A Place Called Safety

Joshua chapter 20 designates six cities where a person may flee for safety when they accidentally killed a person. “Tell the Israelites to designate the cities of refuge, as I instructed you through Moses, so that anyone who kills a person accidentally and unintentionally may flee there and find protection from the avenger of blood (verses 2-3 NIV).

If ever we need a strong reassuring sense of security and protection it is now.

Daily we hear of reports of terrorists destroying lives especially children and breathing out threats against other nations. Right in the heartland of America there was a riot that boiled over into the streets. Schools, movie theaters and even a church - places no one expects violence - lives were gunned down by the hands of men blind with rage. In major cities there is a growing discontent with those who are to uphold the law only to learn they were breaking it themselves.

Who are you going to trust? Where do you run from this ever increasing madness where lives seemed no longer valued but are killed like animals? It seems in our society there's not a thought that God is real and He exists. Or there is a heaven and hell. And a day of reckoning. Indeed truth has fallen in our streets! (Isaiah 59:14).

While we may seek out the courts instead of cities of refugee; we have God who is our ever present help in time of trouble. Psalms 9:9 says, "The LORD also will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble." (KJV)

Beloved, though we live in turbulent and disturbing times we must daily acknowledge God is our refuge. It does not mean we are an exception to suffering or pain. Who knows we may die at the hands of a madman. When the towers fell on 9/11 it claimed the lives of many Christians, including those in the airplanes.

But our hearts are peace with a God who will right every wrong. He is the judge of the whole earth. It says, "For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead." (Acts 17:31, NIV).

When trouble is all around comfort your hearts with this promise: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." (John 14:27).

There is a refuge where peace surrounds us though our hearts and flesh may fail but God is our portion (and refuge) forever (Psalms 73:26).