Light in my darkness

By Rachel Williams

The Light In My Darkness

This tittle depicts that during the dark season of life I experienced, there was a strong presence of light. The light actually overpowered the darkness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rachel Williams
• Release date: Nov 16, 2020
• ISBN: 9781735758213

Book preview

Introduction

Psalm 18:1 —

I love you, LORD, my strength.

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Itruly love the beginning of this Psalm. It starts out with David telling God that he loves him! This is the only Psalm that starts with David directly telling God that he loves him, and I find myself in awe over this. Many of the Psalms are giving God praise and thanks, recounting God's faithfulness and his love and mercy toward us. Psalm 18 begins outright stating, I love you too God! It's a beautiful place to be in when we can express love, stating it with our lips, back to the one who created us. David realizes that God is his strength, his only source of strength and in that moment, the expression that pours out of his heart and spirit is to confess his love to his Lord.

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This Psalm is also one of the longest we find recorded in the book of Psalms. It can be somewhat difficult to read Psalm 18 all at once. Yet, David does not want to forget God’s attributes and what he has done for him. He personalizes all of God's character traits to remind himself of who God is to him and uses vivid imagery to describe God's emotions and actions on his behalf. I have read this Psalm numerous times and there are so many gems in this passage. One of the first times I read through Psalm 18, the Lord revealed verses to me that brought remembrance of my own battle he had rescued me from. My battle was with depression and mania. This battle raged from November of 2006 until the late Spring of 2008. I had experienced a very dark season of my life that the Lord walked me through and delivered me from. Today I can say alongside the Psalmist, I love you LORD, my strength. (vs. 1)

He (God) reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters. (vs. 16)

He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes who were too strong for me. (vs. 17)

He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me. (vs. 19)

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I would like to walk us through Psalm 18. I can’t promise that we will cover every verse, but I will go through each one as the Lord leads me to. As we maneuver through Psalm 18, I will revisit that dark place where the Lord has brought me from. This journey through the darkness into the light may become quite difficult for you, as it was for me. I'm sure there will be tears, some pain, and it will not always be pretty. Yet if you stick with me – You will see the light in your darkness; and I promise, there is beauty waiting for you at the end.

Chapter 1

vs. 2:

The Lord is my rock, my fortress

and my deliverer;

my God is my rock in

whom I take refuge, my shield

and the horn of my salvation,

my stronghold.

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Afew years ago, my then, eight year old daughter, loved collecting rocks. Almost everywhere we went she would find a new rock; large or small it didn’t matter, to add to her ever increasing rock collection. I remember during that time period that she took all of her rocks out and proceeded to count them. She had collected over 100 of them! This girl was serious about rocks. As I thought about my childhood and looked back over my life, I realized that I too had a love and appreciation for rocks. In my life now, I consider one rock to be most special and surpass all others.

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The Lord is my rock...

Throughout the bible and largely in the Old Testament the word rock is used as a descriptive name for God. In Hebrew there are two different words for the name rock, and each carry a different meaning. Sal'i means a fissure or split. Tsur means massive, very safe and virtually impenetrable like a mountain stronghold. In this verse both Hebrew words are used. In the first line of this verse, the Hebrew word for rock is noted as Sal’i and in the second line the Hebrew word for rock is noted to be Tsur.

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The meaning for Tsur is pretty clear. Many times we refer to God as being strong and as our stronghold. But what about Sal’i? If we plug in the definition of that meaning in the verse, we get, The Lord is my fissure. Huh? It sounds strange to our ears but when we look at and understand what a fissure is then the meaning starts becoming clear. A fissure is a long narrow opening in the earth. If you were hiking up a mountain, an example of a fissure would be a mountain cleft; parts of earth and rock that have cracked and opened up. This open area to stop and rest before reaching the top would be a blessing. It would be a secure area; a safe haven. David wrote this Psalm as he reflected on the Lord's deliverance of him from his enemies, mainly Saul. David was saying Lord you are my hiding spot, my safe place, the one to whom I can always run to.

