Archive for February 2006
Gimel - Psalm 199:17-24
Posted on Wednesday, February 01, 2006 at 11:18 AM by David Zavadil
17 ¶ <GIMEL> Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word.
18 ¶ Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.
19 ¶ I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me!
20 ¶ My soul is consumed with longing for your rules at all times.
21 ¶ You rebuke the insolent, accursed ones, who wander from your commandments.
22 ¶ Take away from me scorn and contempt, for I have kept your testimonies.
23 ¶ Even though princes sit plotting against me, your servant will meditate on your statutes.
24 ¶ Your testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors.
The author of this psalm changes pace on us. In Gimel, we find a change to a prayer. The psalmist request of God and as we will see in Daleth, his confession.
Verse 17 begins with the phrase, Deal bountifully with your servant. When you think of the word bountifully what comes to mind? Abundance, greatness or goodness? In 21st century American Christianity bountiful blessing is always to be desired, but then so is a bountiful plate, family, household, job, etc... We struggle with wanting the most of everything. The psalmist however is not seeking bountiful blessing of material things but the bounty found in God's dealings with His people. He desires the most God has, God himself. His eye is first on God but then also on himself. Note, your servant. God provides the bounty, we are to be the stewards of that same bounty.
The phrase your servant calls to question our mindset or attitudes concerning our relationship with God. How do we view ourselves in light of God and His Word? Do we see ourselves as deserving of God's attention and bounty or as servants, serving a Holy God and being blessed by God's bounty. It causes me to ask as the Westminster Divines, "What is man's chief end?" I then must cry out in prayer, "to glorify God and enjoy Him forever!" Only as we grasp this concept and apply it to our lives will we be able to fully live and keep God's word.
18 ¶ Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. The prayer turn to God's illumination of His Holy Writ in our lives. There is a doctrine within the Church called Perspicuity. This doctrine states that the Scripture as written is clear enough for us to understand what is needed about God. Within the text of the Scripture the gospel is clear enough that some deep theological interpretation known only to a few is not needed. The psalmist here prays that God will open his eyes even more.
18 ¶ Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. Consider the thought of God's wondrous works. As you read the Scripture, do you see God's "wondrous things?" Our prayer, like that of the psalmist, should be that our eyes would be open to see God's "wondrous things" throughout the Scriptures. A challenge I gave to the members of Grace Presbyterian Church was to read through the Book of Numbers and list all of the "wondrous things" you find in that book. Try it, you will be surprised how many wonders you find.
19 ¶ I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me! We are all sojourners, pilgrims in this life on earth. Our citizenship is not on earth but in heaven. Php 3:20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. We travel this earth, for God's glory, until we are called once again to come home. As we travel we are not alone, we have the body of Christ, the Church, joining us in this journey. Our brothers and sisters feel our pains, struggle with us as we pray and rejoice with us. Yet, too often we live as though we are alone and can do it ourselves. It makes me wonder, why did the psalmist pray that God would not hide the Word from him? I see him finding in the Word, friend, counselor, teacher and guiding light. Through our journey on earth, the Word of God is the one place we can always turn for a true answer, for guidance, for direction. As sojourners we need to have our eyes opened to see "wondrous things" as God leads us to pursue the call of the heavenly prize.
In verse 20 we continue the theme of a traveler. 20 ¶ My soul is consumed with longing for your rules at all times. The picture that comes to mind is one we have seen in all of the old movies and cartoons involving the desert. In those movies there always seemed to be some man, crawling around crying, "Water! Water!" He was consumed with one thing, his longing for water. In our journey hear on earth we are to be consumed with longing also, not for water or material things, but for the Word of God. We should be consumed with a desire to know what God desires of us, to know what He wants to teach us, to know how we are to live. Is your life consumed with longing for God and his Word? What are those things that consume you? I am a fan of the music of Rich Mullins. In his song, "My One Thing," he sings,
Save me from those things that might distract me
Please take them away and purify my heart
I don't want to lose the eternal for the things that are passing
'Cause what will I have when the world is gone?
