April 13, 2015

Really Looking

Devotion for the Week...

I love to read. Lately I haven't been reading as many books because I'm spending so much time quilting or reading quilting blogs, but I still love a good book. Right now I'm reading The Strangled Queen, an historical fiction written by French author Maurice Druon. The book is number 2 in a series of 7, and is set in France in the 1300s. The series chronicles the end of the Capetian kings, about whom I know absolutely nothing.

When I was reading a couple of weeks ago, this lined jumped out at me: "He had governed men from so high a position and for so long that he had lost the knack of looking at them" (p. 97). The he mentioned in the quote was in charge of the treasury and daily made decisions that affected the lives of everyone in the kingdom, but he had stopped really seeing the people. He had stopped thinking about how his decisions affected them and he had stopped caring about individual people.

I sat for a few minutes, reading the line over and over, before finally getting up and typing it into my laptop for use in a devotion. The contrast was just too great to ignore. There is, after all, no position higher than God. There is no government that is responsible for more people and no politician who has governed longer.

But God hasn't lost the knack of looking at us. He sees every detail of our lives and cares about our well-being. Consider these verses:

"Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows" (Matthew 10: 29-31).

"You have searched me, Lord,
    and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise;
    you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down;
    you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue
    you, Lord, know it completely.
You hem me in behind and before,
    and you lay your hand upon me" (Psalm 139: 1-5).

He sees us. Really sees us. He cares about us so much that He is always aware of where we are, what we are doing, what we are thinking and what we are feeling. No one could possibly see us more clearly than God sees us, and nothing could ever change the fact that He cares enough to really look at us.

1 comment:

  1. That book is next on my list Leanne, I shall look out for that quote now :)

    ReplyDelete

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