“I
will call upon The lord, who is worthy to be praised; so shall I be saved from
my enemies.” Psalm 18:3
In
the Bible and in our own lives, we can usually recount the times when we
deliberately set out to “call upon The Lord”. The psalmist seems to be at
a pretty low point in life, but there are other instances of extreme joy when
we feel so blessed we cannot help but to shout out to The Lord! But what
about those times in between the lows and the highs, say around 2pm on a Tuesday?
There is nothing special about Tuesday afternoon; it’s just another day,
another afternoon of work. What about then?
We
typically run in cycles between the lows and the highs, but the drudgery of
daily living can often just wear us down. We go through the motions of
our daily task without thinking much about The Lord at all. It’s just
life.
In
the Scripture, however, we are constantly reminded of The Lord’s presence –
even in the mundane; but because we are often so caught up in whatever is right
in front of us, calling upon The Lord seems … out of place.
Unnecessary. After all, this is our “real life”, right? No need to
get caught up in religion. What will our co-workers or golf partners or
fishing buddies think of us?
It
seems to me that the many promises of the Bible get lost on us most of the time
precisely because we have never really taken The Lord at His word; e.g., “I am
with you always …” We deliberately get caught up in gossip
without fully realizing the depth of this Assurance. We get lost in our
anger whenever things do not go the way we intended, and fail to realize the
breadth of this Assurance. And we get bound up in the mundane things of
“real life” without realizing His assurance is directly connected to any sort
of life we can hope or expect to have.
Moses
encouraged the people of Israel to be mindful of The Lord’s presence always: “You
shall teach [the Law] to your children diligently, and shall talk of [the
commandments, statutes, and ordinances] when you sit in your house, when you
walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind
them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your
eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your
gates” (Deuteronomy 6:7-9). In other words, pick a moment
of daily living when it would not be appropriate to give The Lord His
due.
Israel
was about to enter into “everyday living”, and Moses was concerned that mundane
life would soon overtake them to the point of forgetfulness and taking each
precious moment of life for granted. Looking around, it is easy to see
that the Church (the WHOLE Church) has become so complacent, taking Jesus’ life
and Death for granted. It is time to wake up, and see the glory of The
Lord even in the mundane. No need to wait for high points, and we
certainly should not live in fear of the low points! See Him now, right
now! “For I am with you always.” This
afternoon at 2pm, you have a Date!
Blessings,
Michael
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