Friends in Christ Message for July 25, 2000

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Friends in Christ Weekly Message
July 25, 2000

I call on you, O God, for you will answer me;
    give ear to me and hear my prayer.
Show the wonder of your great love,
    you who save by your right hand
    those who take refuge in you from their foes.
Keep me as the apple of your eye;
    hide me in the shadow of your wings
from the wicked who assail me,
    from my mortal enemies who surround me.
Psalm 17:6-9 (NIV*)

Someone in the Friends in Christ worship experience last Saturday spoke of coming across this Psalm, and being taken by the idea of being the apple of God's eye. Indeed, we often don't see ourselves that way.

It is easy to think of God as distant. Yet, in reality God is a doting daddy to whom we are the apple of his eye.

There may be a few on this list who do see God this way. But probably most of us at best do so only occasionally. How would our lives change if we kept this constantly in our hearts?

This psalm is believed to be a prayer of David. David had a real sense of God's intimate presence in his life. What were the results of this sense? Several are evident just from this stanza of the psalm:

He trusted God to answer his prayers.
He was certain of God's "great love" for him.
He saw God as one in whom he could take refuge from his foes.

A result not so evident from this stanza, but clear elsewhere in scripture, is that David was eager to please God - just as a child is eager to please a daddy that lets her know she is the apple of his eye. This enabled him to do many things that would have been difficult had he not had this sense, like refusing to do anything against Saul despite Saul's repeated efforts to kill him. It also led him to write beautiful psalms, sing God's praises, and dance with such joyous exuberance to God that others criticized him for not seeming dignified as they thought a king should be.

Would you like to have the kind of sense of God's presence in your life that David had? Try seeing yourself as the apple of God's eye. A useful spiritual exercise might be to prayerfully repeat over and over, "I am the apple of God's eye." This should be especially helpful if you suffer from depression, and/or are inclined to concentrate on your weaknesses rather than on your God-given potential. And remember, this is not just a nice phrase. It is the absolute truth!

Dear friends, may you always bask in God's love.

Bill Samuel

* New International Version © International Bible Society.