Morning Grace Devotional: The Daily Renewal of Steadfast Love
For God’s people, grace, mercy, steadfast love and lovingkindness are renewed each day and each moment. When circumstances may seem bleak, God’s grace remains constant and ready to be renewed every morning and inserted into our lives each and every day.
The biblical authors counted on this. Moses, David, and Jeremiah all depict the promise of God’s never ceasing lovingkindness, steadfast love, and grace through the imagery of morning overcoming the shadows of the night.
Moses in the Psalms
When Moses prayed, “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days” (Psalm 90:14 ESV),1 he was asking God for rejoicing after a severe period of trouble fell upon the people he was charged to lead.2 The people Moses led spent forty years wandering the wilderness and endured lengthy time periods of hunger, with only manna sent from God as their provision (Deuteronomy 8:2-3). Using poetry, Moses’s description of the morning signaled a new era of joy, filled with God’s steadfast love.3
Steadfast Love (Khesed)
In the Old Testament, the term often translated “steadfast love” (ESV) comes from the famous Hebrew word “khesed (kheh’-sed).” In these contexts, the term refers to God’s kindness in taking care of the needs of His creatures, the redemption from troubles, and everlasting mercy.4 The word could also be translated as “lovingkindness,” or “mercies.”5 In several instances throughout the Old Testament, "khesed" is seen in combination with the Hebrew word for grace “khen (k-en).”6,7 Because of this, the word “khesed” is most often viewed as communicating God’s characteristics of compassion and grace.8
David's Request
In one of David’s poetic prayers, we see the word “khesed” appear alongside the imagery of a morning renewal, as we saw with Moses. When David prays, “Let me hear in the morning of your steadfast love, for in you I trust” (Psalm 143:8a), he was experiencing oppression from dangerous enemies.9 For David, the phrase, “in the morning” was used to communicate urgency; he was asking for his plea of God’s grace and lovingkindness to be answered quickly.10 And David knew he could count of God; not because of merit, but because of God’s own righteousness and faithfulness (v.1).11
Jeremiah's Confidence
In a similar fashion to David, the prophet Jeremiah prayed:
“The steadfast love (khesed) of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning” (Lamentations3:22-23a).
In this passage, we again see the word “khesed” appear alongside the imagery of a morning renewal. When Jeremiah wrote this, he was in despair and in a state of hopelessness.12 The fall of his nation and the harsh effects it had on its inhabitants is what drove Jeremiah to write a poem of lament.13 However, Jeremiah knew that God did not abandon His people; much like the manna God gave during the days of wandering in the wilderness (Deuteronomy 8:2-3), Jeremiah knew God’s supply of steadfast love (khesed) would never run out.14 For Jeremiah, the term, “new every morning,” meant that God offered a fresh supply of steadfast love, mercy, and grace every day to His people.15
Morning and Night
Elsewhere, in a psalm described as, “A song of healing,” David again used the imagery of morning as a renewal of God’s grace, saying, “Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning” (Psalm30:5b).16 In this psalm, David is using the imagery “night” to describe a temporary affliction in contrast to “morning” as a depiction of God’s blessings that last a lifetime.17
Our Morning Grace
If we have faith in God’s Son, Jesus, we too can know that His steadfast love, lovingkindness, mercy, and grace (khsed) will be consistently present in our lives. We can apply the imagery of morning renewal to know we are secure in His care. No matter our circumstance, no matter our feelings, we can trust that God’s grace is everlasting, far greater than any affliction or hardship we might find ourselves in. As in the illustrations within the passages above, and like Moses, David, and Jeremiah, we can be sure of this because God has proven it time and time again, and because His grace is not conditional or earned but is given to us because of His faithfulness. Nothing can separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:38-39).
As the famous preacher Charles Spurgeon once said, “There is but one voice that can cheer me: cause me to hear thy lovingkindness… cause me to hear it in themorning.”18
Each morning, we have a reason to give God thanks and praise. Each morning, we have grace.
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Footnotes
[1] Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are taken from the English Standard Version (ESV).
[2] Allen P. Ross, “Psalms,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, ed. John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck (Colorado Springs, CO: David C Cook, 1985), 859.
[3] Ross, “Psalms,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 1:859.
[4] Francis Brown, S. R. Driver,Charles A. Briggs, Edward Robinson, James Strong, and Wilhelm Gesenius. The Brown, Driver, Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon: Coded with the Numbering System from Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1906), 339.
[5] Francis Brown et al., The Brown, Driver, Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, 339.
[6] See Gen. 19:19, Exod. 34:6, Neh. 9:17, 31, Ps 86:15, 103:8, 111:4, 112:4, 145:8.
[7] Francis Brown et al., The Brown, Driver, Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, 336.
[8] Grant Hawley, “How Dispensationalism Advances Sola Gratia,” in Forged from Reformation: How Dispensational Thought Advances the Reformed Legacy, eds. Christopher Cone and James I. Fazio (El Cajon, CA: Southern California Seminary Press, 2017), 385.
[9] Ross, “Psalms,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 1:895.
[10] William MacDonald, Believers Bible Commentary: A Complete Bible Commentary in One Volume, ed. Art Farstad, Second edition (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2016), 708.
[11] Michael Rydelnik and Michael Vanlaningham eds, The Moody Bible Commentary: A One-Volume Commentary on the Whole Bible by the Faculty of Moody Bible Institute (Chicago, IL: MoodyPublishers, 2014), 874.
[12] Charles H. Dyer, “Lamentations,”in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, ed. John F.Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck (Colorado Springs, CO: David C Cook, 1985), 1217.
[13] Dyer, “Lamentations,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 1:1210.
[14] Dyer, “Lamentations,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 1:1217.
[15] Dyer, “Lamentations,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, 1:1217.
[16] MacDonald, Believers Bible Commentary, 535-536.
[17] Rydelnik and Vanlaningham eds, The Moody Bible Commentary, 787.
[18] Charles H. Spurgeon, Psalms: Volume II, series ed. Alister McGrath and J.I. Packer, (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1993), 345.
