In Your Depths, Cry Out to the Lord
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The game Mouse Trap is a board game in which players try to make it to the end of the board without triggering the mousetrap. The player who loses is almost always surprised as the little plastic trap teeters down over their little plastic mouse. Sometimes, no matter how skilled and experienced we are at the game, we get caught in the mouse trap!
Testimony is a term Christ followers use frequently, to describe their stories of faith. Most love to tell of the way they came to know Jesus, and the powerful change He has initiated in their lives. Testimony is evidence. It’s an open declaration or profession. Testimony is a witness or affirmation. My personal testimony runs parallel to my calling to motherhood. It’s constantly humbling, and sends me clinging to Christ each day with a holy cow I’m going to mess these kids up mentality. In His faithfulness, He pulls me from the storm of my mind and into the calm of His presence, and I’m able to laugh about the chaos instead of letting it eat me alive.
The depths the psalmist wrote about in these verses would have been a striking visual to ancient people. Depths were often associated with the realm of the dead, the pit, silence, darkness, destruction, decay, dust, mire, slime, and mud (NIV). The writer of this psalm was in a bad way! The trap was definitely teetering! Yet, he knew the Lord heard him, regardless of how he got there. Psalm 32:6 says,
We all feel the pressure of the depths. The impossible situations and the aches in our confidence muscles that we just can’t seem to kneed out or ice to recovery. We all walk through life with the urge to kick someone who flattens our friend on the playground now and then, and we most certainly all have a sore Achilles heel that threatens to flare up and take us out of the race if we’re not diligent enough to slow down, treat and strengthen it.
The Bible says to guard our hearts, because everything we do flows through it. Following Jesus means to speak less, and listen more; to get quiet, but live loud. And when we come crashing down, we can land safely in the arms of Jesus. As we fall apart from the limits in our abilities, He is faithful to hold us, empathetically, and help us back into the race. Just as the psalmist did in the verses we are studying today, we can come unglued in the presence of God, knowing He hears us, sees us, and loves us. He loves us when we’re healthy, and when we’re dinged up, when we win, and when we’re sidelined with an injury. He loves us when we hug it out with our enemies, and when we kick the kid who decked our friend. His love never, ever wanes. God is unchanging.
My testimony runs alongside my reality as a parent now, but it began alone in a field. Collapsed in a heap, unable to carry the weight of all of the things anymore, He met me there, and has never left me for a single moment since. The depths of God’s love for us will lead us on a journey through life which is more than we can ask for or imagine. Let our testimony be that we trust Him with our lives. He is good, all of the time. All of the time, He is good.
In the depths, cry out to the Lord. He hears our voices. His ears are attentive.
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Photo credit: Unsplash/Luis Alberto Sanchez Terrones
