The very word used for oppression, God comes in and redeems it to bring blessing. Sustain is used to describe suffering something unpleasant, especially an injury. It’s also used to describe the act of being strengthened or supported physically or mentally. It’s also this week’s Your Word for 2020.
Sustain is a contronym; two words, same spelling, same pronunciation, two opposite meanings. As mentioned above, it can either describe suffering or being strengthened. I don’t know about you, but this seems like such a weighty concept to sit with. That’s pretty interesting when you think about it.
It seems so fitting for just about every moment in life. We’re either up or we’re down, and through it all, there’s God, sustaining us. It’s easy to lose sight of His sustaining grace when everything’s smelling like roses. Yet there He is; our Lord, our Lamb, our Savior. Everything about Him shows love towards us, even in His discipline.
O God, you cause abundant showers to fall on your chosen people. When they are tired, you sustain them, for you live among them. You sustain the oppressed with your good blessings, O God.
Psalm 68:9-10 (NET)
It seems so like His nature, to take a bad situation and turn it around for His good. The word rolls off the tongue the same, and yet, it’s the heart condition which leads us to one definition or the other. Where do we look when things aren’t working out? Where do we look when they are? Even when everything is going great, isn’t there danger in thinking it’s all your own doing?
When we’re suffering mental battles, we can look to Him as our sustainer. When life doesn’t seem to be cooperating with us, we can count on Him as the one who so faithfully sustains us. Truth be told, it’s by His sustaining grace we’ve been able to put out content every week for the past five years. We’re not going to take full credit for that one!
May you find rest in His sustaining power. He is after all, our Father and Creator.