by Pastor Douglas Brauner

Looking to Christ for Mercy

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens!”
Psalm 123:1 English Standard Version

This past summer, I became friends with a physical therapist, not that we went to lunch together. I have never seen him outside of his office. We became friends because of the hours we spent together working on my back, hip, and shoulder.

Gravity has taken a toll on my body.

So, I stretch my muscles in the morning and listen to a book to help pass the 45 minutes that I spend on the floor and in a chair. When finished, I then have a YouTube video I watch that includes walking, stretching, and weights. As I move with this video, I will often notice that I’m looking at the floor. It seems easy to look at the floor when I’m giving my back a workout.

Then I hear a voice tell, me, “Keep your head up!” The exercise leader says it encouragingly, not with a scolding tone. I look up. I look up beyond the TV and something positive happens to me.

Psalm 123 is a psalm of ascent that pilgrims recited on their way up to Jerusalem, seeing the Holy City in front of them. They were looking up toward the place of worship. They were looking for the mercy of their Lord. They waited for his mercy.

The poet of this psalm, knew what it meant to look at his feet. Towards the end of the psalm, he declared that God’s people had had enough of the contempt of others who were at ease and those who were proud.

The invitation to look up is still the same for us. We also know contempt and we too wait for the mercy of God to reach down into our daily mess. Because of Christ we can be sure that God has had mercy and will have mercy on us as we by faith lift our eyes to him.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado