My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Psalm 73:26
Today's Scripture & Insight:
Psalm 73:21–28 (NIV):
21 When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered,
22 I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before you.
23 Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.
24 You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.
25 Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
26 My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
27 Those who are far from you will perish; you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.28 But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge; I will tell of all your deeds.
In his book Fearfully and Wonderfully Made, co-authored with Philip Yancey, Dr. Paul Brand observed, “A hummingbird heart weighs a fraction of an ounce and beats eight hundred times a minute; a blue whale’s heart weighs half a ton, beats only ten times per minute, and can be heard two miles away. In contrast to either, the human heart seems dully functional, yet it does its job, beating 100,000 times a day [65–70 times a minute] with no time off for rest, to get most of us through seventy years or more.”
The amazing heart so thoroughly powers us through life that it has become a metaphor for our overall inner well-being. Yet, both our literal and metaphorical hearts are prone to failure. What can we do?
The psalmist Asaph, a worship leader of Israel, acknowledged in Psalm 73 that true strength comes from somewhere—Someone—else. He wrote, “My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (v. 26). Asaph was right. The living God is our ultimate and eternal strength. As the Maker of heaven and earth, He knows no such limitations to His perfect power.
In our times of difficulty and challenge, may we discover what Asaph learned through his own struggles: God is the true strength of our hearts. We can rest in that strength every day.
Today’s Hymns:
Psalm 73 Song
The Lord Is My Strength
Scripture to Respond:
Psalm 42:11
11 Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
Psalm 59:16
16 But I will sing of your strength, in the morning I will sing of your love; for you are my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble.
Reflection:
In our times of difficulty and challenge, can you learn from the struggles that God is the true strength of our hearts and that we can rest in His strength every day?
When you feel that you have lost your faith, how would you gain strength from your Heavenly Father, who loves and watches over you?
Prayer:
Thank you, Heavenly Father, for you are strong while I am weak; you can endure while I cannot; and you fully understand while I am bewildered.
Wong Wai Tung
(Chief executive officer of The Great Wall Education Foundation) &
Sam Chow
(Administrative officer of The Great Wall Education Foundation)
Reflection and Prayer translated by Jenny Hung
“The content of this article is taken from Our Daily Bread. Copyright by Our Daily Bread Ministries. Used by permission.”
