Daily Devotionals

Music For the Soul

Devotional: May 8th

THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF GOD’S PRESENCE

I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. - Psalms 23:6.

What the Psalmist desires is that he should be able to keep up unbroken consciousness of being in God’s presence, and should be always in touch with Him. That seems hard, and people say, "Impossible! How can I get above my daily work, and be perpetually thinking of God and His will, and realizing consciously communion with Him? " But there is such a thing as having an under-current of consciousness running all through a man’s life and mind; such a thing as having a melody sounding in our ears perpetually, "so sweet we know not we are listening to it " until it stops, and then, by the poverty of the naked and silent atmosphere, we know how sweet were the sounds that we scarcely knew we heard, and yet did hear so well high above all the din of earth’s noises.

Every man that has ever cherished such an aspiration as this does know the difficulties all too well. And yet, without entering upon thorny and unprofitable questions as to whether the absolute, unbroken continuity of consciousness of being in God’s presence is possible for men here below, let us look at the question, which has a great deal more bearing upon our present condition - viz., whether a greater continuity of that consciousness is not possible than we attain to to-day. It does seem to me to be a foolish and miserable waste of time and temper and energy for good people to be quarreling about whether they can come to the absolute realization of this desire in this world when there is not one of them that is not leagues below the possible realization of it, and knows that he is. At all events, whether or not the line can be drawn without a break at all, the breaks may be a great deal shorter and a great deal less frequent than they are. An unbroken line of conscious communion with God is the ideal; and that is what this singer wanted and worked for. How many of my feelings and thoughts to-day, or of the things that I have said and done since I woke this morning, would have been done and said and felt exactly the same if there were not a God at all, or if it did not matter in the least whether I ever came into touch with Him or not? Oh! dear friend, it is no vain effort to bring out lives a little bit nearer unbroken continuity of communion with Him. And God knows, and each for himself knows, how much and how sore our need is of such a union. " One thing have I desired, that will I seek after; that I," in my study; I, in my shop; I, in my parlor, kitchen, or nursery; I, in my studio; I, in my lecture-hall - "may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life." In our "Father’s house are many mansions." The room that we spend most of our lives in, each of us at our tasks or our work-tables, may be in our Father’s house, too; and it is only we that can secure that it shall be.