You are more than a body. You have a God-given soul. Sometimes that soul is restless, anxious, confused, stormy, and scared. There will be days, stretches, and seasons of life when all is not “quiet” in the recesses of your inner being.
David was familiar with that feeling. Listen to what he wrote in Psalm 131:
O LORD, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.
O Israel, hope in the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore.
That’s a prescription worth seriously considering today. Is my soul restless? Distracted? Overwhelmed? If so, with what have I “occupied” myself? Ridiculous drama? Ignorant controversies? Foolish quarrels? Idle gossip? Baseless speculations? Fleshly arguments? Senseless distractions? Empty wastes of time and energy? If those are the sorts of things filling my heart and fueling my spirit, why wouldn’t my soul feel disordered and agitated?
But I have calmed and quieted my soul…
How? It’s right there in Psalm 131.
O LORD…
David humbled himself beneath the mighty hand of his Creator.
…my heart is not lifted up…
Pride had to be set aside.
…my eyes are not raised too high…
No place for arrogance, self-centeredness, or haughtiness.
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
We don’t have to stick our heads in the sand, and we ought to be sensitively aware of what is going on in the lives around us, but we need to realize–for our own good–that some things are too big, too complex, too distant for us to fix or even impact. We should certainly serve where we can, seizing opportunities to shine in Jesus’ name, praying every step of the way, but to this day there are secret things that belong to God alone. And that is precisely why David encouraged Israel to “hope in the LORD from this time forth and forevermore.”
I don’t know about you, but I needed Psalm 131 today. I needed David to coach me to say and adopt as my own…
My heart is not lifted up.
My eyes are not raised too high.
I will not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul.
Only then will I be able to encourage and model for others as effectively as possible…
Hope in the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore.