Birth is often described as delivery. Maternity wards are places where doctors and nurses deliver babies. This is because the process of birth is the passage of a life, a soul, from one realm to another, from the womb to the world.
Babies are delivered from a place where they can no longer remain into a place where they can become all they were meant to be.
Likewise, the Bible speaks of God as a “deliverer” (Jehovah-Palat). More times than we can count, we read about God’s people being brought out of trouble, or escaping into blessing.
David was delivered from Saul’s murderous threats into a position on Saul’s throne. Daniel was delivered from the lions’ den into the king’s court. The Hebrew slaves were delivered from Egyptian slavery into a land flowing with milk and honey.
Like that occasional baby who seems to be in no hurry to be born, the people of God sometimes resisted their deliverance—or they wanted to reverse the process and go back to the way things used to be!
But in it all—and through it all—God acted as their powerful and patient deliverer.
Think of a skilled obstetrician or an experienced midwife. He or she knows what the process of delivery involves and what it will take. There will be frightening moments and periods of pain and uncertainty. Complications can arise.
Sometimes the participants voice impulsive expressions of fear and regret. Tears and screams of anguish are not uncommon.
But the deliverer also knows what’s at the end of the delivery process—the immense joy, the celebration, and the wondrous realization of new life. It’s worth it!
For all those reasons, it’s wise for us to put our lives in the hands of Jehovah-Palat. Let God deliver you from where you are to where you need to be next.
In what ways has God delivered you?
