As I Live And Breathe

 

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness. --Lamentations 3:22-23

I woke up this morning with a song on my heart.  It is an old hymn, written a century ago, and it is a commentary on the truths found in Lamentations 3:22-23.

“Great is Thy faithfulness,” O God my Father,
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not
As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be. 

“Great is Thy faithfulness!” “Great is Thy faithfulness!”
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided—
“Great is Thy faithfulness,” Lord, unto me! 

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love. 

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

As I meditated on the hymn text, I was encouraged.  The same God who spoke creation into being, who breathed life into mankind, still speaks life over me.  Psalm 102:25-28 says, "Of old You laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands.  They will perish, but You will remain; they will all wear out like a garment.  You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away, but You are the same, and Your years have no end.  The children of Your servants shall dwell secure; their offspring shall be established before You."

Creation declares the goodness of God.  Psalm 36:5 says, "Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, Your faithfulness to the clouds."  Romans 1:19-20 says, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.  For His invisible attributes, namely His eternal power and divine nature, have clearly been perceived, ever since the the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.  So they are without excuse."  The heavens really do proclaim His goodness to us, even when we sin against Him.

Malachi 3:6 says, "For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." God is forever forgiving, and will not destroy those of us who are called by His Name.  Numbers 23:19 says, "God is not man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind.  Has He said, and will He not do it?  Or has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?"  God loved the world so much that He gave His only Son as a sacrifice for us, so that whoever believes in Him will be saved.

We get so caught up in the current culture that we often lose sight of who He is, and whose we are.  American author and English professor David Foster Wallace told this allegory in a 2005 commencement speech at Kenyon College:

There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, "Morning, boys.  How's the water?"  And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, "What the hell is water?"

Chad Bird writes, "The cultural waters in which we swim are so natural, so ever-present, so much a part of the fixed reality of our lives, that we rarely pause to ponder, 'What the hell is water?' What are these wet assumptions soaking our skin? What are these 'truths' that form the sea in which we live and work and play?" (Bird, Upside Down Spirituality: The 9 Essential Failures of a Faithful Life, 50-51).  Too often we as Christians ride the current, following the crowd like a school of fish.  We should be swimming the other way.  Our lives should be counter-cultural, in a way.  We don't need to be so influenced by current culture that no one can see we are any different.

This culture that so permeates our lives, through which we slog incessantly and often immerse ourselves within, is fickle.  It changes from one generation to the next, from one decade to the next, from one pervasive idea to the next.  James 4:14 says, "Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes."  David Foster Wallace didn't have a fixed point of reference even after observing the cultural winds, as he committed suicide at age 46.

We must remember that we are in this world, but not of this world.  We may be covered in the muck and mire of this world, but we need a daily cleansing, an immersion into the Water of Life.  God does not change, and that is why we are admonished in Romans 12:2, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect."

Job 7:17-18 says, "What is man, that You make so much of him, and that You set Your heart on him, visit him every morning and test him every moment?"  We are not the newest and best versions of humanity, on our way to being the dust of history.  We are made in the image of God, who is faithful, who never changes.  He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  Let us not lose sight of His goodness and faithfulness, so that we can be a beacon on a hill for Him for eternity.