While celebrating the Easter season, I found myself reflecting on how many ways and means that God has chosen to intervene in my circumstances. He does that. The same God of miracles from thousands of years ago is still very much the God of the present. He is not obtrusive or invasive. He is a gentleman. But He is also the ultimate rescuer who is not constrained by time or circumstances or the level of maturity of His loved ones. He just sees what needs to be done, and He shows up large.
Charlene reminded me of a passage in Scripture recently. It’s an epic passage found in 1 Samuel 30 and describes a time when David was still in exile. He and his 600 warriors returned from battle to find that while they were gone the Amalekites had raided their village. Everything was destroyed, all of their possessions were gone, and, most importantly, their wives and children had been taken captive. The passage goes on to say that David and his men wept until they were exhausted, at which point some of his men began to turn on David himself. The key to the whole section came in verse six, which says that “David encouraged himself in the Lord.”
As my awesome wife described it, the verse simply means that David took the time to remember all of the times that God showed up in his life. He found strength in knowing that the God who had been with him so many times before would be with him again. It amounts to the Old Testament version of the passage from Philippians 4 where Paul announced, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
It is easy to face life as if each trial or moment stands on its own. The reality is that the same God who showed up once can and will show up time and time again. He has proven that so many times in my own life that really I shouldn’t ever have to “encourage myself in the Lord” again. It should just be the norm. But I suppose that even David, a man after God’s own heart, had to pause and recount the manner and means by which God had shown up in his past so that he could conquer his present.
I can remember clearly the first time I experienced that sense that the Almighty had just intervened.
In 1976, I was an 11-year-old knot-head. I was a moderate student in most respects, but my ability to read and recite was solid. Somehow, I had won the part of the moderator in the bicentennial play. This was not just any play, mind you. Our school was selected by the school system to be the focal point for celebrating the 200th anniversary of the nation, and of all things this was to be a community event - and televised to boot. The kid who was trusted to stand on stage for the full hour and narrate every scene on cue and without the benefit of notes was yours truly.
But like I said, I was a knot-head living in the days before computers and copiers. After losing my copy of the script twice, my teacher gave me hers with the admonishment that it was the only copyleft. I lost that one too. I don’t remember practicing … ever. I don’t remember reciting my lines at home. But I do remember the night before the big event laying in bed and having a full-on panic attack because I had no idea where the script was, what I was to say, or how I was going to explain my “knot-headedness” to the whole school. I remember praying like only a panicked 11-year-old can, complete with tears. The whole school would be staring at me. The television cameras would be rolling. My parents were divorced, but my Dad was taking off work to be there. It felt like the whole world was expectantly waiting for words that I didn’t know. As I lay there feeling like a failure, I suddenly calmed down, which made no sense.
And then I remembered my lines. All of them. And everyone else’s lines.
I could see the script in my mind’s eye. We performed the play for four days straight, including live TV. I wound up as the prompter for those who couldn’t remember their lines. God had shown up. Even as a knot-head kid I knew that.
This may sound small, but to an 11-year-old it was huge. But that’s the point in my telling you that particular story: God shows up where we are, when we are. He doesn’t wait until it reaches the level of a New York Times four-alarm story. He knows that our biggest moment at that time is our biggest moment at that time.
And He builds us from there.
I can tell you about subsequent years as a young couple in full-time ministry with no means left to pay bills. And we encouraged ourselves in the Lord, and God showed up.
I can describe in vivid detail coming to the end of my physical and mental rope during the swamp phase of Army Ranger School. Nothing left - nothing but to encourage myself in the Lord. God showed up.
Charlene and I found ourselves once in the position of having a job in one state and a house that wouldn’t sell in another. It came to the point of questioning whether we would lose what little we had. We encouraged ourselves in the Lord. He sure did show up.
I remember being in Baghdad during the height of the Shia uprising. Prayers went up every day, and there was a constant sense of walking in His strength. But on one particular day, our mission diverted off of one route to an adjacent line of travel for reasons none of us could explain later. Twelve people died in the VBIED attack that struck on the site to my immediate right, in the very spot where we were supposed to have been. On that day hindsight brought a great deal of emotion, relief and the full realization that God had shown up.
Time and again in my life I have felt the intervention of the God of the angel armies. The same God who also sometimes speaks in a still small voice. The same God that in a myriad of ways, in more stories that I can relate, has just shown up time and again.
Some may take this recounting as a sensationalizing of random events. They can choose for themselves whether to discount these experiences and the countless others of so many who have encouraged themselves in the Lord throughout time. But I believe. And like Peter said in Acts 4, “I cannot stop speaking what I’ve seen and heard.”
So, in the wake of Easter, let me offer this word. Do not for a moment discount your cares and concerns as being too small or too common. God shows up in the life a crying 11-year-old knot-head as surely as He shows up in a war zone for a leader of men.
Encourage yourself in the Lord. Then watch what happens when God shows up.
Phil Williams is a former State Senator, retired Army Colonel and combat veteran, and a practicing Attorney. He has served with the leadership of the Alabama Policy Institute and currently hosts Rightside Radio M-F 2-5 pm on WVNN. His column appears every Monday in 1819 News. To contact Phil or request him for a speaking engagement go to www.rightsideradio.org The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News. To comment, please send an email with your name and contact information to Commentary@1819News.com.
