Sand Between My Toes

Scripture Focus: “He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.” — Psalm 40:2

David had been walking the shoreline for nearly half an hour before he finally stopped.

The beach was almost empty that early in the morning. A few gulls were conducting what sounded like a rather heated discussion over something that had washed ashore, and farther down the beach an older man walked slowly beside an extremely enthusiastic golden retriever. Otherwise, David had the ocean mostly to himself.

He slipped off his sandals and carried them in one hand, choosing that narrow ribbon of dark sand where the last wave had just retreated. It was cool and smooth beneath his feet, firm enough that he barely left a footprint.

When he reached a quiet stretch of shoreline, he stopped to watch the horizon. The sun was beginning to break through the morning clouds, laying a pale streak of gold across the water. A wave rolled in and curled around his ankles before slipping back toward the sea.

David smiled and stayed where he was.

Another wave came. This one climbed a little higher, and as the water rushed back, he felt something strange beneath his feet. The sand seemed to move with it. His heels settled slightly lower.

He looked down, wiggled his toes, and went back to watching the ocean.

A third wave arrived, swirled around his ankles, and retreated. This time there was no mistaking it. His feet had sunk noticeably into the sand.

Apparently, the beach had decided he was staying.

David laughed and pulled one foot free with a small sucking sound. He planted it several inches away on what looked like perfectly solid sand. Within another wave or two, that foot began sinking too.

That was when he noticed the rocks farther up the shoreline.

The waves struck them with considerably more force than the gentle water washing around his ankles. White spray leaped into the air and poured down their sides. Again and again the water came, struck, and retreated.

The sand beneath David kept shifting.

The rocks did not.

Later, that little scene came back to him as he read the words of Psalm 40: “He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.”

There was nothing wrong with the sand on that beach. It was beautiful. It was exactly where sand belonged. The problem came when he expected something constantly being moved by the waves to give him stable footing.

I wonder how many times I have done the same thing with the good things God has placed in my life.

I can put the weight of my security upon having enough money tucked away. I can rest my sense of worth upon being needed, appreciated, or understood. I can lean heavily upon relationships, routines, plans, health, accomplishments, or the comforting assumption that tomorrow will look reasonably similar to today.

None of those things is necessarily wrong. Some are precious gifts from God.

But a gift was never meant to carry the weight that belongs to the Giver.

Eventually another wave comes. Circumstances change. People change. Bodies change. Plans that seemed certain suddenly are not. Something I thought was solid begins slipping away beneath me, and my natural response is often to fight desperately to regain the security I thought I had.

Yet there is a detail in Psalm 40:2 I do not want to miss. God did not stabilize the miry clay beneath David.

He moved David’s feet.

“He brought me up…and set my feet upon a rock.”

Sometimes I am asking God to stabilize something He never intended to become my foundation. Yet His mercy may be found in allowing me to discover that it cannot hold the weight I have placed upon it.

He does not promise to make every place I choose to stand secure. He gives me something infinitely better—Christ Himself, “and that Rock was Christ” (1 Corinthians 10:4).

The sand will shift.

The Rock will not.

Reflection Questions:
1. What good thing in my life may have quietly become something I depend upon for a security only God can provide?
2. When something I depend upon begins to shift, do I automatically ask God to restore it, or do I ask what He may be revealing through its instability?
3. Is there an area of my life where I am exhausting myself trying to make “sand” behave like a rock?
4. If God is presently moving my feet away from something I have leaned upon, what would trusting His placement rather than resisting His movement look like?

Prayer Prompt:
Lord, You have promised to bring me out of the miry clay, set my feet upon a rock, and establish my goings. Show me where I have placed the weight of my heart upon things that were never meant to carry it. When the sand shifts, keep me from clinging desperately to what cannot hold me. Set my feet more firmly upon Christ, and teach me to trust the hand that moves them. Amen.

If this devotional stirred your heart to follow Christ more closely and to walk with purpose, take the next step in His Word—“Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee” (Psalms 119:11). Keep your eyes on Jesus and let Scripture dwell richly in you day by day.

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