The Grace-Providing Heart-Seeing God

I. God sees the heart.

" '...For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart'" (1 Sam. 16:7b).

Nice. Though God will see ugly things that don't always surface with the appearance. Still, it's so nice that God knows our hearts and that that He "is greater than our hearts" (1 John 3:20).

II. God is ultimately in control. Refreshment sometimes requires a process that involves struggle and treatment or effort. It's not a guarantee that our thorns will be removed.

Saul was "tormented" by "an evil spirit from the LORD" (1 Sam. 16:14). The affliction seemed to have persistently lingered over Saul's soul. Interesting that it took a process for the evil spirit to leave Saul. Not sure if the evil spirit repeatedly left him, but it's very well possible as vs. 23 seems to indicate that David repeatedly played the lyre for Saul's refreshment in his times of trouble.

Interesting...Yes, God is ultimately in control. The note in my Bible about the "evil spirit" in vs. 14 says, "The Hebrew word may describe something that is troubling, annoying, or harmful." Though these alternatives sound better than "evil spirit" to me, since they are from God, even if the author intended to convey the meaning of "evil spirit", it could be acceptable as God permits evil in this world and ultimately we will never fully grasp how everything works in this universe.

Guess an application that could be drawn is that refreshment sometimes first requires a process. One thing that is different betweeen Saul and believers today though is that Believers have the Spirit. Not sure if the faithful followers back then had the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but in whatever way the Spirit was with Saul, it seems that He left Saul (verse 14).

God doesn't always (immediately) remove our thorns in the flesh, but His "grace is sufficent" (2 Cor. 12). And that is more than enough.