The life we call Christian is not a problem because God is too difficult to understand, no our problems stem from our distractions. We are not consumed with a longing for God and His Word, we are consumed by the distractions, the TV, the radio, our cars, our jobs even, at times, our families. The psalmist calls us to radical living, open our eyes, seek the cross, and be consumed with the things of God.
21 ¶ You rebuke the insolent, accursed ones, who wander from your commandments. Sin will be with us throughout this journey on earth. It is the common trait among all human beings. God does and will deal with each of us as we struggle. The sins of sinners, the pagans, the heathen, we can understand. The sin and wanderings of the saints are often more difficult to understand. The psalmist reminds us that God will take care of the sinful. He will bring the rebuke. This statement is in contrast to our eyes being opened and our longing for God consuming us. If we continue in faithfulness upon the path of righteousness, we will not be rebuked. If we stray, even the slightest, we will find God's rebuke. Not our of anger but love. 2Pe 3:9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
22 ¶ Take away from me scorn and contempt, for I have kept your testimonies. Our prayers of repentance and forgiveness will bring cleansing. Here the psalmist prays for a removal of the reproach or scorn and a removal of the contempt or anger. How often have you found yourself struggling with some secret sin and live a bitter angry existence Friends, pray that God will open His Word to you and that you will find freedom from the angry bitter existence Search out the Scripture and see God's blessings and desire to make you pure. Pray for His purify power to be active in your life.
23 ¶ Even though princes sit plotting against me, your servant will meditate on your statutes. This verse seems odd in light of the earlier discussion. Yet it serves to address our attitude as we take our journey. We are to plant our minds and hearts upon the Word of God. Rather than dwelling on what other people are doing or thinking about you, focus yourself on God and His teachings.
24 ¶ Your testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors. He closes this passage with a reminder of what brings him the most gratification, the Scripture. Where do you go when facing trials? What or who is your source of counsel when problems arise? Take joy, delight in God's Writ for in it you will find guidance and direction for the weary traveler. Come to Jesus, and find your rest. Delight in his teachings and statutes as they carry you through the day. Meditate on His wondrous works and consider all of his promises to a sin filled world. God's Word is truly amazing.
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Update on my status
Posted on Wednesday, February 08, 2006 at 11:34 AM by David Zavadil
As many of you may know, Ok, the four or five of you who read this periodically, I have been without a full time call since September of 2004. I served as Interim Pastor for Grace PCA until January 29, 2006. I have returned to a without call status and have begun the search process again. Please pray for my family and I as we seek to determine the Lord's direction and will.
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Daleth
Posted on Wednesday, February 08, 2006 at 1:48 PM by David Zavadil
25 ¶ <DALETH> My soul clings to the dust; give me life according to your word!
26 ¶ When I told of my ways, you answered me; teach me your statutes!
27 Make me understand the way of your precepts, and I will meditate on your wondrous works.
28 ¶ My soul melts away for sorrow; strengthen me according to your word!
29 Put false ways far from me and graciously teach me your law!
30 ¶ I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I set your rules before me.
31 I cling to your testimonies, O LORD; let me not be put to shame!
32 I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart!
When you sin, how do you feel? Does it drive you crazy until you confess and repent or do you just move on, as everyone sins? The Psalmist provides a picture of how he deals with sin in his life, what it does to him internally and how he reacts. 25.My soul clings to the dust; give me life according to your word! The sin in his live is such that it knocks him to the ground. The picture he paints for us is of a man prostrated before God, confessing and even then not feeling he is low enough. If you have seen the movie "Luther," you may remember a scene where Luther is praying in his chamber and is laid out on the floor with his arms spread wide confessing his sinfulness to God. This is the picture the psalmist creates here. Bridges writes, "To have a soul cleaving to the dust, and not feel the trouble, is the black mark of the sinner, dead in sins - dead to God." The power of sin in our lives should continually remind us that we came from dust, created by God, but over taken by sin. Apart from our clinging to our creation and crying out to God for help, we can not overcome our sin. No matter how hard we try, how hard we pray or study, if God does not cleanse us, we will not find forgiveness. What a blessing we have in his promise, 1 John 1: 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We may, in our hearts, be led to cling to the dust over our sinfulness, but we can rest in the sure confidence that God will forgive, and this is according to His word!
