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The trash bin at a local thrift store had this warning--maybe to keep
people from getting entrapped in it!
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(Part of an ongoing series on the 48 psalms commended to study during times of "feeling down," from pastor-counselor David Seamands' book, Healing for Damaged Emotions.)
Flash flood! I’ve
never lived where flash flooding rated national front-page news, but our arid valley has endured a few minor-league floods. Decades ago, one sedate stream
turned into a death machine, killing people in a hotel on its banks. A few
years ago, a severe storm turned the street a few blocks away, into an angry
brown river. Israel,
similarly an arid land, is also known for flash floods that its usually dry
wadis cannot handle. That’s the picture King David provides in Psalm 124 as he
seeks ways to illustrate how God is our Help when we feel inundated by life’s
problems and threats. The opening word, “if,” emphasizes how they depended on
God for victory:
If the LORD had not
been on our side—let Israel
say—if the Lord had not been on our side when men attacked us….they would have
swallowed us alive. (vv. 1-3)
Context matters in Bible study, and this one is believed to
have been inspired by one of King David’s more challenging battles against the
Philistines. Recorded in 2 Samuel 5:17-25, it tells how David’s army prevailed
in what threatened to be a “flash flood” of intense fighting (Psalm 124:4-5).
TRAPS
Though probably written in different historical settings,
Psalms 123 and 124 are linked in subject matter. Psalm 123 speaks of verbal
oppression (ridicule and contempt form the oppressor). Psalm 124 goes to
all-out attacks—maybe not sword to shield, but demeaning choices meant to
overwhelm us, like a flood. Then, as if to be sure he covers all the bases of spiritual
attack, David throws in the image of a bird trap:
We have escaped like a
bird out of the fowler’s snare; the snare has been broken, and we have escaped.
(v. 7).
The psalm doesn’t give a clue as to how “meaty” those snared
birds were, but the entrapped birds didn’t have a chance. The apostle Peter
picked up on that image when he said Satan prowls around like a lion looking
for someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8). David’s saying that God cares so much for
us that He reaches down and releases those dangerous traps. How does that
translate to real life, and real days when the negatives get you down? These truths, I believe:
*No overwhelming flood of problems is too overwhelming for
God.
*No entrapment by someone’s negative words or actions is
outside God’s power. The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ broke the power
of the trap!
The psalm ends on a note of praise, as well it should—and as
well we should do as an antidote to prolonged complaints about negative
circumstances:
Our help is in the
name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.(v. 8)
Do you hear an echo from Psalm 121:2?
My help comes from the
LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.
It’s said that French Protestants in the late 18th
century opened every public worship service with this verse. If you have a spot
to post inspirational verses, consider displaying this one. If (there’s that important word again!)
you feel attacked or entrapped, it’s a reminder that our omniscient,
omnipresent, all-powerful God is adequate for any discouraging challenge out
there.
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