Psalm 55:12-14 - June 15,2009

Ps 55:12-14 "If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. 13 But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend, 14 with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God." NIV

There is no feeling in the world like the feeling that comes when someone you had trusted or someone whom you worked together closely with or walked together with in your pursuit of the Lord takes upon themselves the role of betrayer or adversary. Throughout the pages of scripture one of the more common means by which God prepared His servants was through the betrayal or mistreatment of others. David served Saul only to have him fall to a spirit of jealousy and become his adversary. Men who used to stand with him in the leadership of the nation during his rule as king abandoned him when his own son rose up to betray and usurp his throne. Jacob was abused in his service of his father-in-law repeatedly. Moses led the people diligently towards the living God only to have Korah rise up against him with a rebellious spirit. Paul was abandoned by almost everyone near the end of his ministry.
The psalmist reflects on the reality that if his persecutor were only an enemy then he would be able to hide himself from the attack. How mysterious the ways of God that in the lives of those who serve him He allows opposition to arise from sources that we cannot escape from. It seems that God has determined that such opposition is a necessary training ground for godly character, and development of faith and trust. Again and again throughout the word trusted associate becomes the source of aggressive opposition and the heart is tried by the pain of not only broken relationship but violated trust.
God allows the pain to strike close to the heart so that the heart will mature. He knows the brokenness and sin that lies within the heart of every man and He leads us in pathways of pain that sift out our motives. “Will we serve Him even when our hearts have been wounded?” It is only when we have tasted this kind of pain that we can identify with the sufferings of the Lord. Jesus wept over Jerusalem because they rejected their hour of visitation. He carried the pain of knowing that the very ones He would soon suffer and die for would betray Him and choose a thief instead. Yet in all of this Christ called out from the cross “Father forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.” His pain only drove his compassion deeper. The more clearly He experienced the darkness in the hearts of men, the more completely he was captured by the burden to be the source of their deliverance. Even so God allows our lives to be touched by pain. He chooses not to shield us knowing that if we will reach to him in our anguish that the lesson that we will learn will be one of identification. Paul greatly desired to learn the way of Christ’s suffering, understanding the work that it would do in his heart. Instead of shrinking back from his own personal pain he declared in Phil 3:10 “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings.” His thoughts were echoed by Peter as well in 1 Peter 4:13-14 as he encourages the church, “rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. 14 If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you.” When we rightly respond to suffering we are blessed. When we embrace the pain of how people treat us by identifying with Christ’s suffering on the cross Peter says, “the Spirit of glory and of God rests” on us! Don’t shrink back from the pain in your life! Let God introduce you to an even deeper revelation of the glorious man Christ Jesus as you share in his compassion for a broken world!