Something’s nagging me, telling me that I MUST, absolutely MUST post today. I have a lot on my mind, and while the rest of me is saying that I could just go ahead and save it for tomorrow, I think some of it just needs to come out now, or never.
Now, I know that it’s the 6th of the month, but I still have Psalm 5 in my mind:
Lead Me in Your Righteousness
TO THE CHOIRMASTER: FOR THE FLUTES. A PSALM OF DAVID.
Give ear to my words, O LORD; consider my groaning.
Give attention to the sound of my cry, my King and my God, for to you do I pray.
My God, who is also my King and my Adonai, or my Lord, surely as He has displayed His goodness and His glory in and through David, so He shall also heed our own words… and not only that, we also go to Him when we are out of words, but groaning, and when we are out of groans, but all that’s left for us is to cry. We’re so fixated on trying to say the right words, or trying to come to Him with the right attitude or the right mindset ‘installed’ in our brains before we start our ‘formal’ prayers, but it’s just nice to be reminded that prayer isn’t just a litany – it’s being as real as we could be, by the help of the Spirit poured into us through Christ; He hears our groaning and He pays just as much attention to us when we cry, as He would when we’re all pumped up to speak.
Our God is a listening God, a concerned Father who reads between the lines. Surely, He hears my own groanings, and He has heard my quick cries as of late – not that I HAVE been crying, but I have been in a state of mind which is, honestly, neither ‘good’ or ‘bad’, ‘happy’ or ‘sad’; whatever words, groanings, or cries that ARE coming out, not necessarily coming from a position of pleasure or pain… maybe, more of pause. Being in the ‘interim’, if that makes any sense. Again, I’m just thankful, I’m just refreshed to take in, and to share, that our good God is with us, no matter what the status of our minds, or our words.
O LORD, in the morning you hear my voice; in the morning I prepare a sacrifice for you and watch.
For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you.
I don’t know if I should be sharing this here, but I have been a little more mindful as of late, regarding the first things I think and do when I wake up. You’ll see in upcoming posts that I’ve been doing a lot of moving around of stuff – both in the physical, and in my mind – and part of that moving involves me making changes to my routine. Yeah, if there’s anything I want to share here and now, it’s that there’s a lot of change happening, a lot of shifting. Brother Yuri from our prayer meeting just an hour ago expressed his personal concerns regarding how there’ve been more earthquakes here in the Philippines as of late, and while it is cause for alarm, I personally was not surprised; Not to say that I didn’t think of the damage caused by such calamities, but it just falls in line with my own personal observations – If this is a season of shifting and adjusting, changing and re-arranging, then surely, it’s also a season of quaking, and of shaking – some moving impacts more than we anticipate.
Anyway, yeah, changes. Moving, on my part. Re-arranging of things; Two things that are in my mind right now, regarding re-arranging are (1) the value of worship from another perspective – that is, beyond the satisfaction and the pleasure it gives us, worship also aligns our entire beings (body, soul and spirit) to our Savior, and to our Father; also, (2) how, in this regard, worship should definitely take more time first thing, soon as I wake up. And I’ll be honest, it’s not much, if you’re asking about what effort I’m putting in so far – I’ve gone just as far as praying, slowly, with the possibility of dozing back off. But I suppose it’s a sacrifice on its own, considering how it is still so tempting to start my day looking at this generation’s new idiot tube – the ‘smart’ phone.
But see there, small effort as it is, worship and prayer in the first parts of the day aligns the rest of my being with God; and as our loving Father does not delight in wickedness, and as David puts it, as evil does not dwell in Him, so any wickedness and evil that does try to creep into our body, soul, and spirit… well, it’s pushed and purged out.
All this to say that when we worship, we revel in our righteous and living God, and in the process, our minds and our entire beings are re-programmed – that is, evil and wickedness (bad code and errors) are tracked and eliminated, while righteousness and life (the most effective and efficient syntax) are typed in.
In worship, everything is put into its place.
