Week Five - Day Four: End of Day

God’s revelation of Himself to us, if properly grasped, always stimulates humility in us. On the one hand, it is an amazing complement. God has shown Himself to me! This is where the preacher in me wants to say, “Hey, imagine if the President of the U.S. or Tom Brady or Bono or (pick your brand of celebrity that would overwhelm you) wanted to be your very great friend. Imagine if they called you up and said, ‘Let’s hang out. I just want to find out about you and let you get to know me.’ How amazed would you be?”

So that’s what the preacher in me wants to say to remind us how amazing it is that God has revealed Himself to us. But His self-revelation also has the opposite effect. It is also shattering, unnerving, knee-bending, and heart-breaking.

I’m reminded of a children’s book I read years ago.¹ In the book, a pirate decides he will capture the moon. He tries various things with no success. Finally he gets a lasso around the moon and draws it near. On the final page there is a gigantic, page-filling moon and at the bottom a tiny, little pirate standing before it, arms uplifted, overwhelmed.

God’s revelation of Himself, if properly grasped, always stimulates humility in us.

1. Read Psalm 8.

   (1) O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.

   (2) From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.

   (3) When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

   (4) what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?

   (5) You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.

   (6) You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:

   (7) all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field,

   (8) the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.

   (9) O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

2. Whatever verses of Psalm 19 that you tried to commit to memory, review them now.
3. Survey your day. Was God stirring around you in ways that you now need to recognize?
4. End your day by praying this: “Guide us waking, O Lord, and guard us sleeping; that awake we may watch with Christ, and asleep we may rest in peace.”
5. Lights out!