Psalm 119:9-16
Beth
9 How can a young man keep his way pure?
By living according to your word.
By living according to your word.
10 I seek you with all my heart;
do not let me stray from your commands.
11 I have hidden your word in my heart
that I might not sin against you.
12 Praise be to you, O LORD;
teach me your decrees.
13 With my lips I recount
all the laws that come from your mouth.
14 I rejoice in following your statutes
as one rejoices in great riches.
15 I meditate on your precepts
and consider your ways.
16 I delight in your decrees;
I will not neglect your word.
We tend to overlook the key element that enables us to obey God's law.
In my previous Psalms post, I stated that this one would talk about how to continue on this journey of keeping God's law. The first three verses of the "Beth" section (Beth is the next letter in the ancient Hebrew alphabet), gives three guidelines. One keeps God's law by: 1) living according to His word, 2) seeking Him with the entire heart, and 3) hiding His word in the heart. You may think that since it's only three steps that obedience is a simple matter of a checklist. Once you complete those three steps, then you're on your way. Sadly, we tend to make things even more difficult then they need to be.
One of the reasons it is so difficult is that we tend to do steps one and three while neglecting number two. We need to seek God with our entire heart. The point of His word, the Bible, is to draw us to Him. Living a righteous life comes as a result of seeking God. Neither the Bible nor living a righteous life are ends in and of themselves.
To seek God with our entire heart we must surrender our will to His will. This must be a consistent, constant surrender. Once we start along this path, we will become increasingly aware of our need to surrender, and the more we surrender the more of our heart is open to Him. I could go into details as to what we need to surrender, but I'm sure we all have an idea as to where each of us needs to begin. Surrendering involves a struggle, but take heart, the more we surrender, the easier surrender becomes.
12 Praise be to you, O LORD;
teach me your decrees.
13 With my lips I recount
all the laws that come from your mouth.
14 I rejoice in following your statutes
as one rejoices in great riches.
15 I meditate on your precepts
and consider your ways.
16 I delight in your decrees;
I will not neglect your word.
We tend to overlook the key element that enables us to obey God's law.
In my previous Psalms post, I stated that this one would talk about how to continue on this journey of keeping God's law. The first three verses of the "Beth" section (Beth is the next letter in the ancient Hebrew alphabet), gives three guidelines. One keeps God's law by: 1) living according to His word, 2) seeking Him with the entire heart, and 3) hiding His word in the heart. You may think that since it's only three steps that obedience is a simple matter of a checklist. Once you complete those three steps, then you're on your way. Sadly, we tend to make things even more difficult then they need to be.
One of the reasons it is so difficult is that we tend to do steps one and three while neglecting number two. We need to seek God with our entire heart. The point of His word, the Bible, is to draw us to Him. Living a righteous life comes as a result of seeking God. Neither the Bible nor living a righteous life are ends in and of themselves.
To seek God with our entire heart we must surrender our will to His will. This must be a consistent, constant surrender. Once we start along this path, we will become increasingly aware of our need to surrender, and the more we surrender the more of our heart is open to Him. I could go into details as to what we need to surrender, but I'm sure we all have an idea as to where each of us needs to begin. Surrendering involves a struggle, but take heart, the more we surrender, the easier surrender becomes.
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