SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/7/2012 7:36:50 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Psalm 103 PT-1
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Psalm 103:1-6
Message of the verses: We will begin Today’s SD by looking at
several introductions to the 103rd Psalm, and then begin to look at
the psalm.
“This psalm
calls more for devotion than exposition; it is a most excellent psalm of
praise, and of general use. The psalmist,
“I. Stirs up
himself and his own soul to praise God (#Ps 103:1,2) for his favour to him in
particular (#Ps 103:3-5), to the church in general, and to all good men, to
whom he is, and will be, just, and kind, and constant (#Ps 103:6-18), and for
his government of the world #Ps 103:19.
“II. He desires the
assistance of the holy angels, and all the works of God, in praising him #Ps
103:20-22. In singing this psalm we must in a special manner get our hearts
affected with the goodness of God and enlarged in love and thankfulness.” (Matthew Henry)
“TITLE: A
Psalm of David. — Doubtless by David; it is in his own style when at its best,
and we should attribute it to his later years when he had a higher sense of the
preciousness of pardon, because a keener sense of sin, than in his younger
days. His clear sense of the frailty of life indicates his weaker years, as
also does the very fullness of his praiseful gratitude. As in the lofty Alps
some peaks rise above all others so among even the inspired Psalms there are
heights of song which overtop the rest. This one hundred and third Psalm has
ever seemed to us to be the Monte Rosa of the divine chain of mountains of
praise, glowing with a ruddier light than any of the rest. It is as the apple
tree among the trees of the wood, and its golden fruit has a flavor such as no
fruit ever bears unless it has been ripened in the full sunshine of mercy. It
is man’s reply to the benedictions of his God, his Song on the Mount answering
to his Redeemer’s Sermon on the Mount. Nebuchadnezzar adored his idol with
flute, harp, sacbut, psaltery, dulcimer and all kinds of music; and David, in
far nobler style awakens all the melodies of heaven and earth in honour of the
one only living and true God. Our attempt at exposition is commenced under an
impressive sense of the utter impossibility of doing justice to so sublime a
composition; we call upon our soul and all that is within us to aid in the
pleasurable task; but, alas, our soul is finite, and our all of mental faculty
far too little for the enterprise. There is too much in the Psalm, for a
thousand pens to write, it is one of those all-comprehending Scriptures which
is a Bible in itself, and it might alone almost suffice for the hymn-book of
the church.” (Charles H. Spurgeon)
“Psalm 103
and 104 appear as an intentional pair designed to promote the blessing and exaltation
of God. This psalm represents a
soliloquy in which David surveys God’s goodness and encourages the angles and
the works of God’s creation to join him in divine praise.” (John MacArthur Study Bible)
“The Four
psalms that close Book Four of the book of Psalms (90-106) emphasize praise to
the Lord for several reasons: His
benefits to His people 103), His care of His creation (1-4), His wonderful acts
on behalf of Israel (1-5), His longsuffering with His people’s rebellion
(106). There are not requests in this
psalm; it is only praise to the Lord. In
studying this psalm, we must remember that God’s blessings on Israel depended
on their obedience to His covenant (vv. 17-18), and believers today must also
be obedient to God’s will if they would enjoy God’s best (2Cor. 6:14-7:1). The psalm also admonishes us not to forget the blessings after we have
received them and enjoyed them. ‘In
everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you’
(1Thes. 5:18 NKJV). David started with
individual and personal praise (vv. 1-6), then moved to national praise (vv. 6-19),
and concluded with universal praise (vv. 20-22).” (Warren Wiersbe)
Personal Praise to the Lord (vv. 1-6): “1 ¶
«A Psalm of David.» Bless the LORD, O my soul, And all that is within
me, bless His holy name. 2 Bless the
LORD, O my soul, And forget none of His benefits; 3 Who pardons all your iniquities, Who heals
all your diseases; 4 Who redeems your
life from the pit, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and compassion; 5 Who satisfies your years with good things, So
that your youth is renewed like the eagle. 6 The LORD performs righteous deeds
And judgments for all who are oppressed.”
As we begin
to look at this psalm we need to have a definition of what the word “bless”
means when we see it in the Scriptures: “To
‘bless the Lord’ means to delight His heart by expressing love and gratitude
for all He is and all He does.” (Warren
Wiersbe)
There are
times when my little grandson Matthew will come up to me and tell me “I love
you grandpa, or he will say “you’re the best.”
