Shelter, Shield, Shepherd (Part 3/3)

Jesus, My Shelter: Protection from the elements (Part 1) 

Jesus, My Shield: Protection from enemies (Part 2)

A more brief recap…

The 3 Truths You Hope To Find

An open door.  When the elements exert their power over us, our first and only thought is, ‘How can I get out of this?’  Anything will do.  But something permanent would be perfect.

A safe place.  Arrows of hatred whiz by.  Unkind words stab.  Mistreatment stings.  To just be ignored will do, but to be saved would be perfect.

A hero.  When you don’t know, you want to know someone who does.  When you can’t, you hope there is someone who can.  A stranger will do, but a father would be perfect.

Jesus, My Shepherd: Provision of Everything

“We all, like sheep, have gone astray” (see Isaiah).  That is a felt reality we all experience and bear every day.  If it wasn’t then why do you always feel like you’re seeking something?  Why this sense of lostness?

Sheep, as I have heard, are dumb.  They don’t make right choices based on reason.  They choose based on limited information being filtered through a feeble mind.  Sheep couldn’t reason their way through one day, much less a lifetime.  And it isn’t like sheep have a whole lot to do.  Eat grass.  Drink water. Lie down.  That basically covers it.

Sheep rely (not volitionally, but necessarily) entirely on shepherds.  A shepherd exists not because the sheep understood their need, discussed their options, and chose to have a human being lead them around all the time so they could live thanks to his care. But rather a shepherd exists because he knows sheep. He knows their limitations and needs. He knows where they will make mistakes and chooses to care for them in order to save them from themselves.

The shepherd meets the needs of the sheep not because they seek him out but because he seeks them out.  He provides everything for them, not because they ask, but because he cares for and knows them.

Jesus calls himself the ‘Good Shepherd’ who lays down his life for the sheep. We are sheep.  We have not sought Him out, but He has sought us out and found us.

As a shepherd must do and provide everything for his sheep, Jesus has done and provided everything for us. Salvation, sustenance, cleansing, rest, defense, care.

Dwell for a moment in the tension between the oblivious nature of your sheepness and the glimmering of hope that your human mind perceives in the light of the gospel.  Feel your need of a shepherd. Realize the love of Jesus, the Chief Shepherd (see 1 Peter).

Closing thoughts

There are common threads that run through all of us. A vulnerability to elemental forces. A felt opposition or apathy on the part of others to our well-being. And a tremendous capacity to be completely helpless.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, put on flesh in order to provide us with an impenetrable shelter and shield from both the force of God’s wrath raining down on our sin and the fiery darts hurled at us from every enemy.  He laid down his life like a Shepherd for His sheep in order to provide us everything we would ever need for both this life and the life beyond.

Jesus. Our shelter from storms. Our shield from enemies. Our provision for everything.

O my Shelter! You are a refuge to where I can run and be saved from the scorching heat of the day and the chilling winds of the desolate night. O, Mighty Shield! You are to me a sure and reliable defense from the wily attacks of my enemies. O, Great Shepherd! From Your hands I find the provision of all I want and need.

Shelter, Shield, Shepherd (Part 2/3)

A brief recap ~

The 3 Truths You Know

Life happens.  Rain.  Sun.  Heat.  Cold.  Wind.  Snow.  Skin is a poor defense against those things.  We all experience them.  We all have skin.  Therefore, we all need something else.  That something else is a shelter.

Some people just don’t like you.  Rightly or wrongly.  Personally or impersonally.  At best they don’t care, but mostly they care only for your harm and demise.  We are vulnerable.  We need a shield.

You are dumb and weak.  Maybe not in your professional field, recreational interests, or doing sudokus.  But in most things you either don’t have a clue or don’t have the strength.  We’re sheep.  We need a shepherd.

The 3 Truths You Hope To Find

An open door.  When the elements exert their power over us, our first and only thought is, ‘How can I get out of this?’  Anything will do.  But something permanent would be perfect.

A safe place.  Arrows of hatred whiz by.  Unkind words stab.  Mistreatment stings.  To just be ignored will do, but to be saved would be perfect.

A hero.  When you don’t know, you want to know someone who does.  When you can’t, you hope there is someone who can.  A stranger will do, but a father would be perfect.

Jesus, My Shelter: Protection from the elements (Part 1)

Jesus, My Shield: Protection from enemies

Have you felt your vulnerability today?  A better question would be how many times have you felt your vulnerability today?  It’s open season, and you are squarely in the crosshairs of seemingly everyone (and sometimes everything) else.

Why do we feel like that?  Because it’s true.

