Persevering Prayer: Help!

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Psalm 46:1-2 “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”

Hebrews 13:5b-6 “for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’
So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; 
I will not fear; what can man do to me?’”

Psalm‬ ‭38:22‬ “Make haste to help me, O Lord, my salvation!”

Psalm 12:1 “Help, Lord, for the godly man ceases to be,
For the faithful disappear from among the sons of men.”

Other posts: Series Overview, Have Mercy on Me, Search Me, Hallowed Be Your Name

Introduction

I’ll spare you a corny reference to the popular song by the Beatles. Well, I guess I still referenced it... This, for Christians, should be a persevering theme in all of our prayers, a posture even. One of the things I say to those I counsel is that it requires humility to even reach out for help, and it’s evidence of God’s grace in our lives. He enables us to call out to Him (John 6:44). We may even experience this cry for help, tears or not, as a privilege and a blessing. If your faith is that strong, praise God. For me, It does not often feel this way.

I experience this as a primal call. This is often when I don’t know what to pray and I’m feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. Romans 8:26 comes to mind as I start to reach the point of feeling “groanings too deep for words.” When I don’t have words, “Help Lord” is all I can say.

A Very Present Help

Psalm 46:1 kicks off one of my favorite psalms to read in times of trouble, when I feel at the end of what I can take. The NASB translation includes a footnote “or abundantly available for help.” We have faith that God is always near. It’s a common experience in the Psalms, and my experience, to feel as though the Lord is far off. Regardless, He is omnipresent and omnipotent. He is not only present everywhere, He is also unlimited in power. No situation is out of his completely sovereign control. This leads my mind to one of my favorite verses we have when God tells Joshua in Joshua 1:9, “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” He is with me wherever and whenever I am in whatever circumstances.

He knows all and upholds all (Hebrews 1:3). He numbers the very hairs on our heads (Matthew 10:30) while simultaneously calling the stars by name (Isaiah 40:25-27). He is authoring the macro and micro of our lives and the cosmos. There are books that I enjoy that describe story structure. Two I enjoy and recommend are here and here. The end of Act 2 is often what is referred to as “The Dark Night of The Soul” when the character is all alone and in “up against the ropes.” They feel alone and helpless. This is where I find this prayer coming up in my life. The Gospel news for these moments is that they are not the end of the story. They come before the resolution. This resolution comes from God, on His timing and terms. It may mean anything from total relief of the current circumstance, to the strength to endure. This may include death, as we’ll talk about in the next heading. For the Christian, the dark night of the soul is never the end. Your story will end in complete joy, forever.

Psalm 46 continues, “Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling.” This description is a picture of chaos, devastation, and loss. When all footing is thrown out from underneath us, and we have nothing to hold onto, our God is there. When we feel overtaken by the waves of this life, God carries us. When what we were putting all our confidence in is “moved into the heart of the sea” out of sight, we have a personal and Holy God there to be our aid.

Standing on The Promise

Hebrews 13:5-6 gives us one more example of God’s willingness and promise to help us. It says “for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?’” The logic of this verse is “since A, B” which sounds simple enough, but I think there are some distinctions to be made.

The first is that the help is God, not the removal of difficulty. He is there, and He is all we need to endure. We need the Giver more than we need the gift. When we see God more and more as He truly is, we realize His true value as all that we need. Paul discusses this before one of his most popular phrases, “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” It comes as the resounding crescendo to his discussion of a contentment beyond circumstances. He says in Philippians 3:11-12 “Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.”

The second exposition is that “what can man do to me?” may feel as though it’s only discussing relationships. I make this mistake in assuming that when I hear it. If explored more, man can be the cause of every difficult circumstance in our lives. I view this statement and ask the question “What can possibly happen to me?” The answer can be extreme. The answer may include death, but the Christian’s story does not end in death. All that can happen to us is exactly what God had planned for us to endure and the promise that we stand on is that He will be there. He will be present. He will help us through.

God cares about our circumstances. He cares about them so much that he uses them, for the Christian, to maximize their eternal delight in Him. The variety of situations that cause people to cry ‘Help!’ can be used by God to prepare us for reigning with Christ forever. The final note, and Gospel news of it for anyone reading is that, as a favorite author of mine puts it “God takes you where you are, not where you ought to be.” So if you feel you are to blame for reaching this awful circumstance, cry out to God in faith and repentance. He will not only clear you of all blame and declare you innocent, He will lead you from now until forever to eternal joy being reconciled to Him.