We must be delivered from evil by the grace of God

Psalm 43

{43:1}
Judge me,
O God,
and plead my cause against an ungodly nation:
O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.
{43:2}
For thou art the God of my strength
why dost thou cast me off?
why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?
{43:3}
O send out thy light and thy truth
let them lead me
let them bring me unto thy holy hill
and to thy tabernacles.
{43:4}
Then will I go unto the altar of God,
unto God my exceeding joy
yea, upon the harp will I praise thee,
O God my God.
{43:5}
Why art thou cast down, O my soul?
and why art thou disquieted within me?
hope in God
for I shall yet praise him,
who is the health of my countenance,
and my God.

**

Send out thy light and thy truth, let them lead me.

Why dost thou cast me off....

Despair, doubt is no stranger to any who would follow God.

Despair and doubt afflict all of us.

Maybe we don't have enemies in the sense we are fighting them for our lives physically, at least I don't have anyone trying to kill me. Yet we have enemies and we fight for our lives maybe not physically but spiritually there isn't a single person who isn't fighting that battle.

Our attacker might be against our faith and there is no worse attacker.

The oppression from our enemy, any that oppress our faith are our enemies make no doubt about it whatsoever.

We do mourn when our faith wavers? How can we not mourn when something so important is threatened?

We ask God to send out His light and His truth, only that can save us. Light and Truth, Jesus' Christ is the light and truth, His grace, His mercy is truth.

'Why art thou cast down, O my soul?
and why art thou disquieted within me?
hope in God
for I shall yet praise him,
who is the health of my countenance,
and my God.'

We all know the disquiet of our souls don't we? We call it depression, we call it anxiety, we call it my all sorts of *modern* names but it is all the same in the end- a disquiet within us, something that keeps us from a peaceful existence. We place our hope here and now, we place the desire for our peace here and now, we want contentment and happiness here and now and the ONLY way to get that in any small way is to place our hope in God.

Our hope must be in God. It must be in something more than this life. Our hope must be in the saving grace of Jesus.

We aren't going to have it easy here. We fool ourselves by experiencing moments of joy and happiness, periods of praise and song, we can't rely on those! We can have them, we can, but they can't be our mainstay. We can't believe that when we're caught in a depression, or heartache that it's all gone, that hope is gone. It's when we're down the farthest that hope is made even more real if we let it. Hope. Grasp the hope when you feel like all hope is really gone, grasp at it and in faith believe that no matter how you're feeling, no matter how close we are to despairing that God is there as our hope. We don't have to feel it, we can know it. Praise God who is our health, our hope when we are disquieted within. Praise God who will see us through the dark, we can't give up or give in to despair, we can't let evil take hold of us, we must be delivered from evil by the grace of God through His Son, Jesus.

Amen!