During 2025, Peachtree Church is focusing on the Book of Psalms with a series called Dwell, through which we seek to deepen our conversation with God and open ourselves to hearing his response. The practice of praying three times each day will unite the voices of our hearts and souls as we seek the day when we will see the full realization of the Kingdom of God, promised in Revelation 21:3: “…Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.”
We will email devotionals twice weekly with Monday’s providing an overview of the Psalm as a whole, and Wednesday’s focused on that week’s Daily Dwell.
Psalm 55:6-8, 22
I said, “Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
I would fly away and be at rest.
I would flee far away
and stay in the desert;
I would hurry to my place of shelter,
far from the tempest and storm.” …
Cast your cares on the Lord
and he will sustain you;
he will never let
the righteous be shaken.
Devotional
Psalm 55 has two ways to think about how a person can cope with adversity.
One is to fly away.
One is to cast our cares on God.
Long ago, I had a sweet high school friend who came over to my house for a spend-the-night. I noticed that her father was very strict and tough on her; she would get in big trouble for pretty minor things. She seemed a bit afraid of him. There were all kinds of things he said were wrong, and it was easy to displease him. My father was, in contrast, much more gracious and forgiving. The two of us asked if we could take his car and go somewhere, to shop or some such thing. My dad said, “Sure! Have a good time.” And then we asked who could drive and he said, “Well, let’s have Jenny drive.” So we did that. And Jenny had a little bit of an accident and put a dent in my dad’s nice car. We drove home and she was really scared, probably thinking of the way her own father would react. Her reaction was to fold up and go to sleep on a sofa, right in the middle of the afternoon. She just didn’t even want to be awake when my father found out. So she was sound asleep when he got home. I told him what had happened and we walked around the car, looking at the damage. He walked all the way around and said, “I don’t see anything.” I said, “Right here, Daddy,” and pointed out a very small dent. He said, “Oh, that’s not a big deal.” When Jenny finally woke up, expecting to be in huge trouble, he hugged her and told her not to worry. And he did not tell her dad. (I like to think he would have been just this unbothered if I had been the one to dent his car, by the way. Which I never, ever did, thank the Lord.)
One way to deal with trouble is to just flee, check out, ignore it, disassociate, blank out. All of these are avoidant, yes? We aren’t really dealing with the trouble itself; we are reacting by curling up and going to sleep on the sofa of our minds. We are so afraid that we just wish we had the wings of a dove to get away from it all.
Another way to deal with trouble is to cast our cares on God. The Psalmist says he will sustain us; He will make life possible; He will provide for us what we need in the time of trouble. He says that God will not let us be shaken, that he will not permit the righteous to be moved. In a world where foundations seem shaky and things we accepted as immutable are falling, the Psalmist reminds us that God is able to help us stand firm, when we cast our cares on Him.
For Reflection
- Did your family have a particular way of dealing with trouble?
- Can you think of an example from your own past when God helped you to deal with trouble?
Prayer
Dear Lord, when I have sorrow or grief or trouble in my life, I wake up in the night and I think I just wish I could fly away from it all. But then it is with me when I wake up, when I go through my day, and when I lie down to sleep, there it all is again. I can’t fly away from it. But I know I can depend on you to help me deal with it, whatever it is. I know you can give me new ideas and new strength to cope. I know you will walk with me, during each day and when I lie down at night to rest. Lord, thank you for helping me to bear whatever happens. Thank you for helping me to live this messy, abundant, good life with You. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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