“Watermarks-When the Arrows are Beyond”
A VERY MERRY TUESDAY BY PARRIS BAILEY-
“And it came to pass in the morning, that Jonathan went out into the field at the time appointed with David, and a little lad with him. And he said unto his lad, Run, find out now the arrows which I shoot. And as the lad ran, he shot an arrow beyond him. And when the lad was come to the place of the arrow which Jonathan had shot, Jonathan cried after the lad, and said, Is not the arrow beyond thee?”
1 Sam. 20:35-37
WATERMARKS are when our lives take on a suddenly that leaves a mark on us that changes us forever. When we allow the watermarks of God, our lives take on a song that forever keeps singing. These encounters can embitter or transform. The Bible is full of such watermarks, David ran into caves to hide, but in the those caves God met him. Moses had his burning bush, and Joseph his prison along with being ruler in Egypt. Enlargement usually has a price tag.
The day David saw those arrows shoot beyond the amour bearer, his life changed forever. It would by years before David would live as he once did. Listen to F.B. MEYER explain David’s thoughts when he saw those arrows go beyond.
“You have hoped against hope, you have tried to keep your position, you have done your duty, pleaded your cause, sought the intercession of your friends, prayed, wept agonized: but all in vain; the arrow’s plight proves that you must go whither you may. Behind you is the sunny morning, before you is the louring sky; behind you the blessed fellowship, wife, home, royal favor and popular adulation, before you an outcast’s life. The heart clings to the familiar and beloved. But the message of those arrows cannot be resisted. There is no alternative but to tear yourself away, take your life in your hand, and go forth.”
Sometimes our life takes a change and it’s how we embrace it that charts the next course of our lives. In Ps. 57:1 we pick up with David running from Saul, he finds a cave to hide in. “Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me: for my soul trusteth in thee: yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpass”
Treasury of David says, “This is a song from the bowels of the earth, and, like Jonah’s prayer from the bottom of the sea, it has a taste of the place. The poet is in the shadow of the cave at first, but he comes to the cavern’s mouth at last, and sings in the sweet fresh air, with his eye on the heavens, watching joyously the clouds floating therein.” I pray you too when you see those “arrows go beyond”, are able to catch God’s wings carrying you through and see his WATERMARK.