26 ¶ When I told of my ways, you answered me; teach me your statutes! We find a simple picture of the believers walk with Christ. As we lay our hearts before the Throne of Grace, God works in us. To often we question, "Why do I need to confess my sins, God already knows?" That is true, God does know our sin. A better question, and the one addressed here, is, do we know our sin? I can tell you, the reason I fail to confess and repent of sin is not that God already knows, but that I am not convicted of it or know it. The psalmist finds and reveals to us the way to dialog with God, open ourselves up. Confess and talk to him. When we confess our sinfulness it let us know and God know that we realize what we have done. When we confess, he answers with forgiveness. It is only as we come before God in His righteousness that we can then begin to understand His Word. Forgiveness leads to illumination. As we confess our sin and come to the cross, the Scriptures are opened up for us, leading us closer to the throne.
27 Make me understand the way of your precepts, and I will meditate on your wondrous works. How often do you, like me, open the Scripture up and read only to find yourself saying, "What did I just read?" The sin we just spoke about can often lead to a lack of understanding. Blinded by our sinfulness, we find ourselves blinded to all of the things of God. As our hearts come under the caring hand of the Holy Spirit, we are taught. Joh 14:26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. What the Church needs most today are not smarter teachers and preachers, but men of God who go to God daily to find clarity to the teaching of Scripture A knowledge of Greek and Hebrew doesn't make my preaching deeper, it doesn't allow me to expound any deeper, it is only as my knowledge, via my walk with God, grows, that I begin to find a new deepness in my preaching and teaching. I am to seek God's guidance through the Holy Spirit to understand and interpret the Scriptures and then I am to meditate upon them. Dwell on these teachings until they become and integral part of my life. The wondrous works spoke of here are not necessarily miracles of God's mighty hand, but the wonders we find in Scripture. In your next quiet time, instead of just reading, ask God to show you His wonders in the passage you are reading. Write them down and meditate on them. How do they apply to your life? How do these wonders make God even more real in your life?
28 ¶ My soul melts away for sorrow; strengthen me according to your word! This verse brings to us a contrast of hearts. As our heart is is set on self and sin, we experience sorrow. I don't know about you, but in my life, when I focus on self, I am almost always led toward sorrow. Why? Because the sinner that I am, I always want what I want. Sorrow enters because I rarely get what I want. Sin only begets more sin, it never brings fulfillment. So where do we go for fulfillment? Where do we go for strength The psalmist points us back to the Word of God. He cries out, strengthen me according to your word! In the last verse I challenged you to look for God's wonders in the Scripture. In this verse I want to challenge you to seek those passages that provide strength to the weak of heart. Passages like, Ex 33:14 And he said, ‘‘My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.’’Mt 11:28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Our strength is found in God and the promises of God found in Scripture bring us assurance and hope.
29 Put false ways far from me and graciously teach me your law! Do you find yourself struggling with the same things over and over again? Are you like the addict that just needs one more hit and then they will quit? Our struggle with sin is often like that, it is addicting and difficult for us to over come. It is this power that the psalmist calls us to overcome by calling out to the only one who can help. For some of us, we will always have a weakness say for chocolate. It is not enough to say we won't eat any more, sometimes we need someone just to remove ever last crumb of it from our lives. We need God to remove those false ways from us. Sin over powers us, often keeping us from fighting back. We need to seek God and ask that He show his mercy to us by removing the temptations far from us. Ask God to remove those things that tend to tempt and then fill your mind with His Word. As we meditate on Scripture, we find we have less time to think of those things that taunt us daily.
30 ¶ I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I set your rules before me. 31 I cling to your testimonies, O LORD; let me not be put to shame! 32 I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart! These next three verses highlight the paths set before us. One path is laden with lies and deception, the other with truth. As Paul writes, 1Cor 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. We will all be tempted. We will all face a decision, walk the way of God or follow our temptations. Here we see the writer, dealing with the fine line between God's active work in our lives and our responsibility. He makes clear that we have a responsibility in this thing we call sanctification. We are to choose, cling and run.
