Psalm Devotional
Christ, Our Peace
The Christian life is filled with struggle, distress, and doubt as we interact with a world that often seems to lack any good. Psalm 4 offers the promise of moving from distress to sleep-filled calm through Christ who is our peace.
Here we encounter the psalmist in the posture of prayer due to his distress. The Hebrew word for distress implies that the psalmist is in a narrow and tight situation. To express it in a colloquialism, the psalmist is between a rock and a hard place.
In the Book of Psalms, distress is usually the result of external trouble, internal turmoil, or the perceived distance of God. Here, the psalmist suffers from two of these. He is experiencing the external taunting of his enemies and perceives that God is delaying his deliverance.
The three forms of distress in the Psalter are the very same distresses we face today. Maybe you are under distress because of financial, physical, or marital difficulties. Perhaps your distress is caused by unresolved sin. Maybe you feel like the heavens are made of brass or that God has dealt unjustly with you. How should a Christian respond to distress?
