April 10

Look up


“I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth. . . He that keepeth thee will not slumber” (Psa. 121:1-3).

In these first words of one of the greatest psalms of David, the nobleness which we immediately feel seems to lie in this, that David will seek help only from the highest source. “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.” Nothing less than God’s help can really meet his needs. He will not peer into the valleys. He will not turn to fellowmen, to nature, to work, to pleasure, as if they had the relief he needed. “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.”
There are no times in life when opportunity, the chance to be and do, gathers so richly about the soul as when it has to suffer. Then everything depends on whether the man turns to the lower or the higher helps.

If he resorts to mere expedients and tricks, the opportunity is lost. He comes out not richer nor greater; nay, he comes out harder, poorer, smaller for his pain. But if he turns to God, the hour of suffering is the turning hour of his life. Opportunity opens before him as the ocean opens before one who sails out of a river. Men have done the best and worst, the noblest and the basest things the world has seen, under the pressure of excessive pain. Everything depended on whether they looked to the depths or to the hills for help.
—Phillips Brooks.

When the sky is black and lowering, when thy path in life is drear,
Upward lift thy steadfast glances, ’mid the maze of sorrow here.
From the beaming Fount of gladness shall descend a radiance bright;
And the grave shall be a garden, and the hours of darkness light.

For the Lord will hear and answer when in faith His people pray;
Whatso’er He hath appointed shall but work thee good alway.
E’en thy very hairs are numbered, God commands when one shall fall;
And the Lord is with His people, helping each and blessing all.

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