these as we walk with You through the day. Amen.

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