You have put off my sackcloth.. You clothed me with gladness

[Ebn Barbara]

David was an honest clear man with the Lord.. he was humble.. his heart was after God’s heart.. He was a real man, he wasn’t fake, everyone could easily see-through him, he didn’t wear a mask, his words and his outward appearance were 100% similar to what was inside of him, and he didn’t have unrealistic artificial speeches in front of the Lord or when asked by others about his situation..
Totally different than us !!!
We are bitter inside of us.. hurt.. depressed.. smashed.. or at least, we are not as we should be according to God’s promises and plans to our lives.. our joy is unstable, shaken and not full.. our peace is shaken.. our security is lost or troubled.. we have fear.. we worry.. we get depressed.. we lament.. we cry.. there is no victory in our life.. repeated failures.. but our outward appearance doesn’t always reflect our inward situation.. our answers are superficial:
“ thank God, I am good by His grace ”, “ I am great, everything is good ” and other similar speeches.
But David wasn’t like this.. listen to what he used to say to God:
" Lord, all my desire is before You; And my sighing is not hidden from You. My heart pants, my strength fails me; As for the light of my eyes, it also has gone from me… Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? … O my God, my soul is cast down within me; I will say to God my Rock: Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? " (Psalms 38 : 9 – 10, 42 : 5 – 9).
On whom these words don’t apply?
Who is enjoying life, joy, deep peace, feeling secure as he should be…?
I will not wait for anybody’s answer.. we will meditate on God’s encouraging message to each one of us today..
The question is why?
Why depression.. worry.. fear.. sadness.. rejection.. low self esteem.. feeling unloved by God or by others.. we can’t rejoice as we should.. our enjoyment is missing.. our peace is shaken and moved.. why.. and why.. and why? And why did I try to get out of this situation, but I didn’t succeed.. and the results are not pleasing?
The answer.. is because we are:
" Many a time they have afflicted me from my youth, Let Israel now say: Many a time they have afflicted me from my youth; Yet they have not prevailed against me. The plowers plowed on my back; They made their furrows deep and long. The Lord is righteous; He has cut in pieces the cords of the wicked. Let all those who hate Zion Be put to shame and turned back. Let them be as the grass on the housetops, Which withers before it grows up, With which the reaper does not fill his hand, Nor he who binds sheaves, his arms " (Psalms 129 : 1 – 7).

We all without exception.. were harassed as children.. in our childhood.. in the land of our slavery..
The devil, the rude acts we were subject to the hard circumstances we went through, wounded our back.. not any wounds.. the word says here: deep wounds.. long wounds!!!
Our lives.. our souls.. have become like a plowed field.. the plowers’ furrows.. long and deep..
We remember some of what we went through, we don’t remember everything, we don’t remember all the harassments and the hard attitudes and the rude acts, that were beyond our ability to handle.. and they resulted in deep long wounds:
The neglecting of our parents to us, losing our parents in a young age, our rejection by those around us, hurting words, tough words that brought curses to our lives, the rude conduct of the teachers toward us, negative depressing failing words, obligation to work and take care of ourselves in a young age, losing dear ones, the wars that we went through, the destruction that our eyes witnessed, not having enough love, compassion, and kindness, a failing marriage, betrayals we were subject to in variant areas.. we can add too many other things..
All that.. we say resulted in long deep wounds..
But what is the solution? That’s what matters.
The first stage of the solution, in what David said, and in what this psalm is saying:
First: to be real like David, humble, not ashamed to reveal our real selves in front of others and in front of God, asking help, holding on to God’s promises to us, refusing to let Him go until He blesses us, in order to have the great life He prepared for us.
Second: what the psalm itself is saying: “ they have not prevailed against me ”.
The reason is because I came to the Lord, I opened up my heart to Him, I asked Him to come into my life.. that is why they won’t prevail against me.. and also this psalm is saying: “ the Lord is righteous, He has cut in pieces the cords of the wicked ”.
The Lord broke the cords of this hard slavery we suffered from, which made our lives like a plowed field with long deep furrows, this is a symbol of the work of the cross that smashed the head of the devil, and crucified our old man with all that he had from chains problems and wounds, and took us from the land of slavery to the land of freedom.. land of rest.
The slavery cords of Mr. Satan the evil one through which he used to put us in bondage, and plows on our back and wounds it, has been broken.
This is the first stage of the solution:
To be real before God, revealing to Him the innermost of my being like David did saying:
“ all my desire is before you, and my sighing is not hidden from you ”.
Then to proclaim my faith that my God is just, He didn’t stand watching, He broke the hard cords of slavery.. I trust Him with an undoubtful trust.. so I can open the door for the next step of the solution: the work of the Holy Spirit, which will not be released to give the complete solution, without faith in God’s justice, in His goodness, in His care toward me, in His unconditional love for me, whatever my situation is, no matter how great and many are my sins !!!
And the same psalm continue saying:
“ let them be as the grass on the housetop, which withers before it grows up, with which the reaper doesn’t fill his hand, nor he who binds sheaves, his arms ”.
After they had been hard cords of slavery, made of metal and iron, they will be like grass of housetop which withers before it grows up, so the one who took us into slavery will not be able to fill his hand nor his arms from it.
What then?
" You visit the earth and water it, You greatly enrich it; The river of God is full of water; You provide their grain, For so You have prepared it. You water its ridges abundantly, You settle its furrows; You make it soft with showers, You bless its growth ". (Psalms 65 : 9 – 10).
" There will be on every high mountain And on every high hill Rivers and streams of waters, In the day of the great slaughter, When the towers fall. Moreover the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, And the light of the sun will be sevenfold, As the light of seven days, In the day that the Lord binds up the bruise of His people And heals the stroke of their wound " (Isaiah 30 : 25 – 26).
The second stage of the solution: is the work of the Holy Spirit, after we believe what the Lord made for us on the cross..
The Holy Spirit will do two things, and I ask you today to receive these words as if they are coming from the mouth of the Lord directly:
1 - The Holy Spirit will take care of your dry hard land, that is plowed with long deep furrows, and pours on it His fresh healing water, to satisfy the thirst of the furrows.. the deep furrows of the plower, he will settle the high mountains that hinders the blessings, he will soften the wounds with his oil, he will bless the growth, then joy, rest, peace, victory, safety and enjoyment will flow.. for which you have been waiting.
2 - He will do more with you, because He is the one able to do more than you can think or imagine.. the word says in Isaiah: the Lord will settle a day for each one of us, when we believe in what He tells us, and He will slaughter our enemies who have plowed on our backs and wounded us with deep wounds, and when He will wipe them away, and when the towers they built in our lives fall down, the rivers of the Holy Spirit will flow, and the shallow light in our life will increase seven times more, in that day the Lord will bind up your bruise, and heal you from all the wounds.
Beloveds: the enemy has built strongholds in our minds because of the things we mentioned above, and deep long furrows have been rooted in our hearts and minds, like the furrows of the plower, I mean we have had a certain way of thinking that we can’t bypass, we receive everything that comes to our minds through these furrows: any news that make us worry or afraid, any hard circumstance that depresses us, any situation we face that makes us melancholic, our expectations are always negative, our joy is not complete, you can list a long list here.. and the reason is as I said before: strongholds in the mind, deep furrows and plower’s lines through which we receive and deal with things..
That’s why Paul the apostle said:
" For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ " (2 Corinthians 10 : 4 – 5).
This is the solution we spoke about:
1 – confessing our present state as it is without camouflage.
2 – Honest real heart belief in what the Lord has done on the cross, by breaking the chains of slavery, and smashing Satan.
3 - Asking the Holy Spirit with perseverance and insistence, and giving him the opportunity to do a slaughter to our enemies, to tear down the walls and strongholds, to make his fresh comforting healing water flow like rivers, and satisfy our land, and soften the deep furrows, and take away the hills and mountains, tearing down all doubts and height that exalts against the word of God, wiping away the furrows, and the deep lines of the plower, making the shallow light increase seven times more, binding up the bruises, healing the wounds, taking into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ, so we can have the mind of Christ, a new way of thinking to face everything that comes our way.

