SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/4/2012 9:31:00 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Ending Well
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Psalm 119:33-40
Message of the verses: We will be looking at the fifth section of
Psalm 119 today as we journey through this longest chapter in the entire Bible
remembering that in the original Hebrew language each of the verses begins with
the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and in this section that is “He.”
“He”—Ending
Well (vv. 33-40): “33 ¶ He. Teach me, O LORD, the way of Your
statutes, And I shall
observe it to the end. 34 Give me
understanding, that I may observe Your law And keep it with all my heart.
35 ¶ Make me walk in the path of Your
commandments, For I delight in it. 36
Incline my heart to Your testimonies And not to dishonest gain.
37 ¶ Turn away my eyes from looking at vanity, And
revive me in Your ways.
38 ¶ Establish Your word to Your servant, As that
which produces reverence for You.
39 ¶ Turn away my reproach which I dread, For Your
ordinances are good.
40 ¶ Behold, I long for Your precepts; Revive me
through Your righteousness.”
We can see
from verse 33 that it was the desire of the psalmist to end well, and there are
examples in Scripture of those who began and ended well. We read these words in 2Timothy 4:6-8
concerning the apostle Paul: “6 For I am already being poured out as a drink
offering, and the time of my departure has come. 7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished
the course, I have kept the faith; 8 in
the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord,
the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also
to all who have loved His appearing.” In
the gospel of John we read that Jesus finished well too as we will see from
John 17:4, “"I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work
which You have given Me to do.’”
There are
those we can think of in the Scriptures that did not finish well, but they all
started well and a good beginning should lead to a good ending. Think about the following who did not finish
well, Lot, Samson, King Saul, Ahithophel, and Demas.
Dr. Wiersbe
writes “The psalmist wanted to end will (v. 33), but ending well is the
consequence of living well. What are the
essentials for a consistent life that ends well?”
Learning
(vv.33-34): “33 ¶ He. Teach me, O LORD, the way of Your
statutes, And I shall
observe it to the end. 34 Give me
understanding, that I may observe Your law And keep it with all my heart.”
Our learning
must begin by praying for spiritual enlightenment so that we can have an
understanding of what is in the Word of God.
This means more than just reading it for we are to learn what is in it
by memorizing parts of it and then meditating on what we have memorized. The Word of God is alive and it is sharper
than any two edged sword, and we want it to become alive in our hearts so that
we will know what it takes to please our heavenly Father. Just as children learn how to understand what
makes their parents happy we need to learn what makes our Father happy and this
means we must learn about His character which is found in the pages of
Scripture. We need inner illumination to
discover what it means to do this and that begins with “Teach me” but it must
be balanced with “Give me understanding.”
Both of these must lead to obedience.
Notice the verses listed above about Jesus’ ending and Paul’s ending.
Obeying
(v. 35: “ 35 ¶
Make me walk in the path of Your commandments, For I delight in it.”
Dr. Wiersbe
writes “What we learn with our mind and apprehend with our heart must motivate
the will to do what God commands. But
our obedience cannot be that of a slave obeying a master in order to avoid
discipline. It must be the obedience of
a grateful child who delights to please his or her parents.”
We are to
do the will of our Father from our hearts “not by way of eyeservice, as
men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart,
(Eph. 6:6).” Psalm 40:8 says, ‘”I
delight to do Your will, O my God; Your Law is within my heart.’” John 8:29 says “"And He who sent Me is
with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing
to Him.’” John 7:17 teaches us that if
we want to know God’s truth, we must be willing to obey God’s will, “"If
anyone is willing to do His will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is
of God or whether I speak from Myself.”
Delighting
(vv. 36-37): “36 Incline my heart to Your testimonies And not
to dishonest gain. 37 Turn away my eyes
from looking at vanity, And revive me in Your ways.”
The apostle
John writes something similar in 1John “15
Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man
love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the
flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father,
but is of the world. 17 And the world
passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth
for ever.” (AV)
In both of these passages we see
the word “eyes” and what we look at is important to what we delight in. If we keep our eyes and mind on the things of
the Lord and delight in them then when temptation comes we will focus on the
Word of God like the Lord Jesus did in Matthew chapter four and be able to
overcome the temptation.
In the book of Genesis we see that
Abraham looked for the heavenly city and ended will while Lot looked at Sodom
and ended badly. Dr Wiersbe says “What
the heart loves and desires, the eyes will see.
To have one eye on the world and the other on the Word is to be
double-minded, and God does not bless double-minded people (James 1:5-8).”
Fearing (vv. 38-39): “38
¶ Establish Your word to Your servant,
As that which produces reverence for You.
39 Turn away my reproach which I dread, For Your ordinances are good.”
When we
fear the Lord that fears conquers all other fear, but when we fear man we are
in bondage and defeat, “25 ¶ The fear of man brings a snare, But he who trusts
in the LORD will be exalted (Pr. 29:25)”
As we read through this psalm we see that the psalmist was not afraid of
his enemies, but afraid of displeasing His Lord, something that is a good
lesson to learn. We are to do as the
psalmist and trust the promises of the Lord and then allow the Lord to take
care of our enemies as the psalmist did.
Earlier this morning I was reading a part of a chapter on prayer, prayer
in the life of D. L. Moody and Moody’s prayer life was a life of trusting in
the Lord for the answers to the things that came his way. Moody is a man that I would like to learn
from and be like for he was a man that was used by the Lord and even after his
death in 1899 is still being used by the Lord all around the world.
Dr. Wiersbe
writes “Our faith is tested by the promises of God and our faithfulness is
tested by the precepts of God, and both are important.”
Longing
(v. 40): “ 40 ¶
Behold, I long
for Your precepts; Revive me through Your righteousness.”
What the
psalmist was longing for is recorded in this psalm as he longed for a deep
understanding of God’s truth along with the day when God’s salvation would be
revealed “I long for Your salvation, O LORD, And Your law is my delight (V.
174).” Paul also longed for this as we
read the following in Romans 8:18-23: “18 For I consider that the sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be
revealed to us. 19 For the anxious longing
of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility,
not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself also will be set
free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the
children of God. 22 For we know that the
whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.
23 And not only this, but also we
ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan
within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of
our body.”
As the
psalmist had his longings fulfilled with the Word of God so we too can do this.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I have been looking forward to studying this
psalm for a long time and the reason is that it speaks about the Word of God,
something I desire to learn more about and this psalm seems to be a key in a
better understand of God’s Word.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Continue to abide in the
Vine, to study God’s Word and to trust God in all the circumstances of life.
Memory verses for the week:
1Cor. 13:1-2
1.
If I speak with the tongues of men and angles,
but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging symbol. 2. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know
all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing.
9/4/2012 10:35:50 AM
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