SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
1/27/2012 9:34:10 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Psalm
34 Part Two
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm
34:9-22
Message
of the verses: As I begin this
second part of Psalm 34 I began to wonder exactly what it means to “bless the
Lord” which is found in the first verse of this psalm. This is something that I have struggled with
the understanding of for a long time and when I looked up the word in the
Hebrew/English dictionary I was even more confused by it because the Hebrew
word “barak” is actually translated as curse five times in the KJV of the
Bible. I began to look to the internet
for some answers and came across an article that was written in 1978 by John
Piper that helped me to understand what “bless the Lord” is all about. I am going to put this article on this SD and
hopefully it will be a help to others who have struggled with this.
“What Does It Mean to Bless God?
My thesis is
that in the Scripture when God "blesses" men they are thereby helped
and strengthened and made better off than they were before, but when men
"bless" God he is not helped or strengthened or made better off.
Rather (with C. A. Keller in THAT, I, 361) man's blessing God is an
"expression of praising Thankfulness" (ein lobendes Danksagen),
when the OT speaks of
blessing God it does not "designate a process that aims at the increase
of God's strength" (THAT, I, 361). It is an "exclamation of gratitude
and admiration" (THAT, I, 357).
This is not
at all a strange semantic phenomenon. If God is the primal and inexhaustible
"blesser," then he must be above all others in a "blessed"
state—the fullness and source of all "blessing." If this is so, then
a most natural burst of praise would be "You are blessed!" That this
recognition and joyful exclamation of God's blessedness should then be
described as "blessing God" is not unusual. Other analogies, though
not exact, would be our expressions like: "I magnify the Lord" or
"Let us exalt his name." Both of these expressions properly recognize
and give joyful expression to God's magnificence and his exalted status. They
do not mean that we make God larger or higher. So to bless God means to recognize his great richness,
strength, and gracious bounty and to express our gratitude and delight in
seeing and experiencing it.
Here are some texts that have led me to these
conclusions:
Deuteronomy
8:10 And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for
the good land he has given you.
Here
"bless" is virtually identical to "thank" or
"gratefully recognize as the giver of blessing."
Psalm 100:4
Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to
him; bless his name!
Psalm 145:10
All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your saints shall
bless you!
Psalm 103:2 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not
all his benefits,
Psalm 96:2-3
Sing to the Lord, bless his name; tell of his salvation from day to day.
Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!
Here bless probably means: joyfully announce all these
good things about God.
Psalm 104:1
Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, you are very great! You are clothed
with splendor and majesty,
This psalm
begins and ends with "Bless the Lord, O my soul!" This probably means
that the psalm is meant as the blessing. Therefore blessing God means heartily
saying things like "God, you are very great!"
2 Chronicles
29:10 Therefore David blessed the Lord in the presence of all the assembly. And
David said: "Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of Israel our father,
forever and ever."
This is a
clear example of what one does when one blesses the Lord: he calls him blessed!
The same thing is seen in comparing Gen. 24:27 and 48.
Psalm 34:1 I
will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
Psalm
145:1-2, 21 I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and
ever. Every day I will bless you and praise your name forever and ever. My
mouth will speak the praise of the Lord, and let all flesh bless his holy name
forever and ever.
Psalm 113:1-2
Praise the Lord! Praise, O servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord!
Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore!”
Fear the
Lord (vv. 9-16): “9 O fear the LORD, you His
saints; For to those who fear Him there is no want. 10 The young lions do lack
and suffer hunger; But they who seek the LORD shall not be in want of any good
thing. 11 Come, you children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the
LORD. 12 Who is the man who desires life And loves length of days that he may
see good? 13 Keep your tongue from evil And your lips from speaking deceit. 14
Depart from evil and do good; Seek peace and pursue it. 15 The eyes of the LORD
are toward the righteous And His ears are open to their cry. 16 The face of the
LORD is against evildoers, To cut off the memory of them from the earth.”
We have
spoken about the fear of the Lord in past SD’s but if one fears the Lord then
he does not need to fear anything else.
Dr. Wiersbe writes some interesting comments on this subject: “God promises to give us what is good for us
and to cause all things to work together for good (Romans 8:28). If we don’t receive what we think we need, it
means it isn’t good for us and we don’t need it at this time.” He goes on to write: “At this point, David may have gathered the
children and youths around him to teach them the secret of real living. Peter quoted verses 12-14 in 1Peter 3:10-12,
and his instructions are wise and workable.”