This is the kind of thing that we, as children of God are to say to Him,
not just because He has done something for us, but just because we love Him and
desire to bless His heart. Dr. Wiersbe writes
“True praise comes from a grateful heart that sincerely wants to glorify and
please the Lord. ‘All that is within me’ means that all of our inner being is
focused on the Lord—heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark. 12:28-31). It also means that we are prepared to obey
His will after our praise has ended.” We
will find the word “all” some nine times in this psalm, and from this we can
see that we need to have a total commitment to the Lord.
As we look
at verses 3-5 we see six special blessings from the hand of the Lord that David
gives to us. They are forgiveness,
healing, redemption, love, satisfaction and renewal. When we look at the word ”forgiveness” and
how it is used in the Scriptures we will see that it only refers to God’s
forgiveness of sinners (see verses 10-12 of Psalm 103). The word translated “iniquity” means: “perversity, depravity, iniquity, guilt or
punishment of iniquity.” Those who have
trusted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior have been forgiven of all of
their sins. We know from reading the
story of David that he knew something about the forgiveness of God. Read both Psalm 32 and 51 to get a picture of
this as both psalms were written after David had sinned with Bathsheba.
When we
read that God heals every disease (Jesus was going through all the cities and
villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the
kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness,” Matthew
9:35), we see that He has the power to heal every kind of disease, but God is
not obligated to do so. I believe that
if we as believers hold God accountable to heal us that we are putting God into
a box and that is not a right thing to do.
When the Church began we saw that the apostles had the power to heal many
people and even raise some from the dead.
I believe that these were “sign gifts,” given to the early church in
order to show that God is the One behind it.
We read of many times when Paul would heal many people, yet we also read
towards the end of his ministry in Philippians 2:25-30 and also in 2Timothy
4:20 that he was unable to heals two of his friends. In both of these circumstances the Church has
been established and so these sign gifts were not necessary any longer. I am not saying that God does not heal people
today, for when I was a new believer a friend explained this to me by telling
me “God heals you every time except the last time.” This has always made good sense to me.
When we
look at the word redeem the Jewish people must have remembered when the Lord
took them out of Egypt, for they were in great bondage while in Egypt and the
Lord redeemed them from the land of slavery to give them a new land that flowed
with milk and honey. We can also look at
the word redeem and also the use of the word “pit” found in verse and see that
God is the One who redeems us who are about to fall into a pit. David was familiar with this word pit for he
wrote in Psalm 40:2 these words, “He brought me up out of the pit of
destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my
footsteps firm.”
We see the
word crown and we know that David knew something about crowns, for he was king
of Israel, “but no crown he ever word compared with God’s lovingkindness and
compassion.”
In the KJV
of the Bible we read in verse five the word “mouth” “Who satisfieth thy mouth
with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” In the NASB we read “5 Who satisfies your years with good things, So
that your youth is renewed like the eagle.”
The Amplified version of the Bible reads, “Who satisfies your mouth
[your necessity and desire at your personal age] with good; so that your youth
renewed, is like the eagle’s [strong, overcoming, soaring]! [Isa. 40:31)” Dr.
Wiersbe writes “The word translated ‘mouth’ is a bit of a puzzle since it is
usually translated ‘ornaments’ or jewelry,’ words that hardly fit this
context. Some students interpret the
word to mean ‘duration’ or years’ (seen NASB).
No matter how ole we become God can satisfy the needs of our lives and
the spiritual desire of our hearts. The
legend about the physical renewal of the eagle is not what David had in mind in
verse 5. Like most birds, eagles do molt
and have what seems to be a new lease on life.
But the picture here is that of the believer being strengthened by the
Lord even in old age and able to ‘soar’ like the eagle (Isa. 40:31).”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: In yesterday’s SD we looked at the last part
of Psalm 102 and in that psalm the psalmist asked the Lord not to take his life
from him at an age where he was not old.
In today’s SD we read that David speaks of healing and soaring like an
eagle. Both of these had great meaning
to me in what I was going through and I can praise the Lord today.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Continue to abide or remain
in the Vine in order to get my marching orders from the Lord. Continue to learn contentment.
Memory verses for the week:
2Peter 1:1-4
1.
Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus
Christ,
To those who have received a faith
of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our
God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2. Grace and peace by
multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord; 3. seeing that
His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness,
through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His glory and excellence. 4. For
by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by
them we can become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the
corruption that is in the world by lust.
7/7/2012 9:25:19 AM
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