Mar 04 2022

For our heart shall rejoice in him, because we have trusted in his holy name.

Psalm 33 is a song of praise to the Lord, and today's verse appears near the end of it. It is a declaration that our hearts will rejoice in Him because we have trusted in His name. Today, we'll look at both parts of this verse to understand how they work together.

The first part of the verse says that our hearts will rejoice in Him. What does it mean to rejoice in God? This is the natural state of a Christian who loves the Lord—rejoicing! It translates into having a hopeful attitude. It means that we are filled up with and secured in the promises of God. We know that regardless of the circumstances we face, nothing will stop God's faithfulness.

The second part says that we should trust in His holy name. Again, what does this mean? Trust means that we accept and believe. In this case, we're trusting in His holy name. God's name is holy because it is set apart; there is none like it in all the earth. We can trust the promises that come from His name--that He is good, loving, kind, all-powerful, and all-knowing. We trust that Jesus is God.

Knowing that Jesus is God is truly amazing. Think about it: we have no option of choosing the kind of God that exists. God could be a tyrannical dictator. But instead, He came into Earth as a baby. Instead of exercising His power by striking down anyone who doesn't believe in Him, He orchestrated the death and resurrection of His own Son so that we could be saved. This is the kind of God that the Lord is: gracious, loving, powerful, mighty, and holy. This is the kind of God that we get to serve, which is absolutely a cause for rejoicing!

As we get to know and understand the Lord better through reading the Bible and praying, our hearts will grow and learn to rejoice in the Lord more and more. The more we learn about Him, the more we love Him and the more praise naturally flows from our lips.

Dear Lord, I thank you for being such a tender, loving God. Help me to grow in my knowledge, understanding, and relationship with you. I want my heart to rejoice in you again and again, over and over, until it never stops. In Jesus' name, amen.

Mar 03 2022

And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy rest in safety.:

In this verse, Job's friend Zophar is trying to encourage Job to trust the Lord despite the many troubles that have befallen him. A little later, Zophar tells Job that if he "stretches out his hand" toward God (v.13), he will be secure and find hope. Today, like Job, we have the same opportunity. Will we stretch out our hands to the Lord in the midst of whatever we are facing to find hope and safety in Him?

Stretching out our hands is the universal symbol for surrender. It's saying that we need help; we can't do this on our own. As Christians, we have already admitted that we needed Jesus to save us. We cannot become good enough to merit our own heavenly entrances. We surrender to God at the moment of our salvation, and we should surrender to him again and again when we, like Job, face trials of any kind.

When we surrender to the Lord, He takes our cause upon Himself. He secures us in His grip; he makes sure that nothing comes between us and Himself because the most important thing in our lives is our relationship with Him. Nothing is so painful or hard that it will inevitably take away our relationship with Jesus. When we surrender to the Lord, we will be able to endure.

Knowing that we are secure in the Lord gives us hope because we know that He is all-powerful and all-loving. He will not allow something to happen to us for the sake of harming us. While He does allow painful things to happen in our lives, they are not meant to wound us. Instead, they are the results of living in a world full of sin. Yet we have hope because we know they cannot overtake us. We know that even though we live in a broken world, our Savior is with us.

The Lord gives us rest in safety. This means we can rest in full confidence that He will keep us in His hands. While painful things will happen in our lives, the Lord will never remove Himself from us. If we surrender to Him by asking Him to help us, He will draw close to us in any battle we face.

Dear Lord, I thank you for caring about my safety. Thank you for being the author and provider of my hope. All of my hope is in you because you have saved me. I thank you for keeping me safe and secure in you and for guiding and loving me always. In Jesus' name, amen.


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