The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him and what came to my heart and mind in Psalm 63:1,
"You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water."
David speaks of his "thirst" for God. He calls his environment a "dry and parched land where there is no water." In this context David is not speaking about being lost out in the desert. He is speaking of a reality we all know to be true. This world that we live in is lost and fallen with the desolation of God's absence from our ability to apprehend him, to see him. to feel him as we do those things that accompany our physical presence here on earth.
As we all know, although God is omnipresent throughout his creation and beyond, we lack the ability to enjoy his presence, a presence so unlike what we all experience in our daily lives, some have even recoiled at the sight of God when, in exception, they gained a vision of God. Consider Isaiah's reaction to seeing God on his throne. In horror he exclaimed, "'Woe to me!' I cried. 'I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.'"
"You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water."
David speaks of his "thirst" for God. He calls his environment a "dry and parched land where there is no water." In this context David is not speaking about being lost out in the desert. He is speaking of a reality we all know to be true. This world that we live in is lost and fallen with the desolation of God's absence from our ability to apprehend him, to see him. to feel him as we do those things that accompany our physical presence here on earth.
As we all know, although God is omnipresent throughout his creation and beyond, we lack the ability to enjoy his presence, a presence so unlike what we all experience in our daily lives, some have even recoiled at the sight of God when, in exception, they gained a vision of God. Consider Isaiah's reaction to seeing God on his throne. In horror he exclaimed, "'Woe to me!' I cried. 'I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.'"
Like Isaiah, God has provided certain individuals access to himself such that they were able to apprehend him, probably always in some limited way to perceive him. Moses, the prophets, the patriarchs of Israel, those who accompanied Jesus Christ, and others all had glimpses or more of the Lord. Astonishment, enchantment, fear, amazement, awe and wonder are some of the things we read about in Scripture by those who had some contact with God.
David, as a man of deep faith and utilized by God for his purposes certainly had experienced encounters with God in one way or another. Those encounters affected him so much that, as in this psalm, David could say that his whole being longed for God between those events in his life.
Today, those of us who have embraced Jesus Christ as our Savior experience the Lord in differing ways and in differing degrees. Many of us share that hunger, that thirst, that David had felt such that we give ourselves in prayer and immerse ourselves in the Scriptures looking to fill the void created by an earlier experience with the Lord that we now miss. Experiencing God is that way. We hunger for more of him.
A blog with my ruminations over the years can be found here: http://worshipfortoday.blogspot.com/
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know..
A blog with my ruminations over the years can be found here: http://worshipfortoday.blogspot.com/
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know..
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