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All my fears...  Psalm 34:4   Dr. David A Baillie

10/14/2019

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I still remember it like it was yesterday and still tell the story from time to time when I am speaking somewhere.  

In 1990 I was in my third year as volleyball coach at Furman University.  In 1988 I had become the youngest Division I coach in the country (and one of the worst).  Now the third year was at hand.  I had an outstanding recruiting class and had been working hard at  becoming a good coach. 

The first day of practice was at hand and as I sat in my office the whole situation overwhelmed.  I realized I was not good enough, not prepared enough, not capable.  Fear gripped me, and I did not know what to do.  So I did something I have only done one other time in my life, I simply took a Bible, let it fall open, placed down my finger and saw what it said. 

My finger landed on Psalm 34:4, "I sought the Lord, and he answered me, and he delivered me from all my fears."

I remember praying in that office that day, "Lord, please take my fear away, and help me be able to do this thing. "

I don't think that just dropping a Bible down is the best way to study the word, and to know what God is saying to us.  But, I do believe that the God of the universe, can deliver us from any fear when we seek him.  God bigger than anything we may face.

By the way, we went out and started that season 0-4.  Yet, at the end we brought the first Southern Conference championship in school history to Furman. 


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What are we...  Psalm 8    Dr. David A Baillie

10/9/2019

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Years ago there was a Bible study that came out under the title, "The Search for Significance."  As human beings the questions often arise in our lives.  If there is really a God in this great big expanse of a universe where I am just a tiny speck among billions, why would that God even notice me.  Theories (and I do mean theories) have reduced human kind to everything from off shoots of apes, to a series of impulses, to, well, to nothing of significance.   

This life that we have is short.  Very short. In fact in the next presidential election cycle there will be a whole bunch of new eligible voters who weren't even born when the events of 9/11 happened.  It all goes by in a blink of an eye.  And if it all goes by so quick, what significance, if any, do I have. 

The Psalmist addressees that question in Psalm 8.   We find out that in God's creation human kind is the single most important creation.  Last wee in Psalm 100 we were reminded that we are created by God, and that we are not capable of creating ourselves.  This week we are reminded that not only are we created by God, we are given lives that have purpose and meaning.  The Psalmist even tells us that because of who we are God crowns us with glory and honor.  

​Sometimes it is just good to be reminded that we are important in the site of God. 
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