Wednesday 10 February 2021

Thought for the Day 10/02/21 - Come on - heads UP!


In the last fifty or sixty years there's been a lot of attention paid to not just physical but mental health, and we've come to understand the links between rest, sleep, mental attitude and both physical and mental health.

More recently we've found people talking much more openly about their 'mental health' and failing to distinguish that adequately from the presence or absence of their own definition of the 'fun factor' and how happy they feel ... which has more usually over time been recognised as a matter of mental attitude rather than mental health.

Certainly, the Bible is clear - even in challenging times - of the responsibility to nurture gratitude and thankfulness of heart and reminders to count your blessings and worship - especially when we don't feel like it - are blessings to receive with glad thanks!

Which is EXACTLY what happens in our Thought for the Day verse here today ...



Imagine the scene

Imagine night time up at the Temple, in one of the quietest places these guys ever knew.

Imagine what it was like to be there in the early hours of the morning.

And these guys are stuck there on the night shift where they have absolutely nothing to do ... I mean, where they have the privilege of time set apart to practice the presence of God.

You know how it is when you're awake in the early hours and your metabolism and your emotional condition are both low?

Of course they're naturally tired and want to doze off!


And then a whip crack word kick-starts this Psalm

Verse one cracks like a whip into their early hours situation, but not every translation has a clue how to translate v. 1 and so they leave this word out. The effect of that is you can easily end up missing the whole point of what's going on!

You see, that first verse addresses people who are dozy and glum (as you and I often are in the early hours) and says powerfully and incisively 'wake UP!' 
... 'behold!', 'see!' we could say 'heads UP!'

Why?


There is absolute clarity and definition here about what it is that those people slipping into low spirits and sleep in the early hours should do to displace the low condition of their spirits.

"Praise the Lord,

all you servants of the Lord

who serve in the Lord’s temple during the night.

Lift your hands toward the sanctuary

and praise the Lord."

This is to be their, deliberate displacement therapy!

And how do they respond to this summons?

'Go away, I'm miserable and sleepy and I'm going to be staying here to wallow in it'?
'Bring me a treat, I need it for my mental health!'?

No!

Look at verse 3:

"May the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth,

bless you from Zion."

The grammar in the Hebrew there makes it clear this ISN'T a prayer FOR the miserable uttered by the Psalmist!
It's the response that the miserable worn out temple servants make to whoever it is that has called on them to wake up and give praise to God!

The point

The point is that there are often physiological and emotional reasons for what we feel ... whether it's tiredness or inactivity or something else.
It's often less a matter of 'my mental health' than it is of 'my spiritual health' - which has physical and (sometimes sadly) mental health consequences.

The Takeaway

It can be an excellent thing to stay close to friends who can challenge us to wake up and give God the thanks that He's due ... but the responsibility to thank God for His excellent character and good gifts rest on us ourselves.
And not taking up that challenge impacts hard on our feelings of peace, of quality of life and of satisfaction.
"Attention! 
Praise the Lordall you servants of the Lordwho serve in the Lord’s temple during the night.
Lift your hands toward the sanctuary
and praise the Lord."

May God give us strength and determination we need every day to do so.


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