Sometimes I just don’t feel like it. I don’t feel like rejoicing. I don’t feel like worshipping. I don’t feel like even talking to God. I’m tired. I’m physically exhausted. I’m emotionally exhausted. David felt this way, too. In Psalm 31, David talks about how exhausted he is. “I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and body with grief.” He goes on to say how he is like broken pottery, and people were conspiring to kill him.
Does David give up? Does David languish in his agony? Over and over, David makes a conscious choice to praise God. He says repeatedly, “Bless the Lord, oh my soul.” As a kid growing up, I always thought David was “the worshipper,” so therefore he must have felt a deep connection to God all the time. But when you look deeper at the scripture, you’ll see that he is telling his very soul what to do. He isn’t just pouring out praises here. It is as if he is commanding his soul, “Hey, there David! You need to bless the Lord.”
Our soul is comprised of our mind, will and emotions. If I’m not careful, my mind (my thoughts) can overrun my life, my will (my desires to do things) can take control over me, and my emotions (how I feel about things) can become my ruler.
However, David teaches us that we can take control over our soul and tell it what to do. “Oh, my mind—my thoughts! Oh, my will—my choices! Oh, my emotions—my feelings! You three must bow down and bless the Lord. You are subject to the Almighty God.”
Scripture tells us explicitly in 2 Corinthians 10:5 to “take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.” That’s pretty clear-cut that when we have a thought come into our head—we are supposed to take that thought to Christ to see if it aligns with the Word of God. However, we’re human, and we all know it doesn’t always happen like that. The busyness of life and kids and work and school and church all bog us down to the point of exhaustion.
That’s one of the reasons we have David as an example—he was exhausted, too. And he told his soul—his mind, will and emotions—what to think, what to do and what to feel. And we can, too, even when we are exhausted.