The cripple of the pool of Beit Hasda, had been sick for 38 years, he had all what we mentioned above, but the plower’s deep furrows made him receive God’s word as he used to: " (The Lord said to him): Do you want to be made well? The sick man answered Him: Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me. Jesus said to him: Rise, take up your bed and walk " (John 5 : 6 – 8).
A way of thinking has been rooted in him: I will be healed only if someone put me in the pool.. But the Lord said to him:
I broke the cords of slavery.. I watered the deep furrows, and I want to tear down the strongholds that are in your mind.. rise.. take up your bed and walk !!!
Today the Lord wants to do to us all the same thing He did with the cripple..
You might say to me: I heard speeches similar to yours, I tried but I couldn’t do it.. And I tell you today, the reason is that you’ve heard a lot, but you didn’t give the Holy Spirit enough way to do the work, and when you faced the first resistance, you gave up and said maybe there is another way..
When the Lord took out the people from the land of Egypt, the land of slavery, with his mighty hand.. and when the people were faced in the wilderness, with a resistance that is against the promises of God, they gave up and blamed their leaders and asked them to take them back to the land of Egypt, they were used to slavery, the furrows were deep and long, they needed work, trust and faith in order to be healed.. but they didn’t continue the journey.. they didn’t enter the rest. Today if you believed and started the trip it won’t be easy, so don’t loose hope in the way and ask to go back to the land of Egypt, but.. if you trusted the Lord and continued walking with Him, you will certainly reach the point and be set free and you will tear down towers and strongholds, and the rivers and the waterfalls of the healing water will flow..
There is another important dangerous matter on which the Holy Spirit captured my attention:
Many among us, because of how deep and long are the wounds and the furrows of the plower, they started to love their situation, they surrendered to it, each has his reason to, maybe because of hopelessness, failure, not being ready for a deliverance battle, maybe to attract attention, to receive mercy and care, but I am warning you of this matter, the word of God warns us:
“ He loved the curse so it followed him, he didn’t rejoice in the blessing so it fled from him” (Psalm 109: 17)
You love the situation you are in, you don’t respond to God’s word to get out of it, then these things will follow you, and if you don’t rejoice in the blessings God is giving you to enjoy, then they will flee from you..
But we are not like that beloved, especially after receiving this message today, let our words be like David’s:
" You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness " (Psalms 30 : 11).
And let us trust that God’s rest from all weary, suffering and deep wounds, is waiting for us if we believe in His word today: " So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief… Since therefore it remains that some must enter it… There remains therefore a rest for the people of God… Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest " (Hebrews 3 : 19, 4 : 6 – 11).
Yes.. let us work to enter God’s rest which He prepared for us, let us be real like David, trusting His work on the cross that broke the cords of slavery, and let us trust the Holy Spirit to do slaughter among our enemies and tear down towers and strongholds and every height, and make rivers and waterfalls of water flow, and water our land, to soften the furrows, to straiten the furrows and bind up the bruises, to heal the wounds, and sow in us the mind of Christ, so we can shout with David:
You have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness.