I am at the beach for a few days! Usually, we plan on beach camping no later than July each year. So this feels long overdue. I am still counseling remotely, but it feels good to be on a “getaway”.
I have had a profound realization that even though we may long to hurl our cell phones off the mountainside and drive to the end of the continent to get away from it all, there are two things we can’t escape: ourselves and our Savior’s love.
The first can be a challenge. In recovery, when someone changes their location to avoid dealing with all of their issues, we call it “Pulling a geographic.” In response to that stinkin’ thinkin’, we learn that “Where ever you go, there you are!” So it’s best to stick around, buckle down, and deal with our dysfunctions—no matter how daunting they may seem at the time.
But it’s the latter that helps us with the former because no matter where we are in location or dysfunction, our Savior’s love is right there with us, bringing comfort, insight, and support.
In Psalm 139: 7-10, David states, “Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? 8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, 10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.”
David marvels at how the Lord knows his thoughts (v4). And he asks the Lord to show him where he is missing the mark. “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139:23-24).
That takes guts, but after acting on his own self-interest with that whole Bathsheba thing, he now knows how much he needs the Lord’s direction. But there is something else I note here. David has to be assured of God’s unconditional love to ask for such intense scrutiny. Our God-seeking psalmist recognizes God’s unrelenting commitment to his well-being as we see in these verses.
“...for I have always been mindful of your unfailing love and have lived in reliance on your faithfulness,” Psalm 26: 3.
“But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation,” Psalm 13:5.
“Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life,” Psalm 143:8.
We can’t get away from ourselves, and we can’t get away from the Lord either. Psalm 139: 17-18, How precious are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them!... When I awake, I am still with you.”
And no matter what headlines cause us to want to head to Tahiti or to a desert island getaway in the middle of the Caribbean, we know that God’s unfailing love will carry us through. David knew that when he wrote in Psalm 62:8, “Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge.”
I can use a getaway like that. Can you?