| “With your help I can advance against a troop [or run through a barricade]; with my God I can scale a wall.” |
| —Psalm 18:29 |
David was a warrior king. Much of the imagery of his Psalms reveals battle terminology. Even the Psalm from which the verse is quoted at the beginning of this blog post uses the terms “fortress,” “shield,” “stronghold,” “arrows,” “enemies,” “attacks,” and “victories.” In verse 39, David writes:
He [God] trains my hands for battle; my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
However, verse 29, at the beginning of this blog post, has somewhat stymied me. And, I have yet to find any reference to this verse among my ample commentaries.
Yet, when we read the stories of Jesus, after He victoriously defeated the enemy death in His resurrection, we come upon John 20:26, which states:
His disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!”
Jesus didn’t run through a barricade, or scale a wall. But, He did something equally as miraculous. He seemed to have walked through a shut and locked door. Why did John record that information? Perhaps to show us that nothing in our physical world can stop Jesus’ power from penetrating and reaching us.
Does Jesus still do this kind of miracle today? I believe that He does. We can relate to this verse in the Psalms in relation to what God can do in answer to our prayers. We can’t walk through doors, or barricades, nor scale walls. But, we can see Him do this for us through the power of prayer.
In the Bible, prayer is often compared to a battle. Genesis 32:24 relates the story of Jacob who, alone in the wilderness and in danger from the fury of Esau, “wrestled with ‘a man’ until daybreak.” Jacob later learned that this was the angel of God. In Ephesians 6:10-18, Paul likens our struggle to a wrestling match with rulers, authorities, principalities, and dark forces of evil.
I believe that when we plead for others in prayer, God can reach through barricades and over walls in order to move those forces put up by man and by the Evil One to ruin us and our brothers and sisters in Christ. Can God reach into a prison cell in Turkey, or Iran, or Kenya to rescue His children caught there? We have certainly heard witness to these kinds of divine liberations.
Christians who have prayed in faith for people caught in these kinds of situations, and who have seen God release them in miraculous ways, can give testimony to the power of God to break into places too difficult for any of us to penetrate. This Easter season—as we sing with those around the world: “Thine be the glory, risen, conquering Son!”—may we truly believe and use the weapons of prayer to do impossible things in Christ’s name.