Desire what
is good (v. 12): “12 Who is the man who desires
life And loves length of days that he may see good?” What does David mean when he writes “desires
life” or “love life?” Does it mean that
one has to have a lot of possessions to love life, for that is what the world
would teach us. Solomon who was probably
the richest man ever to live as far as possessions wrote in Eccl. 2:17-20 “17 So
I hated life, for the work which had been done under the sun was grievous to
me; because everything is futility and striving after wind. 18 Thus I hated all
the fruit of my labor for which I had labored under the sun, for I must leave
it to the man who will come after me. 19 And who knows whether he will be a
wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the fruit of my labor for
which I have labored by acting wisely under the sun. This too is vanity. 20
Therefore I completely despaired of all the fruit of my labor for which I had
labored under the sun.” This does not
sound to me like possessions are the answer.
Character is certainly part of the answer, along with faith, and a
desire to honor God. Jesus ways in as
seen in John 10:10 “"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I
came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” That word abundantly means “beyond measure.”
Speak what
is true (v. 13): “13 Keep your tongue from evil
And your lips from speaking deceit.”
Both James and Solomon have something to say about the tongue: “5 So also the tongue is a small part of the body,
and yet it boasts of great things. See how great a forest is set aflame by such
a small fire! 6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the
tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets
on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell. 7 For every species
of beasts and birds, of reptiles and creatures of the sea, is tamed and has
been tamed by the human race. 8 But no one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil and full of
deadly poison. 9 With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse
men, who have been made in the likeness of God; 10 from the same mouth come
both blessing and cursing. My
brethren, these things ought not to be this way (James 3:5-10).” “He who guards his mouth and his tongue,
Guards his soul from troubles (Pr. 21:23).”
Paul writes in Ephesians 4:15 these words, “but speaking the truth in
love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even
Christ.” I must say that the 34th
Psalm actually sounds to me like how the Proverbs are written.
Pursue what
is right (v. 14): “14 Depart from evil and do
good; Seek peace and pursue it.” David,
one would think, is not exactly the man who would write “seek peace and pursue
it” for he was a man of war, a man who was not allowed to build the temple
because he had shed so much blood. As
Christians we are not to seek peace at any price, because peace depends on
purity. “13 Who among
you is wise and understanding? Let him show by his good behavior his deeds in
the gentleness of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish
ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. 15
This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural,
demonic. 16 For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder
and every evil thing. 17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then
peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering,
without hypocrisy. 18 And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in
peace by those who make peace (James 3:13-18).”
As Christians we are to make every effort not to make enemies, and yet
when we look at the life of Jesus and the things that He said to the Pharisees
and the Scribes we know that there is a time to stand up for what is right as
Jesus did when talking to these people.
Dr. Wiersbe says that the word “pursue” means that we have to work at
it, with the help of the Lord, and this makes perfect sense because we are to
seek the help of the Lord in all we do.
Expect what
is best (vv. 15-16): “15 The eyes of the LORD are
toward the righteous And His
ears are open to their cry. 16 The face of the LORD is against evildoers, To cut
off the memory of them from the earth.”
We see the entire face of the Lord including His eyes and His ears in
these two verses and this should give us confidence God sees us and hears us
when we pray and God is against evildoers.
There is a great example of this in the 12th chapter of the
book of Acts where we see Peter in prison, sent there by Herod who was king at
that time. The church began to pray to
God so He would have Peter released and God answered their prayer and had Peter
released using a miracle. A little while
later Herod was killed because he did not honor God, thus taking care of that
evildoer.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Today the 27th of January in the
year of our Lord 2012, by the grace of God I begin my 39th year in
serving the Lord, and my prayer is that I will bring honor and glory to His
name.
Character is
something that has spoken to me as I did this SD, and having good character is
important to me and one of the ways to accomplish this is to continue to, not
only read and study the Word of God, but to put the things into practice what I
have learned. Difficult at times because
of the enemies that we all face, the world, the flesh and the devil are all
against us, but God is for us and that is all we need.
My Steps of
Faith for Today:
1. By the help
and grace of God I desire to put into practice what I am learning.
2. Continue to
learn contentment.
1/27/2012
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