Where to Go for Help

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian, pictured the Christian like someone trying to cross a sea of floating pieces of ice. The Christian cannot stand anywhere too long, otherwise he sinks. He cannot rest anywhere while crossing except in his faith that God will see him through. After taking a step, he must watch out for the next. Beneath him is the abyss, and before him is uncertainty, but always ahead is the Lord firm and sure!

The believer doesn’t see the land yet, but it is there as a promise in his heart. The Christian traveler must keep his eyes fixed upon his final place. Scripture calls us to this several times.

“Look to me, and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other” (Isaiah 45:22, NKJV).

“Therefore I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me” (Micah 7:7).

I prefer to think of life as King Jehoshaphat’s battle, along with all the children of Judah, in the desert (see 2 Chronicles 20). Sure, it’s a wilderness; yes, there are snakes, dry water holes, valleys of tears, enemy armies, hot sands, drought, impassable mountains. When the children of the Lord stood still to see his salvation, he spread a table in that wilderness. King Jehoshaphat prayed, “O Lord God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven, and do you not rule over all the kingdoms of the nations, and in your hand is there not power and might, so that no one is able to withstand you? Are you not our God, who drove out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and gave it to the descendants of Abraham your friend forever?” (2 Chronicles 20:6-7).

All throughout Israel’s history in scripture, God warned them to tell every following generation where their salvation would come from: “‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord of hosts” (Zechariah 4:6).

Stop looking in the wrong direction for help. Get alone with Jesus in a secret place; tell him all about your confusion. Tell him you have no other place to go. Tell him you trust him alone to see you through. You will be tempted to take matters into your own hand. You will want to figure things out on your own. You will wonder if God is working at all, but trust that God is your only salvation.