Only One

“For thou art great, and doest wondrous things: thou art God alone.” (Ps 86:10 AV)

The psalm of praise is absolutely marvelous.  Nothing but praise and adoration towards a God who had been faithful the David all his life.  God met every need.  God vanquished every foe.  What struck me as important this morning is the last part of that statement above.  God is God alone.  We need no other.  There is no other aide or help which David needed.  Yes, he used the people around him to accomplish that which God had called him to, but he needed God and God alone.

This is a hard reality to learn.  We are accustomed to relying on many things around us.  We have many safety nets.  In our young years, we had our parents.  We had our teachers.  We had our older siblings.  When we were younger, we had our friends, our neighbors, our community.  As we entered into adulthood and began families of our own, we had our employers.  We had our civic governments.  We had our insurance companies and credit card balances.  AS we approach our twilight years, we will rely upon our health care system, our social security system, our retirement, and our children.  There are so many things and people upon whom we depend, it is easy to forget that God is sufficient.  God, and God alone.  There are precious few saints who have learned this tremendous and life changing truth.  There was Moses who could only survive on the back side of the desert with the intervention of God and God alone.  There was Elijah, who upon fleeing from Jezebel, learned just how great a God he serves.  There was Joseph, who alone and in the prison for a crime which he did not commit, realized the power of God and God alone.  Then there was Jeremiah, wallowing in the pit of a dungeon, or Daniel in the lion’s den, or the three children of Israel in the burning fiery furnace – all experience life with a God who alone is mighty.  There was Peter, walking on the water, or John in the middle of the wilderness or Paul, cast into the dessert for three years of training, or John on the Isle of Patmos.  Who can forget Jonah, alone in the belly of the whale?  All these saints were isolated for the primary purpose of experiencing God and God alone.

This is a hard truth to learn.  But it is a precious truth to learn.  So few are willing to learn it.  So few are willing to let go of their comfort zone to understand the fullness of God’s presence and all-sufficiency.  So very few are willing to let go of all upon which they have come to depend so they might learn that God is God alone.