This Day in History: 0000-05-15

May 15 – Psalm 73: 21-26

Then I realized that my heart was bitter, and I was all torn up inside.
I was so foolish and ignorant – I must have seemed like a senseless animal to You.
Yet I still belong to You; You hold my right hand.  
You guide me with Your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
I desire you more than anything on earth.
My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak,
but God remains the strength of my heart;
He is mine forever!

Are you holding on to any bitterness right now?  Do you need a reset today?  We all have times when what we really need, more than anything else, is to surrender the thing we’ve been stubbornly holding onto and start over.  Praise God, He has given us another chance to do just that today.  Let’s examine our hearts.

Have we ever considered what our bitterness looks like to God?  I love the way this passage says it, “I must have seemed like a senseless animal to You.”  How foolish we must be in His eyes.  He offers us peace and we continue to choose anguish time and time again.  Why?  Why do we do it?  Why do I do it?  The answer is almost always the same: because we don’t realize whose we are.

Let’s use the words of this Psalm to remind us, because no matter how far we stray, no matter how many times we return to our senseless sins we still belong to Him.  We may be prone to wander, but we can’t ever stray beyond His reach, for He holds on to our hand and His grasp is secure.  He has given us His Word – the Bible, and filled us with His Holy Spirit to guide our every move.  His council is sound, His ways are perfect, His Word is true, and His path leads to everlasting life.

What else is there to cling to?  Nothing!  God is all we really have, and He is all we will ever need. May we desire Him with all that we are.  May our love for Him grow deeper with each passing day.  May we have the faith to turn from all the lesser things that pull at our hearts and keep a laser-focus on Him alone.  Life will still hurt.  We’re still going to grow old, we’re still going to suffer heart-ache, our bodies will still experience pain, and our minds will still grow tired.  But as His children, His strength will carry us through everything this life could ever throw at us.  We are His, my friends, and praise the Lord, He is ours forever!