Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK … Please take the time to take in a YouTube video of images and lyrics from the Australian group Hillsong leading a large audience and receptively singing the chorus of the old hymn … Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus … poignantly singing of how when we focus on Jesus, His light shines on us and gives us a view of life that reflects His glory. … And THEN TO THIS LINK to see images and images from Matt Redman’s song, Light of the World, giving us God’s prospective our our walk in this world, with His Light shining to light our way.
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Highlight Verse: John 1:9 [NKJV] …
9 That was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.
… John the Baptizer gives witness to the true light of the world … and that is Jesus, our Messiah.
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Highlight Passage [context]: John 1:1-14 … USE THIS LINK …
… God’s word give believers a view of a darkened earth which produces the Light the world needs to bring light into the darkness and peace from the turmoil of this world.
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Reference Passage #1 [NKJV] : ... Isiah 26:3 …
3 You [LORD] will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You.
... When we focus on our Lord, we can find peace and see light in the darkness of our world.
Reference Passage #2 [NKJV] : ... John 14:6 ...
6 Jesus said to him [a fearful Thomas], “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”
... Jesus is the light of life when we are fearful or lost in the darkness of the world.
My Devotional Journal: Today's ODB author, David McCasland, uses an apt word picture, of seeing earth from space, to illustrate how we can see the world when we focus on Jesus in faith, trusting in His sovereignty. He writes: “My perspective on earth changed dramatically the very first time I went into space,” says Space Shuttle astronaut Charles Frank Bolden Jr. From four hundred miles above the earth, all looked peaceful and beautiful to him. Yet Bolden recalled later that as he passed over the Middle East, he was “shaken into reality” when he considered the ongoing conflict there. During an interview with film producer Jared Leto, Bolden spoke of that moment as a time when he saw the earth with a sense of how it ought to be—and then sensed a challenge to do all he could to make it better.
It’s true, isn’t it? When we focus on the world, things can look very, very dark, … even foreboding. But as the group Hillsong and Matt Redmon sing [linked above], and we read and believe in the truth from God’s word above, when we “Turn Our Eyes Upon Jesus,” and truly see Him, in faith, for Whom He is, … “the things of this world, grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace.”
Need I say more? I think not.
My Prayer Today: Heavenly Father, help me to focus on Your light, the Light of the world, and let You shine on my path through this world. ... Amen
Blogger Note: Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled Our Daily Bread, distributed online via email by RBC Ministries. If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.
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