PART 3 OF 3
At a national competition, my son’s trap-shooting team won second place. The entire team along with coaches were called onto the field and presented plaques. They were lined up under bright lights, and official photos were taken. It was a big moment. Many weeknights of practice and long weekends of competition had led to their success. It was a night they will never forget.
We sometimes refer back to those seasons of our youth as the “glory days.”
When King David was fleeing from the palace and being pursued by his son, Absalom, he wrote Psalm 3:3, the verse we have been studying. But you, oh Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.
Glory? As David ran for his life and lived in hiding? As he mourned the betrayal and rebellion of his own son? Surely all good things had been long left behind in the “glory days” of his kingship.
I know that when I was in the middle of one of life’s most difficult blows, I certainly didn’t feel any glory in its unfolding. As I sat weeping alone in the bathroom floor, I felt no glory. As I watched my family crumbling, I felt no glory.
But feelings can be deceiving.
How, then, can we have glory in the midst of our darkest moments? We cannot. But God can.
Because God is our glory.
God’s power is made perfect in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9), and it is in those very moments that we can’t, that other people see what God can accomplish. That strength to go on? It’s from God. (Isaiah 40:31)
The compassion you now so freely bestow? It’s from God. (2 Cor. 1:4)
The peace no one can explain? It’s from God. (Phil. 4:7)
In our weakness, He is our glory. And never does God’s light shine so brightly as when it spills from a soul the world would deem broken. (2 Cor. 12:9)
We may not be able to see it ourselves—not until time and healing give us perspective—but others will. And if my life can be used to shed just a little bit of God’s light and glory into this broken world, then that is a life well-lived. Even when the living is so very, very hard.
The next time life sends us reeling, let us ask God to be our glory. Then let’s keep our eyes open to all that He does when we can’t.
Until next time,
Shelby
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