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Home > Attitude, Bible Study > Peaceful sleep

Peaceful sleep

December 10th, 2012

In peace I will both lie down and sleep, For You alone, O LORD, make me to dwell in safety.
Psa 4:8 NASB

David’s experience hiding from Saul was a pot in which his dependence on God for his safety was seasoned.  David knew that God wouldn’t start supplying David’s needs and then stop part way through; God would always give to David and protect David because God was faithful and to be trusted.

In this instance David shows how God’s protection led to peaceful sleep for him.

Sometimes I worry over those I cannot protect.  I cannot keep people I love from having injuries or health issues.  My trust needs to lie in God’s protection.

I should learn to temper this verse with the response of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to King Nebuchadnezzar:

Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter.
” If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king.
Dan 3:16-17 NASB

and Jesus point:

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?
“Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?
“And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?
Mat 6:25-27 NASB

The context for Jesus’ statement starts with God being the only one you serve instead of idolizing wealth then He speaks of worrying over things like clothes and food (Matt 6:25 above) but He draws a point with His rhetorical question about the value of worrying.  The three Hebrew children’s point was that God is totally able to provide protection but He is not obligated.  If He acts to protect someone it’s for His glory.  If God allows something to occur, no matter how heinous then He can work through bad circumstances to bring about His wonderful plan.  Injury, death, rape and other horrible things are not what God plans for people but we live in a world that causes us to endure the negative outcomes of sin.

Here are some hypotheticals.  I didn’t sin by drinking and driving but someone else did and I bear an injury by being run into because of someone else’s sin.  That girl did nothing to encourage or lead to being raped but she has to endure the outcome of someone else’s sin.  Conversely, others are not culpable for my sin and yet may endure the effects of it, too.

The point is that regardless of why some bad things happen, we should find peace in God’s desire to protect us.  He allowed Joseph to endure being separated from his family, sold into slavery and put into prison but He worked through all these events to honor Joseph’s faith in Him and raised Joseph up to a point where he could bless God throughout the known world and God simultaneously allowed Joseph to take care of his family after they were reunited.

 

David experienced peaceful sleep with God as his protector when Saul sought to kill him.  God protected David and hid him from Saul.  God doesn’t promise nothing will ever happen to us; David had to kill wild animals as a young man to protect his flock (he grew up as a shepherd).  Surely literally fighting a lion and killing it was a frightening time; it was a Tarzan moment but in real life.  God won’t keep us from having any adventures in our lives but He is our protector and the one in whom we can hide to find peace.


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