My Strong Tower

I'm still in Germany, where B2b (a leadership seminar) finished at the weekend and PCYFM (a youth ministry training course) started yesterday. Last week's softly falling snow has also given way to drizzle and driving rain. 

On Sunday, some of the PCYFM students went on an outing to visit the Bastei Bridge, about an hour's drive from where we're staying in the eastern region of Germany. The Bastei is one of Germany’s most unique landscapes. Giant pinnacles of sandstone rock tower above the Elbe River and a dramatic stone bridge seems to span those pinnacles  - connecting the huge towers of rock and then seeming to disappear into nowhere. (Photo above.)

I would have loved to go with them to see this unusual feature of God's creation, but I knew that the lump on the sole of my foot would make it impossible for me to walk the 40 minutes to and from the lookout point. I was also only too aware that going out in the rain would not be a wise decision (because I have a lung condition that makes me vulnerable to bronchitis) when I needed to be able to teach for five days this week in the PCYFM.

So, while others headed out to have some fun, I decided that it would be wiser for me to stay home and keep dry. It made me very aware of my own physical weaknesses - both in my lungs and in the mobility challenges I currently face because of the neuroma on my foot. I wasn't able to see those towering rocks, but I was able to reflect on a different kind of tower. One of the biblical names of God is Migdal Oz - our Strong Tower.

When in Spain, I live in a town called Alhaurín de la Torre. The tower in the centre of town is not the original construction that gives the town its name, but it's a reflection of the fact that many Spanish towns historically had fortresses and strongholds to protect the inhabitants from invading armies. You can see many of the original towers all along the Spanish coastline, as well as in many mountainous inland towns. The strong tower was a place of safety and refuge, a place that people could flee to when there was danger. In a story told in the book of Judges, the people of an entire city fled to the roof of their strong tower (Judges 9: 51) and the attacking king, Abimelech, was killed when a woman dropped a stone on his head. The people of Israel understood well what it meant to have a migdal oz to flee to when danger was imminent and they felt weak.

So they also totally understood what the songwriter meant when He proclaimed (Psalm 61: 3) that God is a strong tower for us against the enemy... or when that psalmist's son wrote that the name of the Lord is a strong tower (Prov 18: 10) that the righteous can run to for safety. God's name in the biblical context meant His character, as I've been seeing in these weeks of studying biblical names of God. God's unchanging character is like the migdal oz was for ancient cities: a constant source of strength and safety.

Read on below for another name that speaks of the strength God gives us.