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July 22, 2010

Psalm 23, one verse at a time — Verse 6

Dr. Sam Smith Jacksonville Daily Progress The Jacksonville Daily Progress Thu Jul 22, 2010, 06:41 PM CDT

JACKSONVILLE — “Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

I have an exercise I give to my patients to help improve their neck range of motion.

I call it the “goodness and mercy” exercise.

I ask them to remember that the 23rd Psalm tells us that goodness and mercy follows us all the days of our lives.

I then instruct them to stand with their back to a wall to stabilize their shoulders, and to look for goodness over one shoulder and for mercy over the other shoulder.

The goodness and mercy exercise serves two purposes.

It helps increase the mobility of their cervical spine, and more importantly, it reminds them to seek God’s goodness and mercy.

If we look for it enough we might just find it.

The Bible speaks many times of God’s goodness.

Psalm 145:9 says, “The Lord is good to all; He has compassion on all He has made.”

Psalm 34:8 tells us to, “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him.”

We serve a good God who wants to shower His goodness on His children.

Our God is a God of mercy.

Deuteronomy 4:31 tells us, “For the Lord your God is a merciful God; He will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your forefathers, which He confirmed to them by oath.”

Luke 1:50 says, “His mercy extends to those who fear Him, from generation to generation.”

How many times have you experienced the mercy of Father God?

I cannot begin to number the times.

His goodness and mercy follows us always.

I saw a pastor give a great demonstration of this principle.

The pastor had two children come onto the stage.

One had a sign with “Goodness” on them and the other with “Mercy”.

The pastor would walk around the stage and the two children would follow everywhere he went.

He would try to get away from them, but they stayed close behind.

The point was strong: God’s goodness and mercy [some translations say “love”] are always with us.

All too often we forget to realize they are there, and we suffer for it.

We forget to realize the constant presence of the Holy Spirit within us.

We forget that God has assigned angels to watch over us.

We are never alone, and it is so important that we remember that truth.

“I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

In 2 Samuel 7:11 we find this promise, “The Lord declares to you that the Lord Himself will establish a house for you.”

Our Lord Jesus told us, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.

“In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you.

“I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you I will come back and take you with me that you may also be where I am.

“You know the way to the place where I am going.” (John14:1-4)

Looking forward to dwelling forever in the house of the Lord should be a source of great joy and peace for all those who know they are going there.

When the burdens of this earth get too heavy to bear, think about that glorious day that we will be with King Jesus in paradise.

Our eternal future is decided once we give our lives to Jesus Christ, and that future is beyond description.

Never forget these promises.

God’s goodness and mercy is following you always, and you have a room in God’s house for all eternity.

What a wonderful Savior is our Lord Jesus! Amen.

Dr. Sam Smith,

Butterfly Ministry,

ssmithkate@aol.com

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