March 3 Daily Devotional

Bible Verse

"If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth" (Col. 3:1–2).

Devotional

To win heaven, your mind must become heavenly. And to be heavenly, it must adjust itself to heavenly things and heavenly pursuits. The mind is made up in such a way that it adapts its attitude and habits of thought to that which most absorbs it. This is how we sometimes become people of one idea.

Now contemplating divine and spiritual themes has a powerful tendency to spiritualize and sanctify your mind. It seems impossible to breathe a heavenly atmosphere and not to be heavenly; to study holy things and not to be holy; to esteem the image of Christ and not to resemble Christ; to commune often with Jesus and not to catch some stray beam of his glory.

And apart from Jesus, nothing is really pleasant and satisfying to the heavenly mind. Without him, what a dreary, lonesome wilderness this is! But with Christ in your heart and your heart resting in Christ—he in the center of your soul, and your affections and desires centering on him—the desert loses its loneliness and emptiness. To look to Jesus—all your heart-springs in him, your spirit in frequent trips where he dwells in light and glory—to lean upon him and talk with him as though he were actually walking by your side, sitting at your table, associating with you in your calling—this, this is heavenly-mindedness.

This is the counter-attraction that you so deeply need to the "things that are on earth." And this powerful counteracting influence is a realization of your union with Christ in his resurrection and his enthronement in glory.

Christ, of all my hopes the ground,
Christ, the spring of all my joy,
still in thee may I be found,
still for thee my pow'rs employ.

Let thy love my heart inflame;
keep thy fear before my sight;
be thy praise my highest aim;
be thy smile my chief delight.

Fountain of o'erflowing grace,
freely from thy fullness give;
till I close my earthly race,
may I prove it "Christ to live."

Firmly trusting in thy blood,
nothing shall my heart confound;
safely I shall pass the flood,
safely reach Immanuel's ground.

Thus, O thus, an entrance give
to the land of cloudless sky;
having known it "Christ to live,"
let me know it "gain to die."

(Ralph Wardlaw, 1817)

Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.

Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2025.