Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus
This Christmas, my mom wrote a special Christmas greeting to send to family and friends that said:
May your day be filled with anticipation (Hope),
the calm you feel after being busy (Peace),
lots of laughter (Joy),
and hugs filled with (Love) JESUS!
I thought it was so touching and beautiful and it quickly inspired me to write a song. This song ended up being a benediction to close out, not only my church’s service on December 31st, but the Christmas season as a whole. I called it “A Christmas Benediction” and the words are as follows:
May we hope with anticipation -
God’s Word has been fulfilled.
May we know that He is with us
as He whispers: “Peace, be still.”
May His joy flow from deep within us -
new life sent from above.
May we come before the manger
to embrace the precious love
of God.
(For a link to a free PDF with the melody, chords, and lyrics, click here )
I feel like the Lord was guiding my mom and I to send everyone into the new year with their eyes turned upon Jesus, to quote the famous hymn. Indeed, we turn our eyes upon Him by placing our hope in Him, finding peace in Him, being filled with joy in Him, and living as one who is filled with His love. So much changes when we turn our eyes upon Jesus, who He Is, what He has done for us, and who we are in Him. True peace and safety is acknowledging our sins before God, repenting, being regenerated by the Holy Spirit, and then finding ourselves, no longer in the shadow of death, but in the shadow of the Almighty - the shelter of the Most High (paraphrasing/drawing on Psalm 32:7, Isaiah 9:2, and Psalm 91:1 NIV (1978 revision))!
Then, once we have turned our “…eyes upon Jesus”, we can lean upon what we see. What we see is all the facets of God’s character and, the more we lean on these, the clearer we see God. Even one look at Christ reveals truth, honor, righteousness, purity, beauty, glory, excellence, praiseworthiness, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control… the list goes on (Philippians 4:8 and Galatians 5:22-23 NIV (1978 revision)). In Christ dwells the fullness of God(Colossians 2:9) and this is what we are privileged to lean upon. In fact, we not only lean upon Him but we also dwell in Him and Him in us (1 John 4:13-15 NIV (1978 revision)!
Therefore, as we leave the Christmas season behind and begin a new year, may we always be conscious of the reality of Christ. May both His cross and His throne fill our vision. “I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:16-19, NIV (1978 revision)).