Articles
A Broad Place
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I called on the LORD in distress;
The LORD answered me and set me in a broad place.
(Psa. 118:5)
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Victor Frankl was an Austrian psychiatrist who spent several years in Nazi concentration camps throughout World War II. He survived the ordeal, and later wrote a book about his life in the camps (Man's Search for Meaning, 1946). In the book, he recounts one experience that happened a few days after his liberation:
"I walked through the country past flowering meadows, for miles and miles, toward the market town near the camp. Larks rose to the sky and I could hear the joyous song. There was no one to be seen for miles around; there was nothing but the wide earth and sky and the larks' jubilation and the freedom of space. I stopped, looked around, and up to the sky--and then I went down on my knees. At that moment there was very little I knew of myself or of the world--I had but one sentence in mind--always the same: 'I called to the Lord from my narrow prison and He answered me in the freedom of space' " (p. 111).
As a Jew, Frankl was familiar with this verse from Psalm 118. But after what he had been through, the words took on a new--and very literal--meaning. His journey from a wretched concentration camp to a beautiful spring meadow taught him that, whatever the circumstances we might encounter in this life, God is always in control.
Our distresses in life may not be as awful as a Nazi death camp; and our broad places may not be as beautiful as an alpine meadow in springtime. But the Lord has a way of directing our steps from one to the other; and like Frankl, those occasions should cause us to drop to our knees in gratitude.
When life turns hard and cold, and the temptation to scream out in anger ravages your heart, remember the lesson of this verse. Your job is not to critique how God runs His universe. Call on Him in your distress. Some day, at a time and place of His choosing, He will answer and set you in a broad place.
Then you will know: It's not about you or all the craziness that happens in this world. It's about God and His glory. And that's enough.
--David
