Daily Encounter: A Week-day Devotional by a staff of ACTS International.

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

"I will lift up my eyes to the hills—from whence comes my help? My help comes from the LORD, Who made heaven and earth."¹

I have visited Death Valley, and though I wasn't aware of it at the time, I have read how "there is a place there known as Dante's View. From this location you can look down into the lowest spot in the United States, a depression in the earth two hundred feet below sea level called Black Water. But from Dante's View you can also look up to one of the highest peaks in the United States, Mt. Whitney, rising to a height of 14,500 feet. In one direction you move to the lowest spot in the United States, in the other, to one of the highest. From Dante's View, only the traveler can decide which direction to turn."²

Life's like that. Every person experiences the ups and downs of life—joys and sorrows, victories and defeats, gains and losses, good times and bad times, high times and low times. And though it's not always easy, especially in the midst of dark days of loss and disappointment, we do have a choice. We can choose, with God's help, like David, to look up to the Lord for help and choose the upward way by turning every trial and loss into an opportunity for growth. Or we can keep looking down, give up the struggle to overcome, become disillusioned and pessimistic, and live in the valley of defeat and despair.

As God said through Joshua to the ancient Israelites, "I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him."³

God gives you and me that choice too. Be sure to choose life; that is, life with God, for if you do, God is with you and is on your side to guide and help you every step of the way.

Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please help me to have faith and develop the upward look by always looking to You for guidance and help, and to see that You want to use all of my circumstances to help me to become a better and more fulfilled person. Thank You for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus's name, amen."

1. Psalm 121:1-2 (NKJV).
2. The Devil at Noon Day by Maxie Dunnam, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, 1996
3. Deuteronomy 30:19-20 (NIV).

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