When David’s life was threatened, he prayed: "When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?" (Psalm 56:3–4, NIV). When I was afraid in besieged Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, 32 years ago (March 1993), I often prayed David’s psalms.
Today, many of us are facing new, threatening realities. David reminds us, based on his many life-threatening experiences, to dare to put our trust in God and find courage in the thought that, at the end of the day, there is nothing that "mere mortals can do to us." Timothy Keller encourages us: "Fearfulness and faith in God can coexist in us even as trust slowly wins out. Faith is not a vague sense that ‘God will work it out.’ It comes from prayerful immersion in the Scripture, the Word of God. David still prays to be delivered from his attackers, and we can and should cry out to God for deliverance—whether from wicked people or stubborn diseases—but in the end, we are safe in Jesus." (Timothy Keller, The Songs of Jesus)
Let us remember that the ultimate power deciding all outcomes is the power of God—not human powers, whoever or whatever they may be. Ultimate, complete and everlasting safety is found only in King Jesus, not in the empty promises of our earthly would-be kings. Let us learn to trust Jesus today despite the threats of the growing evil around us. And as we grow in trust with new urgency, let us continue to be “the light of the world” and “the salt of the earth” to our communities even more deliberately than ever before (Matthew 5:14–16).
I must admit that in the past I have had my share of reasons to fear. However, I also must admit that episodes of fear and anxiety have visited me more often over the past three unsettling months in this country than at any time in the past—even more than during the days when I tasted the bitterness of war between Serbs, Croats, and Bosnians in the early 1990s.
As I was writing these “Encouraging Words for Today,” I remembered a video reflection I released five years ago, titled "You of Little Faith." I would like to share it with you today because I believe I am not the only one who needs to hear this message again. I am sure that within this audience, there are others who need to hear it too.
So get courage. Evil, pain, and suffering do not have the final word. Let me know if you have been encouraged.
Photo: One Sarajevo woman and I are running across one of the streets of Sarajevo early 1993 to avoid sniper fire.
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