PSALM 138:1-2 – “I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart; before the gods I sing your praise; I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.”
THEME OF THE DAY: OUR DAILY MARCHING ORDERS. God did not make the Christian life complex. Just the opposite. It is simple. It’s not easy, but simple. Sin makes life complex. For instance, what did Jesus give as the Great Command? Love – “And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these”” (Mark 12:28-31). Simple, right? Yes. Easy? Hardly, but never lose sight of this great truth; when God gives a command He also gives the grace to obey the command.
In the day-to-day, moment-by-moment living of the Christian life, today’s scripture gives us simple, clear, and direct “marching orders” to be pleasing unto the Lord. What we see are the two activities that the Lord Himself is constantly doing – exalting His name and His Word. We are to model Him in both.
First, we exalt His Name by living to make much of Jesus in our speech, attitudes, and actions. This means remembering throughout the day what Jesus said would be true of all His disciples – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). We are witnesses of Him. The question is not are we, but what kind are we – an accurate one representing Him or a confusing one clouding the biblical image of Him? To exalt Him is to live aware we are being observed because we proclaim allegiance to Christ. This awareness causes us to be on guard against anything we might say or do that would not exalt Christ.
Our second “marching order” as Christians is to exalt the Lord’s Word. How? Two ways. We intentionally obey the Word. The Christian life requires action. James instructs us to “be doers of the word not hearers only” (James 1:22). It is the action of taking what we believe, the Bible, and putting into our lives by active obedience the very words we profess to believe. It is by obeying God’s Word to affirm our profession of faith in Christ we model Christ. The other way we exalt His Word is by proclaiming it. Jesus told us “Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15). No one gets saved by just observing a Christian. The gospel is a message of words, and every Christian is to be sharing these words of life.
The Christian life is not complex. It is simple, not easy, but simple and our daily privilege and responsibility is to exalt the name of the Lord and the word of the Lord. May we be found faithful in both!
PRAYER: Father, may I live this day striving for what You do each day – exalt Your Name and Word.
REFLECTION: In all we do today, take intentional acts to make much of Jesus by obeying His Word.