The New Orleans of Walker Percy’s _The Moviegoer_ was conspicuous in its absence earlier this week. The intervening decades with its storms and stormy personalities have reshaped the city into something Percy would scarcely recognize. 

We tend to see what we look for more than what can accurately be described with words of fact and truth. Seeing cities unlike our own through eyes accustomed to particular views distorts both what is there and what we imagine. Where some see local color and composition, another sees a life destroyed by his own sin and a prostitute who gave up trying to be good so that she could find nourishment, or escape, for another day. 

Some have grown tired of waiting on God to come to their aid and therefore lean on superstition with its promises of power using familiar names and terms with a bent toward the evil one who once again declares how he can provide what God withholds. He will give you his approval. He will satisfy your appetite. He will drive you in the direction of your ambition. 

The morning light of each new day dawns in disappointment. Pleasant rays from a smiling sun offend besotted senses. Air softened with a moisture ebbing and flowing with the playful breezes off the Big Muddy and the surrounding bayous raise scents beyond what floral features can fend away. 

What was once so charming is now stained to the point of ruin. Order exists only to the degree it is needed after conflict and the necessary cleanup. 

Perhaps it was not the city. Maybe it was simply my mood. Precious memories and future opportunities each were less inspiring, much less hopeful. 

Today is a double sixteen, however. It is the sixteenth day of my second trip through the Psalms this year. It is also the day The Bible Project reading plan includes Psalm 16. This is a welcome coincidence, a word and idea we use when God chooses to remain anonymous. 

This is a song, a poem so like so many others King David of old prayed and teaches us to pray. Bless God because he guides us. Even our resting soul and active dreams instruct us. God is always with us. We have never spent a moment out of his presence or care. He is closer than this moment, more real than the black characters typed on this white screen. 

David’s bottom lines are almost always hopeful and helpful as he reaches across the centuries to turn our thoughts to our timeless Father in heaven. Consider with me life and cities and people groups in the lustrous light of verse 11:

“You will show me the way of life,
granting me the joy of your presence and the pleasures of living with you forever.”

Take your lamentations to the Lord. Give him your disappointments and griefs. Exchange them for the joy of his presence and the pleasures of knowing and experiencing him now and forever. 

Sultry surroundings with a certain stench are no threat to the one who created this world with a song, shaped it with a loving hand, and redeemed it with blood and nails and splinters creating something wonderful, something good out of the worst possible hatred. 

See the sin. Know the forgiveness. Enjoy the renovating, restorational nature of our God.

—

I will see this world as it is and as it can be by God’s grace, mercy, and love.

—

Our Father, show me the way of life. Grant me the joy of your presence. May I know the pleasures of living with you for another day today. Amen.