WHAT DO YOU SEE ?

WHAT DO YOU SEE ?: King David at Ziklag is another Old Testament example of a man's turning his face to the wall. David's possessions were in ashes. His love ones had been taken into captivity, and his followers, who were so noted for their loyalty, were ready to stone him. But thank God, David turned his face to the wall. It says in (1 Samuel 30:6). "But David encouraged himself in the Lord his God." That means he turned his face to the wall. When you and I say that we are trusting God, you must realize that you cannot trust God beyond what his Word says ! David saw nothing but God. The results was a great victory for David. He got his loved ones back and a great spoil besides. History gives us even more examples, Dr. Yeomans points out. Augustine, the noted sixth century bishop, wrote about a high-ranking man of Carthage who was near death after a number of unsuccessful operations. He was facing yet another operation; however, his physician had no hope it would be successful. When Augustine arrived to pray for the nobleman, the man fell on the floor, prostrating himself before God. In fact, Augustine said it looked like he had been forcibly knocked down. Perhaps the power of God fell on him ! The man began to pray, Augustine said, with great earnestness, emotion, a flood of tears, and agitation of his whole body. Augustine meant that the man's whole body was shaking with sobs. It reminds us of what is said in the first chapter of James: "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much" (v. 16). Augustine admitted, "For my part I could not prayer. This alone, inwardly and briefly, I said: "Lord what prayers of thy children wilt thou ever grant if Thou grant not these ?" For nothing seems more possible than that he should die praying." Augustine concluded by saying that when the man's surgeons came to remove the dressing, they found his diseased tissues perfectly healed. This Carthaginian nobleman had simply turned his face to the wall and had found there is a God with whom nothing is impossible. Dr. Yeomans relates how Martin Luther, too, new what it was to turn his face to the wall "in utter despair of all human aid." One of Luther's helpers in the Protestant Reformation became seriously ill, and Luther went to see him. He found him near death. Dr. Yeomans wrote, "Luther turned away from the awful sense to the window, and thou called on God, urging upon Him all the promises he could repeat from the Scripture, and adding, with incredible boldness that God must hear an answer now if He will ever have the petitioner trust Him again." Think about this --- a Lutheran minister prayed like this, Luther said, "I called on God. I called on God with all the promises I could repeat from the Scripture." In other words, Luther simply reminded God of every promise he could think of, and then with incredible boldness said, "God, You must hear an answer, because if You don't hear me, I won't ever be able to trust You again." That's pretty bold, isn't it ? We too must come to the place where we will take God's Word trusting in what he has said, and then reap the results ! That wasn't some wild-eye Pentecostal preacher praying; that was a Lutheran ! Later, his friend wrote, "I should have been a dead man had I not been recalled from death itself by the coming of Luther." He was raised up. Luther wrote friends, "Philip is very well. . . I found him dead but by an evident miracle of God he live." What did Luther do ? He turned his face to the wall. He saw nothing but God. He refused to see anything else. At first glance, his friends seeing virtually dead -- but Luther did look at that. He turned and looked out the window ! Perhaps if it would have been some of us we probably will turn to the situation or circumstance and begin to talk about it rather than talking to God about it ! He didn't see any houses. He didn't see any trees. He was looking at God. He was looking unto the God with whom all things are possible. Think about what he said, "I Reminded Him of all the promises I could think of, and then I said, "Lord, if you don't hear me, I won't ever be able to trust you any more."