Considering him

Let all that I am praise the Lord; may I never forget the good things he does for me. He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases. He redeems me from death and crowns me with love and tender mercies. He fills my life with good things. My youth is renewed like the eagle’s! (Psalm 103:2-5)

With all that I am - is that how you praise Jesus? To be honest here, I can get pretty distracted when it comes to spending time with him. When it comes to worshiping him, it recenters me and redirects that focus back onto what really matters. It is easy to get caught up in all of life's distractions, but there is just something about praising and worshiping Jesus that 'reorganizes' and reprioritizes our thoughts, emotions, and attentiveness, isn't there? When we turn our attention fully toward him, it is amazing what he will show us, do within us, and help us with that we didn't even know we needed or wanted in our lives!

As time passes between those moments of praising and worshiping him, we can get so burdened down with all of life's cares and anxieties. We can almost feel an actual weight upon our shoulders. As soon as we turn our attention toward him, taking time to just get into his word and meditate upon what it says, we find that weight slowly but surely being lifted. I don't know how he does it, but he never fails to bring a release, regeneration, and renewal like nothing else we can possibly do in the way of 'self-care'. Maybe being filled with this world's stuff has weighed you down a bit too frequently. Could it be that Jesus is asking you to carve out a little time with him each day to allow him to unburden your life little by little?

As our psalmist says, "May I never forget..." Those words carry such significant meaning because we have a tendency to forget the good things Jesus has done in our lives. When we take specific time to consider them, we begin to see how one thing led to another, and then in a matter of time all those things added up to something very significant in our lives. One by one we might have missed them. As we ponder them in his presence, taking account of his goodness, we begin to see he has been at work even when we didn't see him or realize he was 'busy' behind the scenes.

Our life is indeed filled with good things. Sometimes all we need to do is take the time to consider them. As we do, we might just find our hearts and minds filled with such a sense of peace and joy. Why? We are entering into worship and that fills our hearts and minds like nothing else can! Just sayin!