Horizons

The LORD said to Samuel, “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.” I Samuel 16:1....."The Lord is able to give us so much more than we lose when we part with all else to trust Him....Life is too short to dwell by any grave. We must proceed." Vance Havner

Samuel loved Saul the king. He was heartbroken that Saul's disobedience to God had caused him to lose the kingdom God had given him. He mourned it. Deeply. So deeply that he was unable to move past it. Someone said that we can get past that which we cannot get over. There are losses in life that will always bring a grieving sense of loss. Death, divorce, rebellious, wayward children, are just a few. Yet we cannot be held captive by them. We must move on, move past. The ache goes with us, but we are not in bondage to the ache.

So many of us dwell at the gravesites of our losses. Emotionally, spiritually, even physically, we remain there. And we are missing what yet remains for us in Him. God fully understood Samuel's grief. He knew how much he loved Saul. What had happened grieved the heart of the Father as well. Yet He had purposes yet to unfold. He had a man after His own heart, David, who was to be anointed as the next king by Samuel. That would not happen if Samuel remained frozen where he was. He had to move out, and go to where the Father was leading him. We do as well. We cannot live at the site of our deep losses, even the deepest of them. We have to move on, and we have to trust that He will not so much make up for the loss, for some can never be made up for, but we can trust that He has good things in store. Beautiful things from His hand. Our lives are not over. Our futures are not lost. He has, in some form or another, a "David" lying ahead for us. Press on.

I hesitate to use myself as an illustration because I don't want to seem to present myself as some kind of martyr. I'm not. There are countless others who have suffered much greater loss than me, but I do know the awful pain of loss. I know what it is like to have your 11 year old daughter literally torn from you and know nothing of her for the next 10 years. I also know the loss of watching her slowly waste away from the devastating effects of choices she didn't make at that time, but did make afterwards. I know the deep pain of rejection and betrayal by the mate you believed would be with you for life. I know the seeming indifference and outright rejection of some in the church who now saw you as tainted and no longer fit for His service. I know the loss of trusted friends through broken relationships, or their falling into sin, or their sudden departure into death. The pain of any and all of these was crushing, and there were times when I too could do nothing but stand by the "gravesite," unable to move on. To go on. Yet always, at every site, He found me, as He found Samuel, and asked that same question, sometimes gently, sometimes not; "How long will you go on grieving here?" Always He had more. Always He had life, joy, peace, and hope.

A young pastor blessed me with a great compliment recently. He said if there was one message for me to preach, it would be the message of victory. I hope that is so. If it is, it is of no credit to me. It is because in the midst of death, defeat, and seeming hopelessness, He always led me through, and He led me out. Neither failure nor defeat were ever final. His victory was and is. To paraphrase Paul, we can be struck down, but we are not destroyed. In Christ, we cannot be destroyed. We must run to the battle. Death and defeat are always Satan's horizon for us. Life and Victory are Christ's. Which Horizon are we heading to?

Blessings,

Pastor O