I love to walk! Whenever I can, I am ready, tennis shoes on and out the door. Just the thought of it fills me with excitement and joy! Most don’t understand my exhilaration, but it is something that gives me great pleasure. Walking with someone is sheer fun, but when I am by myself, it can be a time where tangled thoughts and burdens are lifted. Especially if my heart is listening to the Lord.
Since Jerry‘s successful heart surgery and lifestyle changing cardiac-rehab, he has joined me on our gravel driveway four, sometimes five, days a week. In the past, I had to slow down so he could keep pace with me. Now it is delightfully just the opposite. Sometimes I have to do a skippity-hop to stay up with him.
One morning as we were putting one foot in front of the other, I noticed that to keep from tripping on loose gravel, both Jerry’s head and mine were bent down watching where we stepped. Out of seemingly nowhere, the memory of what my high school ballet teacher used to say came to mind. Keep your shoulders back. And hold your heads high.
That commanding tidbit is now the posture Jerry and I try to keep, but it’s not easy. The habit of walking with our eyes cast to the ground is what we’re used to doing.
That’s when it hit me. I do the same thing in my walk with the Lord. Instead of my gaze being focused on Him, I find myself almost hypnotized by whatever has been spinning me in circles.
Fixating on the problem instead of taking it to God is the place I stumble most. Does that ever ring true with you?
My heart means to go to the Lord first, but my long-lived habits are sadly where I start. Whether it’s relationships, or finances, emotional, physical, or spiritual health, the focus on what I can do, or how can I fix the problem, is the worn out path I have found myself trudging down all too often.
But God shows us a better way.
He tells us to praise Him. Even when we don’t feel like it. Even when it’s a sacrifice to do so. (See Hebrews 13:15.) For when we, His people, praise Him, we are saying to the Lord, I trust You. In everything I face, I know, that I know, that I know, that You love me and have Your best for me.
The Bible tells us our praise also lights the way and encourages others to trust in the Lord.
Hallelujah! Praise the Lord! It’s time to sing to God a brand-new song so that all his holy people will hear how wonderful he is!
Psalm 149:1, tpt
Finally, in praising God, we take the onus of saving ourselves and our loved ones—from the daily to the eternal—off of our shoulders. In doing so, with humbled hearts we ask the Lord to take that majestic title of Savior back to Himself. Where it should have been all along.
Related Post: The Gift of the Heavy Rains
When my focus is anywhere else but God, I miss the beauty of His wisdom and the intricacy of His ways that show us, “…all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28 nkjv).
May praise be the best habit that is formed in all of us.
In His love,
Kimberly
