5/26/13- The Ultimate Shelter

Hear my cry, O God;

    listen to my prayer.

2 

From the ends of the earth I call to you,

    I call as my heart grows faint;

    lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

3 

For you have been my refuge,

    a strong tower against the foe.

4 

I long to dwell in your tent forever

    and take refuge in the shelter of your wings. (Psalm 61:1-4)

Thoughts: The shelter of God's wings shield us from the elements, the sun, the heat, the rain, the cold.  Jesus looked on Jerusalem and said how he would like to gather Jerusalem under his wings as a mother hen would gather his chicks- but they would not come (Mt. 23:37).
    God is the ultimate shelter.  He is called in scripture "the shelterer" or the "one who provides shelter" ten times, and inferred many more times.   He covers us with the pinions of his wings.  He is the ultimate shelter in life and in death.  In fact, He is the only shelter in death that promises to lead us through to more life.  

      Human shelters provide temporary shelter but not the ultimate shelter.  In the tornadoes in Moore, OK May 20, 2013, those who had shelters survived.  But in the end nothing on earth can shelter us from death.  There is an illusion that we can protect ourselves.  So Sadaam Hussein's Yugoslavian engineers promised that his bunkers were impenetrable- until the bunker busting bombs destroyed them.  So today Doomsday Preppers think they can get enough dehydrated food to ride out the end of the world (however they define that).  They deceive themselves.  Only God is the ultimate shelter and refuge.  

     If there were an attack on our land, and we knew where to find shelter, and people were inviting us to come, would we go the other way?  Yet many turn away from the shelter of the Almighty in order to go their own way.  

Prayer: Lord, shelter me in the midst of the storms of life.  I come to you in life and in death- I am yours.