Monday Meditation

Monday Meditation

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When Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look and see Him there–who made an end of all my sin. Before the Throne of God Above

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. 1 Peter 5:6-9

Mondays hit hard, don’t they? I can sometimes so easily fall into feeling overwhelmed and anxious as I consider the tasks of the day[and truly–the week] at hand. That is exactly what happened this morning. My naturally melancholy personality was, once again, tempted to despair. Very quickly–even between leaving my bed and walking downstairs–I was grumpy; choosing to listen to my own negative, sinful thoughts instead of choosing to fix my gaze on Christ.

It feels like a new kind of suffering, doesn’t it?

In Peter’s day, the early Christians of Asia Minor faced what I would consider true suffering–they were harassed mercilessly; facing isolation and persecution by their pagan neighbors. Why? Because they continued to choose Christ.

And the cause of my suffering? My own sinfulness! I suffered by my own hand! I was tempted to despair, instead of remaining watchful and sober-minded.

I chose to listen to the murmurings of my own soul instead of entrusting the day[and it’s duties] to Christ!

Matthew Henry explains this well:

It is the duty of Christians, in all their distresses, to look more to the keeping of their souls than to the preserving of their bodies. The soul is of greatest value, and yet in most danger. If suffering from without raise uneasiness, vexation, and other sinful and tormenting passions within, the soul is then the greatest sufferer. If the soul be not well kept, persecution will drive people to apostasy, Ps. 125:3.The only way to keep the soul well is to commit it to God, in well-doing. Commit your souls to God by solemn dedication, prayer, and patient perseverance in well-doing, Rom. 2:7. Good people, when they are in affliction, have great encouragement to commit their souls to God, because he is their Creator, and faithful in all his promises.

I failed once again to submit my soul first to the Lord. Because of this, I spiraled into a vortex of looking only to myself. This produced within me bitterness, frustration and self-pity. But when we choose, by God’s kindness, to look first and foremost to Christ–this truly changes everything.

Our hearts are recalibrated to the rhythm of the Gospel.

It humbles me that I so quickly forget. I can worship heartily on Sunday, but when Monday rolls around I am–once again–faced with my own neediness.

Let us bless thee at all times and forget not how thou has forgiven our iniquities, healed our diseases, redeemed our lives from destruction, crowned us with lovingkindness and tender mercies, satisfied our mouths with good things, renewed our youth like the eagle’s. May thy holy Scriptures govern every part of our lives, and regulate the discharge of all our duties, so that we may adorn thy doctrine in all things. Valley of Vision

In Christ,

Sus

Featured Open Bible, closed Holy Bible, coffee mug with 'Be Still & Know' text, eyeglasses on wooden table by window

Monday Meditation

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For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. Nor was it to offer himself as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Hebrews 9:24-26

Every Monday morning, I awake thinking of my duties. It is my cleaning day, so that checklist runs through my mind. But it is also the start of another week—with school days, extra-curriculars, meals to plan, etc.

Mondays sometimes[for me] feel a little daunting. There are times when I wake up physically and emotionally drained before the week has even started!

Webster’s defines duty this way: something that one is expected or required to do by moral or legal obligation.

Hebrews 9 gives us a glimpse into the regular duties of the high priest in the Old Testament context. He was responsible for everything from supervising daily morning and evening sacrifices, discerning the will of God for the people and even maintaining the Temple. He inherited this duty and held it for life.

Annually(and arguably most importantly) he was required to go on Yom Kippur(the Day of Atonement) behind the veil into the Holy of Holies, where he sprinkled the blood taken from the sacrifice(made on behalf of himself and of the people) on the Mercy Seat. In this way, he atoned for the sins of the previous year.

As I considered my own duties this morning, I couldn’t help but marvel at the kindness of Christ.

For believers, he is our foremost High Priest. Unlike the priests of the Old Testament, he assumed this role willingly, on behalf of those he foreknew and predestined to be His(Romans 8:29). He did not come due to moral or legal obligation, nor did he come because he was expected to by the Father. He came out of His kindness and love(Titus 3).

And while the high priest offered annually for the sins of the people, this better High Priest offered his own life once and for all, to put away sin that his people might be redeemed.

It was not his duty, yet He came. He lived among us, suffered horribly and humbly, and died alone. And this changes everything.

So, while my actual duties threatened to overwhelm me before the day’s beginning, this was a needed perspective shift.

I can perform my duties(however menial and insignificant they feel at times) to the glory of God, in freedom because of the One who assumed the highest duty voluntarily on my behalf.

May the Holy Scriptures govern every part of our lives, and regulate the discharge of all our duties so that we may adorn thy doctrine in all things Valley of Vision

Monday Meditation

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Colorful building blocks on wooden church pew inside historic church interior

Every Sunday morning, I watch the legos. They’re always right at my feet during corporate worship. The bright colors gleam at me as I follow along with the rest of our church body. Quiet, but captivating; these legos sometimes leave me entranced. And they’re never ever organized in the same way.

Truly, my focus isn’t those legos, but rather the very active, curious 6 year-old tinkering with them.

