SPIRITUAL
DIARY FOR 9/8/2012 12:46:27 PM
My Worship Time Focus: God Is Good, All the Time
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm
119:65-72
Message
of the verses: “65 Teth. You have
dealt well with Your servant, O LORD, according to Your word. 66 Teach me good
discernment and knowledge, For I believe in Your commandments. 67 Before I was
afflicted I went astray, But now I keep Your word. 68 You are good and do good; Teach me Your statutes. 69 The arrogant have forged a lie against me;
With all my heart I will observe Your precepts. 70 Their heart is covered with
fat, But I delight in Your law. 71 It is good for me that I was
afflicted, That I may learn Your statutes. 72 The law of Your mouth is better to me Than
thousands of gold and silver pieces.
We begin Today’s SD by looking at
the Ninth section in the 119th Psalm. We must remember that this psalm is all about
the Word of God for some form of Word is found in all but three verses. Next remember that we will see a letter in
the Hebrew alphabet at the beginning of every eight verse and that all of the
verses in that section will begin in the Hebrew with that letter. You can refer to the introduction of psalm
119 to get more details about this psalm.
As we begin to look at this section it is good
to realize that the Hebrew word tob,
which means good, pleasant, beneficial precious, delightful and right is used
six times in this section. God is good
and that is one of His attributes, and because God is unchangeable, which is
another of His attributes then that means that He is good all the time. God’s Word is good and this means that God
does things according to His Word, which is good. “Turn away my reproach which I dread, For Your ordinances are good
(Psalm 119:39).”
God
does what is good (vv. 65-66): “65 Teth.
You have dealt well with Your servant, O LORD, according to Your word. 66 Teach me good discernment and knowledge,
For I believe in Your commandments.”
The phrase “according to” is used
eighteen times in this psalm (NASB) and it is used to relate a request or a
fact to the Word of God. God will act
according to the precepts, promises, and principles related in His Word. This means that we should pray and act
according to these principles. Pray the
Scriptures is a wonderful way to pray.
James tells us “You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong
motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures (James 4:3).” We have to pray in the will of God in order
to get our prayers answered, and that does not me that we tack on “in Jesus’
name, Amen” at the end of our prayers and expect our prayers to be
answered. Jesus said that when He went
away that more things would get done than when He was here on earth and the
reason for that is that all of those who have been born from above and are now
new creations are able to do more than Jesus did while on earth and so as new
creations we are to be filled with His Holy Spirit to accomplish the things
that He has chosen for us to accomplish and so we are to align our will with
His and then pray that He will give us the power and strength to accomplish His
works through us. I write about being in
the Vine a lot, and this is what being in the vine is all about. Jesus said in that section of John 15 these
words, “’If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish,
and it will be done for you.’” Again
this has to be asking in the will of Jesus.
God
overrules evil and from it brings good (vv. 67-71): “67 Before I was afflicted I went astray,
But now I keep Your word. 68 You are good and do good; Teach me Your statutes.
69
The arrogant have forged a lie against me; With all my heart I will observe
Your precepts.
70
Their heart is covered with fat, But I delight in Your law. 71 It is good for
me that I was afflicted, That I may learn Your statutes.”
We can observe from this section
that the psalmist had sinned, but it was probably a sin of ignorance and not a
sin of that was a flagrant act of rebellion.
(See Lev. 5:17-19 or Numbers 15:28)
God must have sent some form of discipline to the psalmist in order to
show His love for him “’MY SON, DO NOT REGARD LIGHTLY THE DISCIPLINE OF THE
LORD, NOR FAINT WHEN YOU ARE REPROVED BY HIM; 6
FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON
WHOM HE RECEIVES.’” (Hebrews 12:5b)
God used this discipline to bring
back the psalmist into fellowship with Him.
There are times when it seems like we are being disciplined by the Lord,
but cannot figure out why and so we should remember Job at that time and
realize that God sometimes uses this type of action to us in order to bring
maturity into our lives. Charles H.
Spurgeon said “The promises of God shine the brightest in the furnace of
affliction.” Sometimes these afflictions
come from the enemies of God as we seen in verse 70 when the psalmist mentions
“Their heart is covered with fat.” God
can even use this godless opposition for our good (Romans 8:28; 1Peter 1:6-9
and 4:12-19). How can we know that this
is true? Well when we look at the worst
thing that has ever happened on this earth was also the best thing that has
ever happened on this earth we can better understand this. I am of course, speaking of the crucifixion
of Jesus Christ, the Lord of Glory.
God
uses the Word to show us good (v. 72):
“72 The law of Your mouth is better to me Than thousands of gold and
silver pieces.”
I had a good friend of mine whom
I have mentioned before, who lived most of his life in Brazil. He was 93 years old and I believe his heart
was broken because he was going to have to move back to the U.S. and although
he told me that would be okay I never thought he wanted to make the move. It was the 5th of July that he was
to move, but a couple of days later he died in a hospital in Brazil, and one of
the last things he did before he died was to witness to one of the nurses about
how God loved her and wanted her to be saved.
My friend and I would email back and forth a lot and when I would send
him one of my Spiritual Diaries he would call them nuggets and wanted to have
more of them. I was greatly encouraged
by this and it would keep me doing what I am doing.
The psalmist sees the Word of God
more precious than gold and so did David, “9 The fear of the LORD is clean,
enduring forever; The judgments of the LORD are true; they are righteous
altogether. 10 They are
more desirable than gold, yes, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than
honey and the drippings of the honeycomb. 11 Moreover, by them Your servant is
warned; In keeping them there is great reward...” In a lot of ways Psalms 19
and 119 are very similar.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: In the 11th
chapter of Hebrews we read about many of the great men and women of faith from
the OT and here is what we read about Moses:
“24 By faith Moses, when he had
grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25 choosing rather to endure ill-treatment with
the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, 26 considering the reproach of Christ greater
riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward.” When we read these verses we probably don’t
know how much “earthly riches” that Moses was giving up, but a few weeks ago in
a sermon at our church by our youth Pastor he explained how much Moses was
giving up and let me tell you now that what he gave up would probably be worth
billions of dollars in today’s economy.
This is remarkable to me, but Moses was looking for a better reward than
the earthly one that he turned down and this is the attitude I, as a believer
should have. In the book of Ephesians
believers can better understand how rich we really are. Dr. Wiersbe entitles his commentary on
Ephesians “Be Rich.”
My Steps of Faith for Today: Remember
the true riches that are found in the Word of God.
9/8/2012
2:16:30 PM
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