Devotional Word for Thursday, March 26, 2020
There’s a verse in Proverbs I would like for us to consider a bit today. It is Proverbs 20:12, and it says this: The hearing ear and the seeing eye, The Lord has made them both. That is a basic truth of biology, but it also is a basic truth spiritually. It will be good for us to consider both those aspects. Today we’ll do the biology aspect, tomorrow the spiritual.
Some years ago, I purposed to memorize Psalm 33. And I did memorize it. Memorizing is always good because it forces you to think about what exactly you’re memorizing! Psalm 33 is about giving thanks to God. Verse 5, however, brought me up short. Here’s what it says: God loves righteousness and justice; The earth is full of the lovingkindness of the Lord. As I considered that verse, I realized my eyes did not see the earth that way at all. Was the Psalmist right or was I right? I knew the answer to that – the Psalmist is right! As a result, I began to pray for God to open my eyes so I could see how the earth his full of His lovingkindness.
God did begin to open my eyes. First, I began to notice the wonders of the natural world. Everything is so precise. I had taken all that for granted. The sun coming up each day at a specific time – a time that could be known down to the second at any spot on the earth and at any point in time. For instance, we know the exact time the sun will rise on August 15, 2083 in Paducah, KY. We also now the exact time the sun set in Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517. What a marvelous mercy of God. It is evidence of His lovingkindness.
Once my eyes were open to that realm, the world simply exploded with evidences of God’s lovingkindnesses. By this we know we don’t live in a random universe, but in a world created and ordered and watched over by God. That’s good to know when we are up against something that challenges or threatens us.
As God continued to open my eyes to His lovingkindnesses, He drew my attention to Psalm 139:14 where David says to the Lord, I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. Again, upon reflection, I realized my soul did not know very well at all how I was fearfully and wonderfully made. As a consequence, that was an entire area of thanksgiving that was missing in my prayers.
Do you realize what a blessing it is to be able to swallow? How wonderful that we can drink a big, cold glass of water on a hot day! Think of your eating. Isn’t our digestive system a marvel? We have the joy of ingesting food in an enjoyable fashion. Then our digestive system takes over. We don’t have to push any buttons or pull any levers. It simply breaks down the food, processes it, sends the components to the various organs and parts of our body, and then causes the waste to get discarded. Marvelous! A lovingkindness of God.
Our bodies are fearfully and wonderfully made. From thumbs to salivary glands to kneecaps to pancreas to retinas to parathyroid glands to a list that goes on and on.
Today would be a good day for each of us to ask God to open our eyes to see His lovingkindness in the physical world around us. And then to give thanks to Him for our being fearfully and wonderfully made and for the earth being full of His lovingkindnesses. Let us pray: Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless His Holy Name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits. Lord, we know Your lovingkindnesses never cease, but our awareness of them isn’t always as it should be. Help us to see Your handiwork around us in the natural world and in us in our physical bodies. Protect us from all harm, and guide us into Your truth. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.