When you and I walked into sin (just like Adam and Eve, from whom we inherited that bent to do so), we simultaneously decided to walk away from the covering of God.  We decided that our way of doing things was the better way of doing things.  At least for us, it was.

What we failed to realize was that those very words we were revolting against and discarding because they were too strict, or archaic, or irrelevant, or simply a myth were more of a defense for us than an attack against us.  When we turned away from the words of God, we turned away from the protection of God.  This reality along with the real presence of enemies is what produces our vulnerability.

We have spiritual enemies, the chief of which is Satan.  On our own we’ve never stood a chance (again, see: Adam & Eve).  We’re vulnerable to his accusations because we have sinned and are in fact guilty.  We succumb to his deception because we don’t have the solid bedrock of God’s words illuminating truth.  And our lives become awash with doubt because on our own, in the end, all we really have is…ourselves.

But we, also, all become physical enemies to each other when we walk away from the covering of God.  Billions of people living according to their own set of standards and who appoint themselves as their sole authority, determining their own right and wrong, is a boiling pot ready to overflow with scalding hatred, evil, and pain.

Everyone’s defenses are up because we have all become vulnerable.  We have no shield.

Jesus has become to us the shelter from the wrath of God, and if we take refuge in Him from the elements of life we will also find Him to be a shield from our enemies.

Not only are we shielded in the midst of attack, but we are released from trying to be our own defense.  We can put down the weapons we’ve trained on those around us.  And, rather than being another enemy, we are freed to become healers and helpers.

We are vulnerable as long as we are in our sin.  We will always have enemies in this life, but we don’t have to be one.  Be shielded by Jesus today.  Forgiven of sin.  Saved from enemies.

“The LORD is…my shield.  I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies.”  - Psalm 18:2-3

Jesus, My Shepherd: Provision for everything

Shelter, Shield, Shepherd (Part 1/3)

Jesus is become to us the manifest expression of God’s manifold provision for our many needs.

Yes, you are needy.  Admit it or don’t.  We both know it’s true. We all know it’s true.

You’re beat up.  You’re naked.  You’re lost.  You’re needy.

And no one else cares, no one else loves you to the degree or depth that God does.

How else does the gospel message even make sense or come to be apart from a divine reality saving us from our sorry human condition?

The gospel is the bridge between what you know experientially to be true in you and what you hope to be true beyond you.

The 3 Truths You Know

Life happens.  Rain.  Sun.  Heat.  Cold.  Wind.  Snow.  Skin is a poor defense against those things.  We all experience them.  We all have skin.  Therefore, we all need something else.  That something else is a shelter.

Some people just don’t like you.  Rightly or wrongly.  Personally or impersonally.  At best they don’t care, but mostly they care only for your harm and demise.  We are vulnerable.  We need a shield.

You are dumb and weak.  Maybe not in your professional field, recreational interests, or doing sudokus.  But in most things you either don’t have a clue or don’t have the strength.  We’re sheep.  We need a shepherd.

The 3 Truths You Hope To Find

An open door.  When the elements exert their power over us, our first and only thought is, ‘How can I get out of this?’  Anything will do.  But something permanent would be perfect.

A safe place.  Arrows of hatred whiz by.  Unkind words stab.  Mistreatment stings.  To just be ignored will do, but to be saved would be perfect.

A hero.  When you don’t know, you want to know someone who does.  When you can’t, you hope there is someone who can.  A stranger will do, but a father would be perfect.

Jesus, My Shelter: Protection from the elements

Jesus is the only person I know who has ever calmed a storm with his words.  Use your physical eyes to witness the powers that roam this world – the elements.  They are unrelenting, impartial, unsympathetic, impassionate, furious.  Now apply that to the world that lives inside your chest.  Storms don’t just blow across the plains, and hurricanes don’t only affect the coasts.  They rise in our hearts, minds, and souls.

We live in a world threatened and terrified by disaster.  Jesus alone stands above the unchangeable elements.  He has weathered the elemental wrath of God that is tracking directly across our souls.  He has withstood every torrential temptation and damaging disappointment.

The best we can do in a storm is hide.  The same holds true for the storms of life.  And Jesus invites us to hide in Him.  He provides Himself as the protection we need from the elements of life.  ‘…your life is hidden with Christ in God.’  Jesus used the image of a door to describe His role in the rescue mission of the gospel.  He is the only true shelter you will ever find for your soul.  Come in out of the rain.  Jesus is your shelter.

Jesus, My Shield: Protection from enemies

Jesus, My Shepherd: Provision for everything