April 4 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

Devotional

If someone were to take your picture from the top of a twenty-story build­ing while you were walking in the street, you would look like an ant in the jungle. But if your picture were taken while you yourself stood on that building, the photo would show you towering over the other buildings with the city beneath your feet. Everything depends on the angle. From one angle a person is puny; from another perspective he or she is impressive.

The Bible wants us to look at people from both angles. People are very small—and they are very great. People are small with respect to what is above them. But they are great because of all that God has placed under them. Projected against the skies, people are puny, but in their workshop (the earth), people are king. God has placed everything beneath their feet.

Therefore, when we hear someone boast, we should visualize the per­son against the expanse of the skies or against the mountain ranges of God's greatness—and we should shudder. Why? Because a mere human has exalted him- or herself.

On the other hand, we should also shudder when we see a person who has become a slave of that which God entrusted to him or her—a farm, stocks and bonds, machines, material. People were made a little less than God. But they become pitiful beggars when they are reduced to the slavery of things.

We must learn to look at people the way the Bible does. And we can be the kind of people God wants us to be only when Jesus has taught us once again how to be men and women in God's world.

Before the sovereign God, we are small. We eat out of his hand and live by his grace. Nobody has a right to make his or her own rules, and it takes more than human power to keep the rules of God. At the same time, those who have been redeemed by the Lord may never fall into the slavery of people and things. They are princes and princesses in God's palace.

REFLECTIONS

Try turning verses 4 and 5 into a prayer of your own, reflecting both your "smallness" and your "greatness."

Andrew Kuyvenhoven's Daylight, a modern devotional classic, was originally published by Paideia Press in 1977. This updated edition is copyright 2009 by Faith Alive Christian Resources. You can order a copy of this revised version of the book directly from the publisher.

A man of many accomplishments, Andrew Kuyvenhoven is probably best known for his contributions to Today (formerly The Family Altar), a widely-used monthly devotional booklet associated with the Back to God Hour. Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations for this updated edition of Daylight are from the Holy Bible: Today's New International Version copyright 2001, 2005 by the International Bible Society.