As I mentioned yesterday, I love mornings. In the mornings I turn my gaze from the things of this world to seek the Lord. Psalm 143, a Psalm of David, has a delightful passage in verses 8 to 9. Yesterday’s devotion looked at the first thought found there: “Let me hear of your unfailing love each morning, for I am trusting you.” [NLT]
David’s part is to trust in God; God’s part is to bring him word of His unfailing love. David goes on: “Show me where to walk, for I give myself to you.” That’s my morning. It’s the time when I lift my soul away from the problems of the world and re-focus my gaze on the Lord. As I do this, God once again shows “me where to walk.”
When we lift our souls to God, we are for a time raised above self and the world. We are with God in heavenly places. Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:4-6, “But God is so rich in mercy, and he loved us so much, that even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!) For he raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus.” [NLT]
That place will be ours in totality once we have crossed from this life to the next one. Now, however, we can only know it in part. Most of the time the world and life in general pushes us down. The world, the flesh, and the devil work very hard to crush us. They seek to keep us pinned as it were to this earthly dwelling.
God, however, in His mercy, calls us to lift our souls to Him and realize that in Christ, we are seated with him in the heavenly realms. As that happens, He will show us the way to go. Come mornings, as I sit alone with Him, I am drawn away from this world to the heavenlies and my gaze is once again where it should be, on my Lord and my God.
