It’s Wednesday, the day before our big TURKEY day…the one day out of the year when we celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends and just make even more memories together!
And you know what I’ll be doing today?
The exact same as some of you — baking, cooking, cleaning, crafting, creating, decorating, oh and shampooing our carpets. (oh the joy of 38 year old carpet cleaning!! haha!)
But before I plow into my new day, I always love to read from the Christian classics, like Oswald Chambers or Charles Spurgeon. Well, it was this morning’s search for something inspiring and “thanksgiving-ny” that I stumbled across a quote from Spurgeon. It said:
“Before you go into the world, wash your face in the clear crystal of praise. Bury each yesterday in the fine linen and spices of thankfulness.”
“Wash your face“….that just got me. He described the daily purifying practice of praise, using the analogy of our daily washing our face.
In other words, we wouldn’t get up and get out the door without washing and cleansing our face. It needs a daily wash. And with that wash, it is made clean, purer, healthier and more radiant!
In the same way, we ought not get up and get out the door into a new day without praise! Praise deep cleans our spirit and thoughts like nothing else can! Praise purifies motives, makes right any wayward thinking. Praise helps us to BURY all of our yesterday with thankfulness!
Just thinking about washing my face with praise makes that one daily routine even more exciting and enjoyable for me!! You agree?
Reminds me of these scriptures, too –
Psalm 51:2 – “Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.”
Psalm 51:7 – “Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.”
Psalm 34:5 – “Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame.”
So, as I drove up our driveway this morning, as you see in today’s featured photo, it is that quote that stirred up in me an elated JOY!! Joy for the promises found in those 3 Psalms, AND it stirred in me an ANTICIPATION of His righteousness at work! Because as we praise and offer God our thanksgiving, HE WORKS MIGHTILY!! Nothing summons His power more than our praise!! (I have no idea how my “!” I have used in this devotional, but y’all….I’m typing so fast and wanting to share this truly profound thought with you, that an “!” just seems to belong after every. single. sentence!!)
SO, have you washed your face today? (smile)
Happy Thanksgiving, y’all!
