#DailyDevotion God Has Not Abandoned You, Discarded You, Or Left You
Psalm 71 7To many I am a wonder, but You are my strong Shelter. 8My mouth is full of praise of You and of Your glory all day long.
We can see Christ in these words. Many wondered at Him as He suffered upon the cross. Christ remained faithful to His Father. Jesus’ mouth is full of praise to the Father and His glory. The Father was Jesus’ strong Shelter as He underwent His passion for us to save us. As such, these are David’s words and now our words as we are in Christ when we suffer.
9Don’t discard me when I’m old or leave me when I lose my strength, 10because my enemies talk about me, and those who watch to take my life plan together. 11They say, “God has abandoned him. Pursue and grab him–there’s no one to rescue him.” 12O God, don’t be far away from me; O my God, come quickly to help me.
We may not see Jesus when he writes, “don’t discard me when I’m old,” but we can see Him when it is written, “when I lose my strength.” We will certainly see David in his old age in these words. We may join him in praying this particularly when we age. When we age we may see family and friends discard and leave us. They don’t know how to interact with us. They don’t like seeing us this way. We may seem to them not the people we once were but we are still in there. God our Father will not discard or leave us in those times. Jesus is Immanuel! He is God with us. Jesus has promised He will be with us always, even to the end of the age.
Now David is a type of Christ. Christ is the fulfillment. We see Jesus lose His strength in the garden. The Father sends His angels to strengthen Him. Jesus’ enemies talked about Him and planned to take His life. They thought God had abandoned Him. So they pursued and grabbed him. They taunted Jesus on the cross believing there was no one to rescue Him. Jesus prayed this prayer for God to not be far from Him and to quickly help Him. Jesus gave up His life on the cross. Those who wanted His life could not take it from Him. Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day. God the Father did rescue Him quickly and made His resurrection the justification of the world.
We may have opposition in our daily lives because we belong to Jesus. We may get beaten down by life, the world, the devil and all his crew. They may, and we may at times, believe God has abandoned us. Let us cry out and pray with Jesus and David, “O God, don’t be far away from me; O my God, come quickly to help me.” We can pray this with the certainty of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In Jesus, we may have hope God helps us and helps us quickly. We too may have to wait for the resurrection to see our help completely filled. That help, though, never fades. It is eternal.
Merciful God and Father, have mercy upon us and come to help us quickly when we are attacked by outside forces. When we are weak and feel abandoned, be our ever present shelter and strength. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.