SPIRITUAL DIARY
FOR 12/3/2012 10:08:32 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Psalm
143-PT-2
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
Psalm 143:7-12
Message of
the verses: We will continue looking at the last five
verses from Psalm 143 in Today’s Spiritual Diary. I want to quote from the introduction of the
commentary that Dr. Wiersbe wrote on this psalm: “In this psalm, David presents many requests
to the Lord, all of which may be summarized in two prayers: ‘Hear me’ (vv. 1-6) and ‘Answer me’ (vv.
7-12). This kind of praying is a good
example for us to follow.” We looked at
“Hear me” in yesterdays SD, and now we will look at “Answer me” in today’s SD.
“Answer
Me”—Wait for the Answer in Expectation (vv. 7-12): “7 Answer me quickly, O LORD, my
spirit fails; Do not hide Your face from me, Or I will become like those who go
down to the pit. 8 Let me hear Your lovingkindness in the morning; For I trust
in You; Teach me the way in which I should walk; For to You I lift up my soul. 9
Deliver me, O LORD, from my enemies; I take refuge in You. 10 Teach me to do
Your will, For You are my God; Let Your good Spirit lead me on level ground. 11
For the sake of Your name,
O LORD, revive me. In
Your righteousness bring my soul out of trouble. 12 And in Your lovingkindness,
cut off my enemies And destroy all those who afflict my soul, For I am Your
servant.”
What were the answers that David was
looking for from the Lord? Well in verse
seven David prays something that all true believers pray and that is to see
God’s face. I am reminded of the answer
that Jesus gave to Philip in John 14:8-9 “Philip said to Him, "Lord, show
us the Father, and it is enough for us." 9 Jesus said to him, "Have I
been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the
Father; how can you say, ’Show us the Father’?” There are days when I think about how it
would have been to be alive when Jesus walked on the earth, to go where He
went, to sit and talk to Him and see His face, and then I remember what Jesus
said to Thomas after He had risen from the dead, “Jesus said to him, ‘Because
you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.’” We as believers can talk to our Lord at any
time and any place and although we do not see His face at this time we are
blessed because we have believed without seeing His face, and yet one day all
believers will see the face of Jesus.
There is a song that the Brooklyn
Tabernacle Choir sang a few years back that speaks of a person who had died and
went to heaven and he was being shown around heaven meeting all the people that
he had heard and read about and then the person says that “I want to see Jesus,
for He is the One who died for me.” Yes heaven will be the place where we will
see the face of Jesus and that is what David wanted to experience. David knew the truth of Numbers 6:22-27, “22
Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 23 “Speak to Aaron and to his sons,
saying, ’Thus you shall bless the sons of Israel. You shall say to them: 24 The
LORD bless you, and keep you; 25 The LORD make His face shine on
you, And be gracious to you; 26 The LORD lift up His countenance
on you, And give
you peace.’ 27 “So they shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel, and
I then will bless them.’” David also
knew that if the Lord was displeased with Israel that He would hide His face
from them, “Why do You stand afar off, O LORD? Why do You hide Yourself in
times of trouble? (Psalm 10:1).” “How
long will You hide Your face from me? (Psalm 13:1).” “And do not hide Your face from Your servant,
For I am in distress; answer me quickly (Psalm 69:17).” “Do not hide Your face from me in the day of
my distress; Incline Your ear to me; In the day when I call answer me quickly
(Psalm 102:2).”
Dr. Wiersbe points out, “To know the
shining of His face means to walk in the light of His countenance and enjoy the
smile of God upon our lives, but the absence of that blessing was like a living
death, ‘1 A Psalm of David: To You, O LORD, I call; My rock, do not be deaf to
me, For if You are silent to me, I will become like those who go down to the
pit (Psalm 28:1).’”
The next thing that David prayed for
and we also pray for is found in verse eight, “8 Let me hear Your lovingkindness in the morning;
For I trust in You; Teach me the way in which I should walk; For to You I lift
up my soul.” Hearing God’s Word gave
David strength, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ
(Romans 10:17).” This verse in Romans is
one we usually think about it being a verse that is used to witness to someone,
and it surely is, but it also speaks to the believers so that are faith will be
lifted up as we read the Word of God, for the Word of God is, “living and active and
sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul
and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and
intentions of the heart (Hebrews 4:12).”
Next we see in verse nine, “9 Deliver me, O LORD, from my
enemies; I take refuge in You.”
David wanted protection from His enemies and David knew that God was
able to keep him safe from those who were trying to harm him. The LORD was David’s Rock, and like the song
sates David wanted to hide himself in the LORD, “Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let
me hide myself in Thee.”
I will finish this portion of
Today’s SD by quoting Dr. Wiersbe, “Another answer we receive from the Lord is a knowledge of the will of God (v.10). His good Spirit (Neh. 9:20) teaches us from
the Word and shows us the path we should take (Psalm 119:105). A Knowledge of God’s will gives us confidence
in the difficulties of life; it keeps us going when the going gets tough. Finally, God answers prayer by helping us bring glory to His great name (vv. 11-12). ‘For thy name’s sake’ was the great
motivation of David’s life and ministry (1Sam. 17:26, 36, 45-47). ‘Hallowed be Thy name’ is the first request
in the Lord’s Prayer, and it ought to be the motivation of all our
prayers. David knew that he had a great
work to do for the Lord, and he depended on the Lord to help him accomplish it
and bring honor to His name.”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: It is
wonderful how the Lord works out certain details in my life. As I have been studying many of the psalms
that David wrote our Pastor has just began a series that he says will take up
to ten months to complete and it is on the life of David. David is my favorite character in the OT and
I truly enjoy studying about his life, so it looks like it will continue for a
while. David’s life is an inspiration to
me and I hope to others as they look at my Spiritual Diaries.
My Steps of Faith for Today: For many
days I have put contentment into this portion of my SD, and the reason is from
what I have learned from Phil. 4:11b, “for I have learned to be content in
whatever circumstances I am.” Paul
states that he had learned to be content, something that is difficult to learn,
and yet possible to learn as Paul states it here, and the reason he learned
this is because of the troubles that God sent him through, and as he went
through those troubles he learned to rely on the Lord to sustain him. Paul was like David in many ways and that is
why Paul is my favorite NT character.
I have also been putting the word “transformed” in
this section, a word that means to change from the inside out. We get the word “metamorphous” from the Greek
word that is translated “transformed.”
Romans 12:2 states that we are to be transformed by the renewing of our
minds, and the only way that this will happen is from the Word of God, which is
living and active and sharper than any two edged sword as we saw earlier in
Hebrews 4:12. Memorizing and mediating
on the Word of God will transform our minds from the inside out, it will give
us the strength we need to go through difficult situations because we will have
the mind of Christ, “’For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to
instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ (1Cor. 2:16).’”
Memory verses for the
week: Psalm 130:1-7
1 Out of the debts I cried to You, O
LORD. 2 Lord, hear my voice! Let Your ears be attentive to the voice of my
supplications. 3 If You, LORD, should
mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?
4 But there is forgiveness with You, That You may be feared.
5 I wait for the Lord, my soul does
wait, And in His Word do I hope. 6 My
soul waits for the Lord more than the watchman for the morning; Indeed more
than the watchman for the morning. 7 O
Israel hope in the LORD; For with the LORD there is lovingkindness, and with
Him is abundant redemption.
12/3/2012 11:48:48 AM
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