My Best Thought

At the time of this writing, I’ve written over 3,500 blog posts, numerous articles, eight books, and countless academic essays including a thesis and dissertation. And I’ve spoken over 100 times to various audiences in various contexts. And I’ve read more books than I can mention.

That’s a lot of words. Probably too many. I think about all these words this morning as worshippers begin to sing one of my favorite hymns. In Be Thou My Vision, based on the Irish Christian poem by Dallan Forgaille and then translated by Eleanor Hull, we hear this beautiful line about God:

. . . Thou my best Thought by day or by night. . .

The best thought! I’m frozen in place by the phrase.

I think about everything I could ever possibly think or know or speak or write. I think of the highest and best of any possible knowledge I might hear. And I conclude this:

My best thought is Jesus.

I think of the excellency and supremacy of Christ written about in the book of Colossians (1:15-20). Paul writes this about Jesus:

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

We know that Jesus is the One the whole world will one day acknowledge. He is the One! I affirm the truth of Philippians 2 about Jesus:

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

I think about how Paul had no greater thought and no greater message. In fact, he said that he would venture to speak of nothing else except what Christ had accomplished in him (Romans 15:18). As I grow closer to God, I can think of no better thought but Jesus.

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