I don’t want to ever find myself grieving for the past, when I should be celebrating what God is doing in the present. I don’t ever want to forget that God’s presence is the thing worth celebrating–not merely the method that he has used for seasons of my life.
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Scripture
Ezra 3:11-13
“…And all the people shouted with a great shout when they praised the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid. But many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers’ houses, old men who had seen the first house, wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid, though many shouted aloud for joy, so that the people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people’s weeping, for the people shouted with a great shout, and the sound was heard far away.”
Observation
What an amazing time in Israels history! The foundation of the temple was being laid, and plans were coming together to rebuild the house of God. Solomon’s temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians nearly 70 years prior, and the rebuilding of the temple was a huge reason for celebration among God’s people. Yet the voices in the crowd were not all celebrating–some of them were raised in sorrow, weeping over the memory of the former temple. Those that were old enough to have seen the first temple saw this as a time of grief, perhaps recognizing that this new temple would never be quite the same as the original.
It seems that in the midst of their grief they forgot, that the thing which made Solomon’s temple glorious was not the gold and the silver and the stonework and the majestic architecture–but the God who dwelt there. The temple was merely the location and the method God used, to interact with those who served him.
Application
Seasons and circumstances change, and time keeps moving forward. Eventually the things which I work so hard to achieve today, will become a faint memory and a footnote in the pages of history–unless the things in which I am investing myself are eternal in nature. Like the Israelites who mourned instead of rejoicing to see the temple foundations laid, I can allow myself to cling so hard to the things which pass away that I forget the significance of the things which last. Projects that I work on, system that I create, ministries and classes that I put together, all will eventually come to an end–but if those things are all pointed toward the God of the universe, then their impact will continue on even when their time comes to an end.
I don’t want to ever find myself grieving for the past, when I should be celebrating what God is doing in the present. I don’t ever want to forget that God’s presence is the thing worth celebrating–not merely the method that he has used for seasons of my life.
This week, I choose to celebrate the eternal Savior!
Prayer
God, thank you for who you are: eternally good, eternally faithful, eternally true, and eternally loving. Help me to celebrate the right things in my life–not just the methods that you use, but the God who is faithful through every season. Help me not to cling so hard to what you have done in the past, that I miss out on what you are doing today.
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