by Pastor Douglas Brauner

…God Hears.

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

“Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress.”
Psalm 107:13 English Standard Version

Stress and tension are important components of life, but bad things happen when we are overstressed or there is too much tension in our lives. Our muscles are stressed when we go for a walk; that stress is healthy. Yet we run the risk of damaging our muscles if we push them too far. We might say that we have put our muscles in distress.

At the beginning of Psalm 107, the psalmist reminds us that God’s steadfast love lasts forever, it lasts even when we put ourselves in stressful situations.

There are times when we wander in deserted places, when it seems that we cannot find satisfaction for our souls or a place to call home (Psalm 107:4-5).

There are other times when it seems that we are imprisoned, and darkness surrounds us and keeps us from experiencing the joy that God desires we experience (Psalm 107:10-11).

There are times when we play the role of a fool and get stuck in our sin-filled ways, finding it impossible to dig ourselves out of our troubles (Psalm 107:17-18).

Then there are times when it feels like we are a drift at sea, worried about things we cannot control and fearful that there will be no one to save us (Psalm 107:23-24).

God’s promise is that when we cry out to him in our distress, when we have overstressed our lives, that he will hear us, he will hear you. The proof that God will not abandon you is Jesus’ distress on the cross, distress that caused his death. He forgives you, he heals you, he redeems you even when it feels like you’ve gone too far and distressed your life. And so, with the psalmist we declare,

“Let [us] thank the LORD for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works to the children of man!”
Psalm 107:21 English Standard Version

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