Psalm 25:20
20 O keep [shamar] my soul [nephesh], and deliver [natsal] me:
let me not be ashamed [buwsh]; for I put my
trust [chacah] in thee. KJV-Interlinear
20
Guard my soul and deliver me; Do not let me be ashamed, for I take refuge in
Thee. NASB
Keep, ‘shamar,’ means to
place a hedge of thorns all around me, to guard completely, to protect
round-about as with the Israelites who had a wall of fire between them and the
Egyptian army, or walls of water when they crossed the Red Sea.
Gods protection is
impenetrable when it comes the fundamental essence of ones life, the soul of the
believer. And, as to the physical well-being
of the believer, Gods will, is likewise undeniable. If God does not will something, then it does
not happen.
Ever wonder how so many
beach invading forces survive as they come across an open beach with a devastating
hail of bullets and shells just raking across the beaches? How could anyone survive? And yet so many bullets miss their targets as
the good guys land and take the beaches.
This is the meaning of
guard or keep my soul. Just as in this
real world so much assault can be kept from us, so too, in the spiritual realm,
once you have believed in Christ, then nothing, absolutely nothing can ever
come close to you. Nothing can remove you from Gods possession.
Deliver, ‘natsal,’ means
to snatch, pluck, snatch away, defend, deliver, rescue. And in this sense life has many assaults
against us which are not necessarily of a violent nature, but may be of a
social nature or even an economic nature.
We can come onto hard
times, or even face social ostracism, and so long as we do not get caught up in
the drama or try to take things into our own hands such as in revenge or
reaction, or avoid the poor me attitude to get attention or sympathy and such,
then God will bring things together and get us out of our predicament.
Difficulties occur for a
reason. Nothing in life is by accident.
Life happens in order to test you and perhaps to test others. There are many variables to life, and how you
deal with life's situations tells a great deal about who and what you are as a
person.
And as to the last of
this verse, being not ashamed for trusting in God, points totally to your
spiritual character.
God is perfect, we are
not. God knows everything, we do
not. God never makes any mistakes, we
do.
Trusting in God does not
mean doing nothing. Only a fool would
try that one.
Trusting in God means
that you trust that God has made some provision for you and for every situation
in your life. Often times you just have
to see it.
Break your arm and do you
pray for it to get healed? Well, you
could pray, but the pertinent issue here is what are you going to do to get it
healed? God gave you medical facilities,
so you use them. You get a cast,
antibiotics, pain meds and wait for the healing process to run its course.
Having family, drug,
drinking issues? God made therapists
available to help in those areas.
Need more money? God made education facilities, business, resumes,
jobs so you can advance yourself to something better.
For every situation,
there is an answer of some kind, even if it is running to a refugee camp,
leaving everything behind and getting out of the country, and starting over.
If you think through your
situation, whatever it is, great or small, so long as you are advancing in your
spiritual life, then God is there, and answers will present themselves to you
one way or another.
On the flip side of that
coin, if you ignore God, then you are indeed depending on the world, and the
world does not have your best interest in mind.
That is the ultimate aloneness that no one should ever place themselves
in.
Your decisions either
make you a valuable person with meaning and purpose, or simply historical
filler with not much meaning or use at all.
