For as long as I can remember, I have leaned more to the glass half empty variety! I am getting better but for others who share this diposition, you will know that it is a delicate condition. I remember sharing with a friend of similar qualities about this mentality and he commented that he was happiest when he was moaning! I rest my case. Yet in the eyes of those ever perky glass half full brigade, we must appear as the epitomy of negativity. We must know the whole dictionary when it comes to words that define grumbling and moaning. It is here that I will bring in King David.I have been reading through the story of David and the psalms he wrote. It has helped that I have done this during my travels through this country. Being a lover of geography and maps, I like to understand just where something happened in relation to the other events - what distance did they walk? What landscape met them? What temperature was it? What did the sky look like? As I have read through the account of his life and journeyed with him on his pusuit of God I can see that David had as much to be disgruntled about as he did to be joyous. His life was hard, often on the move, in battle and trying to defend his country. He went to battle in the harsh desert sun, touring the brittle hills where only the most robust flaura and fauna can survive. I am wonderng how they managed, to be honest, as my time in the desert heat and the dead sea basin drained every ounce of life from my bones. I guess they had no choice and knew nothing else, born into that time and part of history. I am sure, though, that some people were half empty types and others half full. I think there is something wonderful about the sanctification process of the Christian as the Lord transforms our hearts and attitudes. We can watch in ourselves the transition from negativity and pessimism to trust and joy in the Lord and for David it was no exception. When he faced his battles and persecutions, sufferings and trials, he often poured out his heart to the Lord in the psalms.
Psalm 13 expresses the turmoil of David's mind and how he is battling with problems inside and out but it also shows how he springboards himself into the arms of his loving father who soothes away his anguish and causes his glass to be filled to overflowing. I love David's ability to seek and pursue God, when life is trickling out of him, when his exhausted body and mind are close to collapse. He has experienced the lavish grace of God many times and knows where to throw himself when he is emptied out. He knows that God will pour his precious oils into those dark depths, heal his wounds, turn his mourning into dancing and the night of sorrow into a morning of joy.
It is no different for us. We too can experience that very real peace and grace to help us in our times of trouble. So often we rely on other's testimonies of such victories and yet battle on alone in defeat in our situations but these promises are for everyone. No one is exempt. Such transitions don't always happen overnight and the Bible tells us that through many hardships we will enter the kingdom of God - but what a Kingdom it is! How the Lord longs to change us, mould us and re shape us to be more like him. How it is his job to do it too and if we can just see that life here, with all its twists and turns and trials and difficulties, is to help achieve this purpose, then we can stand firm in the knowledge that we really are loved by God and are being formed into something more and more beautiful...like Jesus. When we are are in the bottomless pit we can cry out to God and, like David, allow the compassion and love of God to strengthen us once more.