He began worshiping alongside our family when he turned five. He’s our only boy and a more tenacious yet tender soul never lived. I kind of love how savage he can be at times. It is both exhilarating and challenging all at once!

But here, in corporate worship… I honestly couldn’t have predicted what would happen. Well, honestly…I expected noise. Maybe even some commentary or a little clamor. But, as he always does, this boy surprised me.

We can thank the legos for that.

Every Sunday, my precious boy excitedly opens that same lego box with anticipation. He looks forward to this special building time weekly. This could be because the box doesn’t come home with us. It stays there, tucked under our church seats, waiting for him. And every time we go, he beholds the box as if for the first. He is enrapured.

Here’s the kicker: the legos haven’t changed(mostly because I don’t think to bring a new bag from home)! It’s the same assortment as the week before.

And as I admired my little boy’s ingenuity yesterday, I was struck that those legos point to something greater: God’s eternal Word.

I love what the Westminster Larger catechism shares concerning this:

Q. 4. How doth it appear that the Scriptures are the Word of God?
A. The Scriptures manifest themselves to be the Word of God, by their majesty and purity; by the consent of all the parts, and the scope of the whole, which is to give all glory to God; by their light and power to convince and convert sinners, to comfort and build up believers unto salvation: but the Spirit of God bearing witness by and with the Scriptures in the heart of man, is alone able fully to persuade it that they are the very Word of God.

Hos. 8:12; 1 Cor. 2:6-7, 13; Ps. 119:18, 129; Ps. 12:6; Ps. 119:140; Acts 10:43; Acts 26:22; Rom. 3:19, 27; Acts 18:28; Heb. 4:12; Jas. 1:18; Ps. 19:7-9; Rom. 15:4; Acts 20:32; John 16:13-14; 1 John 2:20, 27; John 20:31.

Q. 5. What do the Scriptures principally teach?
A. The Scriptures principally teach, what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man.

2 Tim. 1:13.

What do we know? God’s word is:

  • Pure(Proverbs 30:5)
  • Perfect(Psalm 19:7)
  • Wholly true(Psalm 119:60)
  • Our source for salvation, exhortation and equipping(2 Tim. 3:15)
  • Conclusive and active(Hebrews 4:12)
  • brings glory to God(Psalm 119:105)

There is so much more to it, but what the legos highlighted for me is the abounding illumination of the word.

Though this book never changes, there is always treasure to mine from these precious pages. May we, by God’s grace, ever have eyes to see and ears to hear.

Like the Psalmist, may we pray: Open my eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of your Law – Psalm 119:18

Sus

Monday Meditation

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There’s a sacredness in it, motherhood. I confess that I lose sight of this almost daily, but God–in his faithfulness–continues to gently impress upon me that loving them–tenderly nurturing their hearts and minds–is most needful.

There have been days lately when I’ve felt the heaviness in it; constant care, juggling schedules, the endless feeling that the house may never truly be tidy…it gets to me sometimes.

But the thing is—I’m not really alone in that. So many other women throughout history felt this same pressure:

Susanna Wesley–mother to 10(who had lost 9 of her 19 in total) spent around 2 hours daily under her “tent of meeting”(which was an apron she pulled over her head)!

Early in her life, she vowed that she would never spend more time in leisure entertainment than she did in prayer and Bible study. Even amid the most complex and busy years of her life as a mother, she still scheduled two hours each day for fellowship with God and time in His Word, and she adhered to that schedule faithfully. The challenge was finding a place of privacy in a house filled to overflowing with children.

Mother Wesley’s solution to this was to bring her Bible to her favorite chair and throw her long apron up over her head, forming a sort of tent. This became something akin to the “tent of meeting,” the tabernacle in the days of Moses in the Old Testament. Every person in the household, from the smallest toddler to the oldest domestic helpers, knew well to respect this signal. When Susanna was under the apron, she was with God and was not to be disturbed except in the case of the direst emergency. There in the privacy of her little tent, she interceded for her husband and children and plumbed the deep mysteries of God in the Scriptures. This holy discipline equipped her with a thorough and profound knowledge of the Bible.

I commented to a friend recently that alone time seems scarce and rarely uninterrupted. There is always a mess to manage, laundry to be done, schoolwork to complete, reconciliation to facilitate among siblings…

Even if you don’t find yourself in a season of motherhood, seeking quiet is a challenge. There are continual distractions–whether at home or in our vocations; always something tugging at our attention, desiring to divide our minds and take our gaze from Christ. And these distractions aren’t always bad, but the truth is that our souls need quiet now and then. Not just to put our minds at rest, but to remember our source of true rest, found in Christ.

It can be tricky, but even if we’re only taking 5-10 minutes, couldn’t it be worth it? God, in His faithfulness, never wastes these efforts, sisters. Though they be meager, no obedient moment is in vain. Wherever you are, know that the Father graciously loves you just as you are–exactly where you are–and He desires that you come.

Grace and Peace,

Sus

For further reflection: Mark 1:35, Luke 5:16, Matthew 14:23, 1 Corinthians15:58, Isaiah 30:15