This is the day the LORD has made

Psalm 118:24 contains a famous verse, one which has inspired a famous hymn. It reads (KJV),

This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.

When we're struggling to pray, when we fail to find the right words of praise, and when our thoughts seem to drift during our prayerful meditations, it might be useful to consider this verse.

The reason this day exists, and the reason we're even alive to breathe the air around us, is because God willed it to be so. That, alone, is reason enough to offer praise and proceed through the day with spiritual gladness.

A prayer of praise from Revelation

The first several chapters of Revelation present letters to various churches around the Mediterranean. But, starting in Chapter 4, John begins describing visions of heaven. At the end of chapter 4, we find the twenty four "elders" offering their praise to God. Their prayer is (Revelation 4:11, KJV),

Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

The prayer offers praise to God, and then describes why God deserved such praise. I like this prayer, because it's easy to memorize, and it gets right to the heart of worship.

Hey, if this prayer is what God's followers pray in heaven, then it's certainly worth us praying as well!

Promises from God

In Zechariah 2:5 (KJV), God describes life in "Jerusalem," which is an obvious pointer toward the future "New Jerusalem," or heaven. In that verse, God says,

For I, saith the LORD, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.

That is, God will offer both (1) protection from outside trouble and (2) inner joy. A simple message, to be sure, but one which should focus our prayers, and encourage us to remain diligent and faithful.

A lesson from Obadiah

The book of Obadiah is easy to overlook, in part due to its brevity -- it clocks in at a mere 21 verses -- and in part due to its seemingly narrow message of judgment on Jerusalem's neighboring nation of Edom.

Evidently, as the Hebrews were being carted off to captivity, the Edomites were sitting nearby mocking the Hebrews. Recalling that the Edomites were related to the Hebrews through Isaac, Obadiah delivers the message that the Edomites' mockery will not go unpunished (Obadiah 1:12, KJV),

But thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy brother in the day that he became a stranger; neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction; neither shouldest thou have spoken proudly in the day of distress.

For this haughty attitude, God promises (Obadiah 1:15, KJV)

Thy reward shall return upon thine own head.

Again, it's easy to ignore the book of Obadiah since it appears to deal with an ancient political dispute between two nations. But the larger question for us is this: Have we ever behaved like Edom when misfortune fell upon someone else? When politicians, or athletes, or even people we know encounter embarrassing situations or misfortunes, do we ever take a kind of perverse delight? Plain and simple, that kind of attitude, even if kept to ourselves, is a sin. And our "reward" for such an attitude? "Thy reward shall return upon thine own head."

Let us try to flush such haughty thoughts out of our heads.

But if not...

In the third chapter of Daniel, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar erects a golden idol and demands everyone to bow down and worship it. Three Jews (Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego) refuse, drawing the wrath of Nebuchadnezzar, who threatens to throw them into a fiery furnace.

The response of the three Jews is one of my favorite passages in the entire Bible (Daniel 3:17-18, KJV),

Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.

The three words "but if not," which I place in bold font, have earned a certain mystique thanks to their potential role in the World War II battle of Dunkirk. But in terms of pure theology, those three words are powerful. The three Jews recognize that God was under no obligation to save them from destruction, but they were under an obligation to obey God.

It's tempting to view prayer as a method to get stuff from God, and certainly some prayers take the form of requests. But prayer is more than the process of making requests. It's deeper purpose involves conforming our will to God's through a life of spiritual obedience. Facing near-certain destruction Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego understood that. Let us try to emulate their example.

The nearness of God

Where is God? In John 4:24 (KJV), Jesus says,

God is a Spirit.

Being a spirit, he is anywhere and everywhere, all at the same time.
God, himself, expresses this concept clearly through Jeremiah (23:23-24, KJV),

Am I a God at hand ... and not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him? ... Do not I fill heaven and earth?

This omnipresence of God speaks first and foremost to his infinite power. Our finite minds cannot process such infinite presence. But it also speaks to his nearness. Even now, as I type on my keyboard, God is here, watching my actions and reading my thoughts. That should provide motivation for me to remain obedient, but more important, when I stumble, it means that God understands my weaknesses, and is ready to forgive when I confess.

The "nearness of God" is one of his defining features, and one that we should acknowledge in prayer.

But thou didst trust in thine own beauty

In chapter 16 of Ezekiel, God spends verses 1-14 outlining all of the blessings he bestowed upon his people. As we pray today, let us read those 14 verses, pause for a moment, and reflect upon how God has provided for us.

But then continue to verse 15, which begins (KJV),

But thou didst trust in thine own beauty...

So many of our sins stem from this very problem. We gladly accept God's blessings, including the very blessing of being alive. But then we turn our attention and adoration to those blessings themselves, rather than toward he who provided them.

In our prayers today, let us focus (as Paul put it) on the creator rather than the creation.