Have you ever wondered, "Has God forgotten me?" If so, you are not the first. This is not a new experience. We find the same question expressed over and over again in the Bible. For example, David cried out: How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will...
Category: David
Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I call to you all day long
We don’t all have the same experience of God in suffering. For some, their primary experience of him through trauma is a sense of being close to him, that he is present with them in it. For others, there can be a deep sense of abandonment or doubt about God’s...
How long, O God?
How do we relate to God while going through trauma? You might resonate with the cry, “How long, O God?”
In the midst of deep anguish, hanging on for dear life, attacked by those around him, David cried out to God. Just as Hannah did a generation earlier:
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Are abusers aware of their behaviour?
Are abusers aware of what they are doing? Overlapping with the question of whether abusers are deliberate is: are they aware? Aware of what they are doing? Aware of the harm it causes? Knowing the answer to those questions might make a profound difference in what a...
Some trust in chariots and some in horses
One of the many difficult and important challenges for victims of abuse is to predict future behaviour. Is the abuser going to change? Abuse often happens in a cycle, with increasing tension until there is an episode, followed by a show of “remorse” from the abuser,...
Wicked people will not oppress them anymore
When God spoke to David about building a temple, 3000 years ago, he promised to make a place of sanctuary for his people. “Wicked people will not oppress them anymore,” he said.
In that passage, the name God uses is still “Yahweh”, given at the time of the Exodus. The mission hasn’t changed either. He also calls himself “the LORD Almighty”, or, Yahweh/Lord of Hosts. It’s the same name Hannah uses when she cries out to God in the agony of her domestic violence: yet another person crying out against oppression.
Children are a heritage from Yahweh
“Children are a heritage from Yahweh”
In the middle verse of the middle psalm of the Songs of Ascents, the focus is on children.
Solomon, who likely wrote this psalm, did not appear to have a wonderful father. Few positive or healthy interactions between David and his children are recorded.