Be thou my Vision

Recently I have been driving in fog.  I don’t love driving in fog.  I suppose that not many people do.  However, while I was driving home, at about the halfway point of driving, the fog was lifted.  It was a very beautiful sight.  It was like the world was cleared.  The sun looked so beautiful.  It was most definitely just double as beautiful because it had been so ugly and cloudy outside a little bit before.  This really gave me a great perspective to the beautiful sight and the beautiful world that is around me.  

Then the day after, I went to church (on a cloudy morning as well) where we sang one of my favorite hymns, “Be thou my vision.”  I made a bit of a connection while listening to this song.  I realized that the song was discussing how God should be our vision.  He should be the one helping us see the things that are pure and holy in the world.  Just like my vision was cleared from the ugly fog, the Lord wants to clear my vision from the ugly things of this world. The lyrics will say, “still be my vision, oh ruler of all.”  He is the one that is ruler of the whole world.  He is the one who is in control of everything, so he can see everything clearly and he wants us to be similar.  This is a prayer that we keep the Lord as our main set of eyes for our entire life.  

There are so many lyrics in this hymn that provide a great deal of wisdom.  Including, two lyrics back to back of, “waking or sleeping, my presence, my light;” and then “Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true word.”  The Bible should be the light that guides our steps or light to our path.  There is even a verse in scripture that says, “Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.” We should really ever only look for one book for advice in our life, and that is the Holy Bible. There are many times that we can look to other people’s advice, other worldly books, and many multiple other things to have the best life, but at the end of the day they will not provide the same wisdom to us as the Bible can.  Not to say that other books and other advice can’t be helpful, but they only can when they are based out of the Holy book, not based on the things or the wisdom of the world. The things of the world will not be a sufficient lamp for our feet as one day they will fade and grow dark like all other things of this world.  

Another lyric is, “I ever with thee and thou with me, Lord; Thou in me dwelling and I with thee one.”  Once we have become a Christian, the Lord is always with us.  We have a part of the Lord in us and that is the Holy Spirit.  This should be a constant great comfort and joy from the anxiety and evil that comes from the world because we are one with the Lord.  We know that we have a part of the world beyond inside of us no matter what time it is and no matter where we go.  Listening to the Holy Spirit also reminds us to make wiser choices.  When we lean into what the Lord tells us, we can grow more patient, more compassionate, more joyful, and more loving.  This is really only going to happen with the Lord and the Holy Spirit (who are one and the same) guiding us.  

The song also has the lyrics of “thou and thou only first in my heart.”  This is my favorite lyric in the hymn.  This is a reminder that when God is first in our hearts, being able to see clearly is significantly easier.   This comes right after the lyrics in the same stanza of “Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise.” There are many times we can start to look at almost everything else as the first in our hearts.   This may be a significant other, jobs, sports, clothes, cars, and riches.  That is when our vision can easily get cloudy.  I often do this with my job.  I love my job as a teacher,  and I dedicate a lot of time to it.  However, I can also so easily get wrapped up in my job, I also start getting a lot of anxiety that I am doing my job incorrectly and that I am really not serving my students correctly.  I may even be seeking that vain and empty praise from doing my job the best. When I start to focus more on the Lord, then I am seeing clearly and letting go of the pieces of my anxiety and look to the Lord to do my job to the best of my ability to serve him and the people around me.    

God wants to make everything clear in our lives like it was when the fog cleared on that sunny afternoon.  He wants us to be able to see completely clearly.  The next set of lyrics says, “High King of heaven, my victory won; May I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heaven’s sun.”  This song is also looking to the future when we reach heaven and get to spend our eternity with the Lord.  This will end up being our final victory.  This then will be the clearest and the most sunny place in our entire world.  When one focuses on the clear items of the world, and keeps our focus on God as first in our hearts, we are rewarded with the ultimate victory of heaven and being able to see clearly for the rest of our lives. 

There are many times that I don’t always pay attention to the simple things in the world around me.  I don’t always pay attention to the beauty of the nature around me, even though there is so much happiness and realization that can come with it.  I also don’t always pay attention to the lyrics in the Christian songs or hymns that I sing or listen to, even though they provide such great wisdom, joy and thankfulness.  There is a lot that we can learn from the music that we chose to listen to.  There are times that I don’t listen to the music that I should, and hearing this song was a reminder that I need to spend more time in devotion to the Lord through the worship and songs that I seek.