The Ballestero Blog

Crying for Your Mama

One of the most uncomfortable passages in Psalms that I have read in recent years is found in Psalms 35.

David explains that there were some that hated him. More than that, the laid traps for him and even lied and brought trumped up charges against him.

These were the same people that David cared about. Those you love can hurt you the most. When they were sick, he fasted and prayed for them.  This was the thanks he got.

David’s defense caught me off guard. He didn’t try to defend him self.

• Psa. 35:7 For without cause have they hid for me their net in a pit, which without cause they have digged for my soul.
• Psa. 35:11 False witnesses did rise up; they laid to my charge things that I knew not.
• Psa. 35:12 They rewarded me evil for good to the spoiling of my soul.
• Psa. 35:13 But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth: I humbled my soul with fasting; and my prayer returned into mine own bosom.
• Psa. 35:14 I behaved myself as though he had been my friend or brother: I bowed down heavily, as one that mourneth for his mother.

David’s response to their injustice was to bow himself down heavily (put his head on the floor) and weep for them in the same manner, and with the same emotion he would have used at his own mother’s funeral.

Imagine, crying unto God for your enemies, like you would cry at the loss of your own mother.

If this is a picture of what my response to my enemy is suppose to be, then help me Jesus.

If I am to mourn for my enemies, like I am crying for my my dead mother, then what is my prayer for my brother or sister in Christ supposed to be like.

• I am not sure our prayers are at the level in God they should be.
• We are all too selfish, our prayers are all about us.

When Job prayed for his friends, God turned his world around.

What would it take to turn ours around?