I Am His

"For he who touches you,

Touches the apple of His eye"

(Zechariah 2:7-9)

The bombs go off around me, the ground shakes. The sky is dark with smoke, the fire blazes. Ambush. The testing surrounds me, this trying of my soul is round about me. I look out and see the city in ruins... Isn't my city protected? Don't I have walls, and guards, and chariots of fire?

I feel as if I lay here, naked and vulnerable before my enemy. And I will not lie, I question, Have I done something wrong? Have You taken Your hand of protection from me? Have You given the enemy access to my life? I thought I had walls fortifying me?

I have not yielded. I have not relented. I have not been defeated. But my city is under siege. This is not a battle that lasts a day, a night, a moment... this battle persists.

Again I question, "Have I done something wrong?"

I'm nearly startled to falling over when God assures me that this is good. I can't help but associate being under attack with meaning I am weak, that somehow I have given the enemy access to my city. That I have been careless, unguarded. But God assures me that this is not so. I struggle to believe it.

Here in this place, with bombs going off all around me, I learn beautiful truth. I am His.

You see, it is for that very reason that this enemy rages against me. It is because I belong to the Most High that he fights so relentlessly to steal me away. This enemy wants possession of my land, so he tries to destroy in order to own. And my Father lets him.

At first I wondered how God could give him that access, and call it good. Surely He does not delight to see His children tormented by their enemy?

But then I realized, My Father gives him this access, because there is NO doubt that I belong to Him.

My God knows that I am irrevocably HIS. He knows that nothing can separate us. He knows that forever and always, I am His possession. And it is to HIS glory and the enemy's shame for this to be tested.

My enemy holds on to hope that I can still be won over and made his possession. So he sends his armies against me. However, both God and I know that the victory is already won. I will never be my enemy's possession. I am irrevocably God's.

So I rejoice to be tested. This is to me the very seal that I am indeed my Beloved's. This fire is to me, the very Love of God. Because He delights to show the enemy that His children cannot be won over. And I love that my Father counts me worthy to be tested.

Even in the midst of this siege, My God is watching over me with jealous love. I am safe under His wings, because I am His... And I always will be.

Every man of Judah and Jerusalem returned

With Jehoshaphat at their head,

Returning to Jerusalem WITH JOY,

for the LORD had made them

To rejoice over their enemies.

(2 Chronicles 20:27)