"Being Set Apart"

"For strangers are risen up against me, and oppressors seek after my soul: they have not set God before them. Selah." (Psalms 54:3) Additionally, if we are truly a child of God, then we can expect to have it difficult in this world, because we are not of this world, but merely pilgrims here waiting to go home. I have heard it said, that Moses wore the vail over his face after coming down from the mountain, not to hide the shine of his face from the people, as if it would blind them or anything like that, but that they would not notice the shine being gone from his face when it had departed. It is not the outer appearance that matters to God, but it is the appearance of the heart that matters; the outer appearance is what man is concerned with, and typically, the outer appearance is what we judge each other by. Being set apart for God is not something that you just live, as in making right choices so that you can put forth a godly example, it is something that you are because God has set you apart from this world. Just as Moses did not make his own face shine by being in God's presence, it was God's radiance that made his face to shine, making Moses appear different from everyone else; as soon as the shine had wore off, then Moses was just as everyone else in appearance. Basically, that is the whole point of what it means it be a Christian in this world, and the point that Paul was making to the Corinthian church; we are set apart by God for the ministry, not because of any power that we have in us, but because the power of God works in us and through us to reach the lost. It is very unfortunate that we cannot automatically contain the glow in our own lives, which is the result of living in these earthen vessels; but God is the glow that shines in us, not us that make ourselves shine for God. I know that this is not in line with what David might be speaking of with regards Ziphim and Saul; but in the spiritual life of every believer, we need to understand what we are up against; while at the same time, we need to understand what we are in this world. As I said before, relief is always right there in front of us; as long as we set God before us, then relief is always within reach; but that relief is only available in God, not in anyone else, not even ourselves...
"For we know that, if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: if so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life. Now He that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit." (2 Corinthians 5:1-5)