I have been on a rollercoaster of sorts. There’s been times especially during the first parts of November, when I’ve been praying as hard as I used to pray, oh, 15 years ago, going as far as to switch off the lights and play some worship music, if only to get to the ‘mood’; later in the month, things got a little busier, and I did notice for a time that things were happening at so fast a rate that there wasn’t time to respond more mindfully, much less to meditate on what was going on. Now, with things and people being moved, I’m seeing more time again… and with that, I could say that I was back to ‘praying strong’, as I’ll call it, both at home and in the car (opting to shut the stereo off and to pull up the power windows), oh, as of a day or two ago.
But again, whether it is in more primitive forms, or in more subtle ways as I write tonight, the fact remains – the TRUTH remains that worship reinforces how everything is put into its rightful place; and I don’t just mean that Christ is put above all other things (don’t get me wrong, that’s VERY essential), but here we see how all other things and people (that are ALL under Christ) are given their priorities, seasons, functions, etc.
The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers.
You destroy those who speak lies; the LORD abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house.
I will bow down toward your holy temple in the fear of you.
Just breezing through here, and thanking God, because we can see something else here, more than the comeuppance of the boastful, the bloodthirsty, and the deceitful evil man: We see how, through Christ who has reconciled us to God by way of His righteousness, we not only stand before the eyes of our God, knowing that while He IS thrice holy, He also welcomes us, almost bids us (with the Holy Spirit from within, and calling us) not only to stand, but to RUN to His throne of grace in out time of need (Hebrews 4:16). Not hating us or abhorring us, He loves us; Not destroying us, He came to give us life, and life abundant (John 10:10).
Again, we RUN to His throne, confident in His steadfast love, but also in reverence and awe of His absolute power and, more importantly, His holiness.
Lead me, O LORD, in your righteousness because of my enemies; make your way straight before me.
Oh, in my realization of how much is being reprogrammed and rearranged, I give God the praise, first and foremost for the realization, but also that, in His reprogramming my mind, He not only purges the old and obsolete code, but He also integrates more and more of His goodness into the entire program – and here, oh, we praise Him, because He does reprogram us by leading us, and making our ways straight. Even when we are in the presence of our enemies, we are in His righteousness, and we are led, and we are reprogrammed. Sure as our Way is the Truth and the Life, so Christ is our more excellent Way, and by His being our Way AND showing us the Way, our paths, our perspectives, our minds are all made straight before Him.
For there is no truth in their mouth; their inmost self is destruction; their throat is an open grave; they flatter with their tongue.
Make them bear their guilt, O God; let them fall by their own counsels; because of the abundance of their transgressions cast them out, for they have rebelled against you.
In this world as of late, this world full of all sorts of facts – false facts, half-facts, facts that remain only because of consensus, facts that stick to us as old as time, facts that reach their time limit sooner than we expect – the demand for truth is absolutely high, but unfortunately those who absolutely refuse to take in the goodness of God in their own lives, as brought to them and guaranteed to them by no less than Jesus Christ, they can spill all the facts that cause them to be a step ahead of the rest of humanity… but there will never be absolute, eternal Truth in their mouths. And with that said, no matter how valuable their words ARE perceived, the lack of Truth always brings them to flattery, guilt, deceitful counsel, transgression, rebellion – death so dishonorable, as an open grave.
For those of us who see this in the light of the Salvation we have in and through Christ, it just humbles us – that through Him the Truth has been poured into our beings, and that makes all the difference. Much so, that we rejoice, and sing for joy. We exult in Christ, our Savior.
But let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them ever sing for joy, and spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may exult in you.
For you bless the righteous, O LORD; you cover him with favor as with a shield.
In this Christmas season, let’s sing as Mary sang, as Darlene Zschech and the wonderful folks back in the earlier days of Hillsong composed:
My soul magnifies the Lord,
my heart joys in God my Saviour,
for He lifts the lowly,
He’s done great things for me.
I will sing, praising evermore,
He is mighty and Holy is His Name.
Thank You, Lord.
Until the next posts, God bless us all.
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#Worship #Reprogramming #SeasonOfRearranging #TrustingGod #Writing #PersonalThoughtProcesses #JesusChrist #PracticalChristianity
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