“As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness.” Psalm 17:15
David spends this entire psalm pleading with the Lord to deliver him from his persecutors, to show His love for him while his enemies plot against him, to hear his cry while being surrounded by those whose desire to is to oppress him, and to vindicate him while his enemies have risen up against him.
David is in great distress with no one to come to his aid. He ends this psalm not by taking comfort in earthly blessings like those who are against him (vs 14) but in the hope of his being transformed into the likeness of God. David knows that God will use these terrible trials to make him more like God himself and he rejoices in that.
Now to us, in our fallen human nature, this might seem like little comfort because we feel acutely the intensity of our sufferings and we fail to understand the grandeur and exceeding glory of what it means to be like God. But the difference is like a firecracker compared to a nuclear bomb.
God is love. To be like God means to be perfected in love. When we are suffering, what do we want? We want relief, deliverance from our pain and troubles, and to experience peace, comfort, unity, and ultimately love. Christlikeness means experiencing true love. This is the amazing truth of the Gospel that God can use our sufferings to perfect us in love, which is ultimately what we really want and need. Romans 8:15 says,” For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” This chapter ends by declaring that nothing can separate us from the love of God which in Christ Jesus our Lord.
David understood, and so should we, that in Christ, our difficulties make us more like Jesus. We become more able to experience and express true love. And that is truly cause for rejoicing!
His mercy endures forever!
Pastor Flynn
Photo by John Thomas