Anguish of Soul
Turn us again to yourself, O Lord God of Heaven’s Armies. M ake your face shine down upon us. Only then will we be saved. (Psalm 80:19 NLT) If you have ever been in one of those places some would label as "a funk", you probably have cried out a little to God because of the circumstances of life and the just plain miserableness of your plight. You might even have complained, groaned, screamed, and even fallen prostrate before him in prayer. It is not uncommon to begin to heighten our intensity toward prayer when life isn't dealing us what we consider to be a "fair hand". As I read through a couple of the psalms this morning, beginning at the 77th and moving through the 80th, I noted a common theme of crying out to God for restoration of some "former condition". The nation of Israel had slipped away from their first love - they had enjoyed times of great privilege, but had come into a place of being overtaken in their own lands and placed under t...