"Blessed are those whose strength is in you, in whose heart are the highways to Zion. As they go through the Valley of Baca they make it a place of springs; the early rain also covers it with pools." - Psalm 84:5-6
Very simply, in today's verse, the Valley of Baca was a route that many had to take on the way to worship the Lord in Zion, which is the city of God. The Valley of Baca was filled with many dangers: thorns, pitfalls, wild animals, and poisonous snakes. But the promise of God in the verse is that God will turn the very path of danger into a place of refreshment, a path filled with springs and pools for those who seek intimate fellowship with the Lord.
So let's cut right to the chase with the application. The Valley of Baca represents life in a fallen world. Life is filled with all sorts of things that will hurt you (dangers), with people and situations that will scratch you (thorns), cause you to stumble (pitfalls), threaten to eat you alive (wild animals), and lie in wait to bite you (poisonous snakes). Because of these dangers, many people never go this route. The problem in not taking this route is that this route is the path for seeking intimate fellowship with the Lord, namely, worshiping him, listening for him, praying to him, studying his word, and serving people.
And so it is. The studies show that on any given Sunday alone, at least 68% of people who call themselves Christian will not be seeking the Lord. It's not just about being in church; it's about doing anything, something to seek the Lord: worshiping him, listening for him, praying to him, studying his word, serving people.
68%! And that's just Christians! And that's just on Sundays! In other words, there's a whole lot of time in any given week when very few people are seeking
intimate fellowship with the Lord. And at this point, I'm not even going to reinforce the bazillion reasons that people give for not seeking intimate fellowship with the Lord. In sum, the collective reason is that it's just too hard to put more energy into seeking God when the day and the week have already been filled with people and situations that have hurt you (dangers), scratched you (thorns), caused you to stumble (pitfalls), threatened to eat you alive (wild animals), and lied in wait to bite you (poisonous snakes).
But I'm here to tell you that what God is saying in today's verse is that if you will believe God's promise and make time to seek the Lord, God will not only bring you refreshment, but (look at the Psalm!) God will transform your difficulties into pools of refreshment just like he transformed the cross of Jesus Christ into the way of salvation for all who would believe.
He is the Lord!
He is able to do it!
He has promised to do it!
Trust him! Seek him, no matter how hard your day or tough your week, and he will refresh you and transform your difficulties!
Praise God!
(For an archive of "Day of Praise", please visit my daughter Calley's website at http://dayofpraisepc.blogspot.com/?m=1)
Pastor Chris
"The gospel is the story of Jesus [what God's only Son has done for us that we can't do for ourselves], spoken as a promise." - Robert Jenson
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