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The Lord was David's covering; he had his back. God is our covering and protection as well. He is our hiding place, our fortress, and our deliverer. He’s got our back! Not only that, he wants all of us! God wants to be our stronghold. Do you know what a stronghold is? A stronghold is any area in our lives that has become such a part of us that it will literally take an army to tear it down. We’ve made a fortress out of this thing. It may be something that you notice one day and believe it just appeared overnight. The truth is, this is something that has been built in us, little by little over a period of time. Almost anything can become a stronghold if we allow it to. People, money, sex, alcohol and drugs, food, lust, gambling, gossip, criticism, need to control, self- righteousness, pride, pity, self - denial, disillusionment, lies, depression, anxiety, negative thinking, are just some of the common ones. Anything we have made a fortress of in our lives other than the Lord can and eventually do become strongholds.

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My season of depression was something I believed I had fallen into. As a child, a teenager and even into my young adulthood, depression was something I had never experienced. Of course as a young person I experienced sadness, heartache and pain, but I was quickly able to pull myself together, get back up and keep moving forward. At least that is what I believed.

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Recently as I spent some time thinking back over my life, I realized there were different situations that I experienced, where my response, most likely, was from a place of depression. I remembered as a middle schooler getting angry with my parents and thinking no one would miss me if I just died and wasn't around anymore. I remembered back in high school, a breakup I had with a boyfriend, and I thought about ending my life because I didn't want to deal with the guilt and shame I was feeling over the loss of the relationship. Then the most painful and closest to depression I had, before my major episode was when I chose to have an abortion at the age of twenty. A decision I said I would never make, I had now found myself making, believing it was the best option at the time, and hating every minute of it. Afterwards I experienced days of sadness and thoughts of ending my life because I had just taken a life and felt like I didn't deserve to live. This lasted for only a couple weeks and then I was able to put it behind me and move on.

Those memories brought the realization that I had opened myself up to allow the stronghold of depression to begin building in my life. A crisis that I believed to just happen at the age of twenty-six, had been being built in me, spiritually, under the radar for quite some time.

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God wants to be our stronghold. He desires to be the fortress in our lives that nothing can stand against or knock down. He wants to be our rock – our safe place for us to run to. God can handle all our enemies. He can fight all the things we want to hide from. We will have to face them, but he will keep us safe while doing so, and fight against them on our behalf. Oh, how I need the LORD to be my stronghold; don't you?

Let's pray.

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Father God,

You tell me in your word that you are my rock, my deliverer and my fortress. Lord Jesus, I run to you. I claim these truths as my own. Lord, I need your protection, I need you as my shield. I need your direction and I need you as my stronghold. O God, there are things in my life I need to be delivered from so I pray, Heal me, LORD, and I will be healed, save me and I will be saved, for you are the one I praise. Jeremiah 17:14

In Jesus' name, Amen.

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vs. 3:

I called to the LORD who is worthy of praise,

and I have been saved from my enemies.

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Oh LORD,

You are so worthy of all my praise. When I call to you Lord, you hear me. When I cry out to you Lord, you save me from all my enemies. You know who my enemies are. They may be people, spiritual forces or strongholds that have me enslaved. Thank you, that you are able to deliver me, just as you delivered your servant David. I love you LORD, I thank you, and I praise you!

In Jesus name, Amen

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In the darkest time of my life I did cry out. I cried out many days and nights with no clear answer or change in my condition. I began to believe the lie that God was not listening, or more so that he just wasn't answering me. I believed the reason to be that he was angry and disappointed with me. I later learned neither of those reasons were true. God was listening. He was answering and moving on my behalf. He loved me with a passion and an unconditional love that I still do not fully understand. He heard every cry and every prayer. His plan was to give me more than just an answer to prayer. His desire was to give me a total makeover. This could only happen by letting some things in me die, so that new life could begin.

Chapter 2

vs. 4:

The cords of death entangled me;

The torrents of destruction overwhelmed me.

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vs. 5:

The cords of the grave coiled around me;

The snares of death