Theological Commentary: Click Here
Discipleship Focus: Protection
- Protection: In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray that God might deliver us from evil – even the Evil One. Sometimes we need God’s protection from the sin around us. Sometimes we need protection from the sinful people around us. Other times we need protection from the sin that lies within ourselves. In any case, Jesus’ point is clear. We need protection from the Father to make it through each and every day.
This is a chapter that gives us a lot of reality in the
world. How many times do we as people
try to do something nice or meaningful and have it come back to bite us? How many times do we try and make a gesture
in love and only have it come back to hurt us?
In many instances our good deeds are received well. But all too often our well-meaning intentions
aren’t received.
In fact, sometimes our well-meaning intentions actually bring
about conflict! When we see David reach
out in love in this chapter, what we see come back at David is the other side
lining up for war! David simply desires
to honor the death of a neighboring king with whom he had a good relationship. The next thing he knows, the Ammonites are
buying mercenary support and coming against him in war. Sometimes life just isn’t fair when you try
and do the right thing or the meaningful thing.
This is where protection comes into play. David relies upon the protection of the
Lord. David knows that his heart was
genuine and he relies upon God to bring him through this tough stretch. God allows his armies to fight well and sent home
those who come to oppose David. We
cannot control how other people receive our gestures. But if we are genuine in our intentions, we
can know that God will protect us.
<><
No comments:
Post a Comment