“I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. 9. Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices: my flesh shall also rest in hope.”
We need to ask what it really is that makes our hearts glad? Are our hearts made glad because of what we have in the world, or are our hearts made glad because of the Lord and what He is doing in our lives? I am not saying that there is nothing in the world that should make our hearts glad. I am saying that those things in the world that make us glad would be better if the Lord was the basic cause for all of them. He wants to be a part of all of our lives, and wants to add to our joy. Let’s take a look at what David wrote in the two verses above that made his heart glad. He wrote that “I have set the Lord always before me.” This says to me that David wanted to be sure that He was being guided by right principles, so he always set the Lord before him instead of after him. God was not a last resort for David. Too many people put the Lord behind their backs and do what they want to do until they run into hard times, then they try to put the Lord before them and follow His leadership. It will be much better if we seek God before the bad things happen in our lives. He should be “before us” in the good times and bad times. I love the old gospel song, “The God on the Mountain Is Still God in the Valley.” The song reminds us that we always have God whether the times are good or bad. We just need to remember that it is as important to seek Him in the good times as it is to seek Him in the bad times. He wrote: “Because He is at my right hand…” I know that this does not complete the thought that David was making. We will deal with that next, but for now we need to see the importance of having God at our right hand. This means that David wanted to stay close to God. Along this same line, James wrote in James 4:7-8: “Submit yourselves therefore to God, Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you….” If God is not at your right hand, and you feel that He is not near you, let me remind you that God didn’t move – you did. In our own minds and hearts, we need to keep ourselves close to God. God does not move. He is always right where He has always been. After all, Jesus promised: “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the ages.” We need to remember that promise and know that God is at our right hand. He wrote: “Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” The NIV translates this as “I will not be shaken.” What David meant here was that because He realized that God was near Him all of the time, the things that happened in his life did not shake him and move him away from his commitment to God. Often, when we face hard times, we think that God has forsaken us and we are shaken, so we move farther away from Him. These are the times when we need to draw ever closer to our Lord. He is with us in the valley and on the mountain. Clasp this truth from the song “My God Is Near Me all the Time” close to your heart and you will not be shaken and will stay close to Him in your mind and heart. Is your heart glad because you have set the Lord before you? Is your heart glad because you realize that He is near you every minute of every day? Is your heart glad because you have not been shaken and have stayed close to Him no matter what has happened in your life? Good questions, what are the answers? Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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