January 2, 2007

Be Still and Know . . .

Instead of making New Year Resolutions, I sometimes write a letter to God, thanking Him, but also putting down what I’d like to see Him do in the coming year. Then I seal it up to read at the end of December.

Faith is the evidence of things hoped for and the assurance of things not seen. Sometimes I just know God is going to answer my prayers or take care of a situation, but He never tells me exactly what He is going to do. Oswald Chambers in today’s reading from My Utmost for His Highest says, “Have you been asking God what He is going to do? He will never tell you. God does not tell you what He is going to do; He reveals to you Who He is.”

That explains the why behind the verses I’m directed to this morning: Psalm 8:1 and 9. They both say the same thing, “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”

These days I’m full of why, what, when and how, but God is not telling me. Instead, He keeps saying, “Look at me. Is anything too hard for God?”

Of course not. Even in this psalm He shows His majesty. He tells how His glory is set above the heavens. He is greater than all the universe because He created it. He even gives infants who belong to Him the power to overcome His enemies. He made the sun, moon and stars. He orders the working of the entire universe, yet He is intimately involved in the lives of puny humans whose time here is so short and whose power is so limited. He gives small, dependent and insignificant mankind dominion over all that He made, and even crowns us who have sinned against Him, with glory and honor in knowing Him.

Current world views say God, even if He exists, does not enter into the lives of men; He is just out there somewhere, either watching or ignoring us. The psalmist, in this case King David of Israel, knows better. He sees and knows a grand and majestic God, who is glorious and above us in every way, but asks in mouth-open wonder, “What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him?”

He experienced the care of God. He knew God’s visit into his life. He knew too that he was just a babe, a nothing in the world, yet God gave him significance. This says far more about God than it does about David.

With all our trials, questions, perplexities, complications of life, God bids me to think about who He is—a God who is mindful of me, who visits me and (to borrow a football term) runs interference in my life. Nothing happens that He cannot use for good, to make me more like His Son. Today He asks nothing of me except to look up and remember that I worship and serve Him, a majestic and powerful God.

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