SPIRITUAL
DIARY FOR 9/12/2012 7:38:56 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Beyond
Bible Study
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm
119:97-104
Message
of the verses: “97 Mem. O how I love
Your law! It is my meditation all the day.
98
Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies, For they are ever mine. 99 I
have more insight than all my teachers, For Your testimonies are my meditation.
100 I understand more than the aged, Because I have observed Your precepts. 101
I have restrained my feet from every evil way, That I may keep Your word. 102 I
have not turned aside from Your ordinances, For You Yourself have taught me.
103 How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
104 From Your precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way.”
When one first reads through this
section they can sense the great importance that is found there, and yet it is
like what the entire psalm is about, the Word of God. This section shows the importance of not just
having head knowledge of the Word of God, but also heart knowledge of the Word of God. In today’s technical world we have many great
tools that aid in the study of God’s Word, and this makes Bible Study easier,
but we have to be careful not to just understand the Bible in our heads and
mind, but we must understand it in our hearts so that we can be able to apply
it to difficult situations in our daily life.
Dr. Wiersbe writes “Our
relationship to the Lord is determined by our relationship to His will, and
that is determined by how we relate to His Word. Too many believers have only academic head
knowledge of the Word, but they do not know how to put this knowledge into
practice in the decisions of daily life.
What we all need is a heart knowledge of the Word, and this means being
taught by God (v. 102). Here are the
conditions we must meet.”
We
must love His Word and meditate on it (vv. 97-100): “97 Mem. O how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day.
98 Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies, For they are ever mine. 99
I have more insight than all my teachers, For Your testimonies are my meditation. 100 I
understand more than the aged, Because I have observed Your precepts.”
In this section we see the word
meditation two times and we also see the results of meditation upon the Word of
God. Meditation may seem a bit obscure
or difficult to understand and practice in today’s world. I have heard that when a person worries that
he is actually meditating upon his worries, and probably should be meditating
upon the Word of God. I suppose that a
crude picture of meditating upon the Word of God, and the results of meditating
upon the Word of God could be seen in taking vitamins. We take vitamins in
order to build up our bodies so that if we come into contact with something
that is harmful to our bodies we are better able to fight it off. When we meditate upon the truths of God’s
Word we are building our spiritual life up so that when troubles come, and they
will, we are better off in caring for them.
Joshua is a good example of this as we read in Joshua 1:1-9 these words,
“1 Now it came about after the death of Moses the servant of the LORD, that the
LORD spoke to Joshua the son of Nun, Moses’ servant, saying, 2 “Moses My
servant is dead; now therefore arise, cross this Jordan, you and all this
people, to the land which I am giving to them, to the sons of Israel. 3 “Every
place on which the sole of your foot treads, I have given it to you, just as I
spoke to Moses. 4 "From the wilderness
and this Lebanon, even as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the
land of the Hittites, and as far as the Great Sea toward the setting of the sun
will be your territory. 5 “No man will be able to stand before you all the days
of your life. Just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you; I will not
fail you or forsake you. 6 “Be strong and courageous, for you shall give this
people possession of the land which I swore to their fathers to give them.
7 "Only be strong and very courageous;
be careful to do according to all the law which Moses My servant commanded you;
do not turn from it to the right or to the left, so that you may have success
wherever you go. 8 "This book of the law shall not depart
from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be
careful to do according to all that is written in it; for then you will make
your way prosperous, and then you will have success. 9 “Have I not
commanded you? Be strong and courageous! Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the
LORD your God is with you wherever you go." These are the Word’s of God that He spoke to
Joshua right after the death of Moses and right before Israel crossed the
Jordan. Joshua learned from Moses, who
was his teacher, and he also learned from his enemies in the battles that he
had already fought, Joshua also learned from his teachers, and all three of
these are mentioned in this section of Psalm 119. Learning from one’s enemies is found in verse
ninety-eight, and learning from teachers in verse ninety-nine, and we find
learning from older saints who have had the experiences of live is found in
verse 100.
Dr. Wiersbe explains meditation and
what it means when he writes, “Rather, it means that our minds and hearts are
so yielded to the Spirit that He can remind us of the Word when we need it and
give us fresh understanding in the new challenges we face.” He said that meditation “does not mean that
we abandon our daily responsibilities or that we constantly quote Bible verses
to ourselves and ignore our work.”
We
must obey His Word (vv. 101-102):
“101 I have restrained my feet from every evil way, That I may keep Your word. 102 I
have not turned aside from Your ordinances, For You Yourself have taught me.”
As believers we are not to pick and
choose what we learn from the Scriptures, but study all of the Word of God and
obey the things that we know is true from His Word. We are not to brag about what we learn, but
one must have an obedient heart and love to do the will of God. In my memory verses for this week from 1Cor.
13 we read, “Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not
brag and is not arrogant.” F. W.
Robertson writes, “Obedience is the organ of spiritual knowledge” (See John
7:17) “"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.’”
We
must enjoy His Word (vv. 103-104): “103
How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth! 104
From Your precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way.”
We know from the study of God’s Word
that there are sweet things in it and there are things that are bitter,” Rev.
10:9 So I went to the angel, telling him
to give me the little book. And he said to me, "Take it and eat it; it
will make your stomach bitter, but in your mouth it will be sweet as
honey." Rev. 10:10 I took the
little book out of the angel’s hand and ate it, and in my mouth it was sweet as
honey; and when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter.” Jeremiah says, “Jer. 15:16 Your words were found and I ate them, And
Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart; For I have been
called by Your name, O LORD God of hosts.”
Dr. Wiersbe concludes with these
words, “God’s Word is pure, not defiled, and gives energy we need to obey His
commands. The unsaved person finds the
Bible boring, but the devoted child of God feeds on the Scriptures and enjoys
the sweet taste of truth. This is what
it means to go beyond Bible Study.”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: Learning
to be a person who meditates upon the Word of God is something that I desire to
do.
My Steps of Faith for Today: To
go beyond Bible Study.
Memory
verses for the week: 1Cor. 13:1-4
1
¶ If I speak with the tongues of men and
of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging
cymbal. 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. 3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the
poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits
me nothing.
4 ¶
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and
is not arrogant,
9/12/2012
8:39:32 AM
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