by Pastor Douglas Brauner

No need to eat worms!

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

As children we might have recited the lyrics of the poem, Nobody Likes Me when we felt sorry for ourselves. “Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, I think I’ll eat worms!”

When we read the Psalms, we might get the feeling that the psalmist felt sorry for himself, that he is ready to go eat worms. Even David, the man after God’s own heart, expressed words that makes one think that he was ready to go eat worms.

“Look to the right and see: there is none who takes notice of me; no refuge remains to me; no one cares for my soul.”
Psalm 142:4 English Standard Version

Do David’s words sound familiar to you? Do you feel like you are alone, that there is no one in whom you can find refuge, that there is no one who cares for your soul? Many of us have.

No sooner does David express his feelings of abandonment than he expresses his trust in the Lord.  In the very next verse David sang,

“I cry to you, O LORD; I say, ‘You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.’” 
Psalm 142:5 (ESV)

It is true that people might abandon us, especially when we are going through hard times. The people that we expect to be in our corner are nowhere to be found. It hurts deeply, so deeply that we might even consider eating worms.

David constantly speaks of God as his refuge. The introduction to this psalm states that David composed this psalm while in “the cave.” We know that David hid from King Saul in caves when Saul wanted to kill David. This cave was David’s reminder that God was his refuge.

God is our refuge too. When it feels like people have abandoned us, we can always turn to Jesus. Jesus not only felt abandoned, he was abandoned on his cross so that we might know that he will never forsake us.

There is no need for us to eat worms when we find refuge in Jesus.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado