Here is a verse you can convert into a wall hanging or a 5X7 desktop text or a screen-saver. With all the techno-geeks out there, creating an impressive looking text on your computer and printing it off is a breeze these days. You don’t have to be a skilled calligrapher.
‘Trust in him at all times: ye people. Pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah.‘ Ps. 62:8
You can read the verse in many ways. Try emphasizing one word over another as you read it. Your appreciation and enjoyment of the verse will be enhanced. In your mind, capitalize the word TRUST….and then do some thinking: in whom or in what have I been trusting? Myself? Others? My job? My brains? Or hi-lite the huge word ALL. ALL times. The good times and bad times too. There are some days we would like to erase from our memories. Possibly times when we were angry with God or filled with bitterness or flooded by questions. ALL includes even those times!
But the word I really enjoyed is: POUR OUT. Sometimes I get so formal in my private prayers, (not to mention my public ones!) a listener might think I was reciting a prayer from a prayer book. If you check the Hebrew meaning of the word you will see that the thought behind pouring out is …dump it all out! Spill your inner fears and thoughts out before the Lord – regardless of what order they gush out! Spill the thoughts out like water; dump the thoughts out before Him. Shed them out like blood spurting from a severed artery. Let them ‘gush’ out!
It is the same word that Hannah used in 1Samuel 1:15,16, when Eli the priest accused her of being ‘out of it’, or drunk! She assured him that she had not lost her marbles and that she was not drunk! She said: ” Don’t think for a minute that I’m a bad woman or that I have been dipping into the sauce or pouring out wine or beer! I have been pouring – but not wine. I’ve been pouring out my heart to the Lord. I have been desperately unhappy and angry and that’s the reason I have been praying and pouring it all out for so long.“
Our prayers can become so technical, professional, sophisticated and formal! In times of distress and trouble, we forget that when we sneak away into a private area to be alone with God, we don’t have to restrain ourselves any longer. We don’t have to keep it all in anymore or to let it out slowly in calm, measured, and controlled words. Once we are alone with Him we can let our inner turmoils, distresses, and our conflicting thoughts burst out! We can pour them all out before the Lord.
“God is a refuge for us.” There are very few people we could ever trust enough to tell them everything that is going on inside our minds and hearts. But we can get alone with the Lord and tell Him every single thing – the wildest and darkest thoughts of our hearts – and He will be a safe place for us to allow our pent up emotions and fears to gush forth! He is a shelter, a refuge for us.
The cool thing about it is: He will not shun us after we tell Him everything that has been going on inside us. He will not think less of us. In fact, He will draw us nearer to Himself, because we have expressed such confidence in Him to be able to share the deepest secrets of our hearts. That’s the intimacy with us that He craves. So He loves it when we spill it all out before Him. He will prove Himself to us once again that He is a Refuge for us. Because of a Christian’s position in Christ Jesus we can come to the throne of grace with boldness, confidence and liberty, and there freely tell the Lord all our mind, and all that is in our heart. (Hebrews 4:16, Romans 8:26)
Do you have anything to pour out today?