Stress
Notice the six things that God says we should focus on in our prayer during times of stress.
First, he says in verse four “stand in awe”. The problem that we have is that we are too often in awe of our problems, and David is not referring to that. Instead, he is telling us to stand in awe of God. You have a choice: you can see God from the perspective of your problems or you can see your problems from the perspective of your God. The one that seems bigger is the one that you are focused on. During times of stress, if you will get your focus back on how great God is, then it will change your perspective about how big your problems are. “Stand in awe” means that you remember that God is bigger than any problem; He is greater than any trial and He is able to deliver you from any stress. As a child of God, the only reason we face stress alone is because we have forgotten God. He has never forgotten you, though. The first step is to get your view back where it ought to be, relying on God and His power.
The second thing David says to us is “sin not”. This sounds simple enough, but that is certainly the temptation during times of stress. The first step of sin in stress is that you stop trusting in God and start trusting in your own thinking. I shudder to think of all the times that I have made a plan to get myself out of a stressful time and how badly I have messed it up. David reminds us that if we don’t get our eyes on God, then we are likely to make a sinful decision. What a good reminder that the alternative to turning to God in our stress is sinful.
The next instruction that we have from David is to “commune with your own heart upon your bed”. This is a poetic way of saying, “meditate on what God is trying to teach you”. In times of stress, God wants to enlarge you, He wants to make you greater than you have been before so the stress that He has allowed in your life is for that purpose. In those times then we are to meditate on what God is doing and in prayer seek to apply His Word to learn not only how to respond in the moment but what lesson God wants us to take that will make us better. There is no doubt that David was stressed many times in his life, and that is when God gave him many of the Psalms as answers. The meditation of David on what God was doing changed his thoughts from problems to praises.
“And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers: And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left.”
Isaiah 30:20-21
When we meditate on what God is doing, He will show us the teachers that He has placed in our life. So often we run from the lessons, but God wants to use these things tospeak to us instead. I praise God forthose times that I have been willing to meditate on what God was doing in mylife through my stresses and learned great lessons that changed me for thebetter. Now I know many of my teachers,when they come around, I recognize them and know that they are there to help menot to hurt me. I am better able toprepare myself for the lesson in that fashion and be teachable in thosetimes.
