Lift Our Eyes

By: Joanne Viola

We know we desperately need God’s power to live each day, but who knew how great our need for Him would be to simply live at home?

This was the question Psalm 121 brought to mind in reading the familiar words. The morning is a dark, raw, and rainy one. It fit the current week of grim statistics and news.

The psalm reminds me of these travelers, God’s people, who made the trip to Jerusalem three times a year. The journey was not an easy one as there were no smoothly paved roads along the path which took them through valleys, through mountains and other rough terrain.

Yet they found strength in the Lord Himself to keep returning to Him. So what can we learn from these travelers to help us navigate these days in which we now find ourselves?

• God will be our help. “I look up to the mountains – does my help come from there? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth!” (verses 1-2, NLT). May we look to the Maker, our Maker, for all help.
• God will be our support system. “He will not let you stumble; the one who watches over you will not slumber” (verse 3, NLT). God will be continuously there for us. He never sleeps on the job but stay ever positioned, ever alert to our needs.
• God will keep watch over us. “The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and go, both now and forever” (verse 8, NLT). The words “watches over” is used five times in this short psalm (see verses 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8). Discouragement and harm will threaten to invade our space but God deposits into each of us all that we need to press on in our journey. There is never a day He is not faithfully watching over us.

May we lift our eyes to see the Source of our help,
and rely solely on Him to bring us through these days.

Photo by Luke Richardson on Unsplash