If It Wasn't You, Lord

When you need to remember — that You're still my Shepherd.

You can look back at a stretch of your life and feel the goosebumps of how close you came to disaster. You did not see it at the time. You were just trying to survive the week. But now, with some distance, you can almost name the moments when something should have buried you and did not — and the only honest response is "if it had not been the Lord." You do not need a self-congratulatory narrative about how you made it. You need to tell the story the way it actually happened — that escape was real because Someone was on your side.

This one opens with a hypothesis tested by experience: "If it had not been the Lord who was on our side — let Israel now say — if it had not been the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against us, then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their wrath was kindled against us." Twice he says it because he means it twice. Then the picture of how close it got: "Then the waters would have overwhelmed us, the stream would have gone over our soul; then the proud waters would have gone over our soul." Three water-images in a row. Drowning was the trajectory. Then the turn that becomes worship: "Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth. Our soul has escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped." The bird-out-of-the-snare image is precise. The fowler set the trap. The bird was caught. Then the snare broke. Escape was real because the snare did not hold. The close lands wide and steady: "Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth." Help came from the name of the same One who made the world. He is the One the world rests on.

• Right now, name one specific moment in your life where, looking back, you can say honestly: "If it had not been the Lord on my side, this would have buried me." • Write this down: "What story have I been telling about how I made it that I should be telling about Him instead?" • Repeat this line when fear of the next storm rises: "Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth."

Stop. Breathe. Let the close calls come back as evidence of His mercy, then tell Him exactly where you should have drowned and did not — out loud if you can.

God, if it had not been You on my side, the waters would have gone over my soul. I want to tell the story of my life the way it actually happened — that the snare broke because You broke it, not because I was strong. Blessed be the Lord, who has not given me as prey to their teeth. Like a bird out of the snare, I escaped — and I do not want to forget who set me free. My help is in Your name, the name of the One who made heaven and earth. You're still my Shepherd.

The snare broke because He broke it — your escape was real.