Hearing God’s voice in the darkness

"He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings."- Psalms 40:2 kjv

When you are in a pit and it is so dark that the only time rays of sunlight filter into your prison is at high noon, you don’t play games with God. You don’t tell Him what a nice person you are, or how much you have done for His cause. You go one-on-one with God, pleading your case, asking Him to intervene for you.

Today–at least in most civilized countries of the world–we no longer take people and place them in pits. In ancient days, it was done. You may remember the Old testament story of Joseph, who so angered his brothers that they cast him into a pit and later sold him into slavery. Old Jeremiah was cast into a slime pit when his prophecies angered the king (see Jeremiah 38). Go to the remains of the house of Caiaphas, the high priest who condemned Jesus, at St. Peter’s in Gallicantu, as it is now known, and you will see a kind of pit, a hallowed out limestone cavern where Jesus was kept while the council of the Sanhedrin was summoned.

The pits that we often find ourselves in today are psychological–depression, anger, inadequacy, worry, addiction–something that you just can’t break out of, something that keeps you in darkness, something which you feel has swallowed you and from which you will never escape. Have I said anything that strikes a chord in your life?

I am thinking of some of the letters which come to our office from people just like you–people with education, people who married with the greatest hopes but now live with the most desperate fear, people who believe that God at one time did answer their prayers, but who now wonder where He is and why He doesn’t deliver them from their problems.

Whether or not David was actually in a pit is uncertain, but he talked about pits more than we often do today. But David always credited God as being the One who brings deliverance from the pit. God is still the Deliverer who can take us from the pit and out our feet on solid rock.

Here’s a question: Would you admit you need help in getting out of the pit? You’ve tried and tried, and failed. Why not ask for His help? There’s no need to strike a bargain with God, or to say politely, "Look, if You do this for me, here’s what I’ll do for You." Just tell Him what your need is and then trust Him completely. The man or woman who has been delivered from the darkness of the pit has been through a life-changing experience. You’ll never, ever be the same again. - Resource reading: Habakkuk 2