Repentance: An Invitation to RestSample

Healed by Stripes

David prayed, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” (Psalms 139:23-24 NKJV)

When we ask God to try us, we are asking to be exposed, to have our offensive thoughts, words, and deeds revealed, examined, and pruned by the Master Gardener. Our anxious thoughts reveal what idols we have set up in opposition to God, for as Isaiah said, “You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.” (Isaiah 26:3 NKJV)

If we’re not at perfect peace, we’re not keeping our mind stayed on the God who made us and loves us; we’re not trusting in Him.

Which means we’re trusting in something else. 

Which may also mean we’re reluctant to ask God to try us, because we don’t want Him to know we’re trusting in something lesser. (As if He doesn’t already know.) On the contrary, when we say, “try me,” we’re saying, “I have a cancer in me that is acting like it’s part of me but is really trying to kill me. I need You to poison, cut, or burn it out of me so that only You remain.”

We are asking to be examined, exposed, cleaned. Healed. 

By His mercies, the flame, the scalpel, the trial doesn’t consume us (though we do experience the pain of the trial—and sometimes wonder if we, too, will be consumed), it consumes that part of us that is a stronghold built against Him. After we are tried and our dross removed, we are more like Christ, the One who was tried and found worthy, and by Whose stripes we are healed.

Reflection

Are you willing to let God remove the wickedness in you?

Do you believe that Jesus’s stripes have already paid the price and are now able to bring you healing?