First we are to chose the way of faithfulness. He is not talking about our salvation but our sanctification or holiness. Jesus said, Lu 9:23 And he said to all, ‘‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Every morning as we arise, we have a choice to carry the cross or to leave it by the bed. To follow Christ and grow in our relationship or to watch our relationship stagnate on the vine. My friends, you will never draw nearer to Christ if you never choose to read the Word, let alone set His rules (Word) as your guide for life. You can not have it both ways. I believe in Christ, but I want to live my own way. No, you must chose the way of faithfulness and then set about to live according to God's Word. This concept teaches me that I must make the Word of God and integral part of my life, not just light reading for late in the evening.
Second, we must cling to that Word of God. The world bombards us with all sorts of messages. Even within the Church universal, we are being told that the Bible is a nice story but is not authoritative. The efforts to downplay the power of the Scripture is evident in everything from the evening news to the local school system. Yet, look where we are today. We have seen more advances by intelligentsia in the last hundred years than in all of history and still we have poverty, our kids struggle with drug and alcohol addictions, sexual addictions and people in general are no more happier than they were even fifty years ago. The Word of God promises fulfillment and satisfaction. It teaches they are found in the Great Shepherd, Jesus Christ. What a shame it would be if on that day we stand before God, He asks, "Why should I let you into my heaven?" and our only answer is, "uh, cause I didn't drink, I didn't swear, I didn't chew and I did not date any girls that do." The Word of God provides the teachings that will keep us from being shamed. As they point us to Christ, we find our confidence in Him.
Finally, we are to run in the way of His commandments. Paul writes of our walk being a race. 2Ti 4:7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Heb 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. The life of a Christian isn't a one and done proposition. We don't simply pray and all is over, we must daily hit the track we call life and live as though we are His chosen people. Again the psalmist reminds us of where we will find the strength to run this race, we are to find it in Christ. As we run according to the Word, our hearts will be enlarged, we will be enabled to see and receive more and more of what Christ offers. We do not receive all of our understanding of Christ and our relationship upon conversion, as we grow, as we walk, more and more comes clear. We need to run our race in such a way as to draw nearer to the prize, "for which we have been called heavenward." We need to run to Christ, that we may run with Him.
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New Addition
Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 at 12:01 PM by David Zavadil
I am going to start a new section to my blog. I will review books that I have been reading. Keep in mind, these will be MY opinions of books. Occasionally there may be a fad book included, not often as I try to stay away from the fads, I am typically more critical of the fad books than others. I will explain my approach to reading the book before reviewing it so that maybe you will understand where I get my crazy thoughts. Look for the first post soon. I will review two biographies, one on C.S. Lewis and one about Rich Mullins.
Book Review
Posted on Tuesday, February 14, 2006 at 10:42 AM by David Zavadil
I must confess, I like biographies, almost any biographies. So, when I received two at Christmas time, I was excited. Now, you should know, I read multiple books at the same time so it often takes me a while to get through some books. These two, however, were not difficult reading and so I was able to read them pretty quickly.
Jack's Life is about, as you may have guessed, C.S. Lewis. As a fan of C.S. Lewis' writings, I was anxious to read this little book. 167 pages long with a DVD documentary included, it is a biography written by Douglas Gresham, his stepson.
Let me begin by saying, if you are seeking a book to help you understand the theological background of C.S. Lewis, this is not it. It is a biography pure and simple. Gresham surprised me in two ways. One he spoke very little of the foundations and theology of Lewis' faith and spent very little time detailing the relationship between Lewis and Joy Gresham. It seemed to me that Douglas Gresham was more concerned with showing the hardships put upon Lewis by his drunken brother and Mrs. Moore than anything else. Mrs. Moore is portrayed as a hypochondriac, manipulative, psycho that worked Lewis as a slave. The Major, Warnie, was written as a good natured drunk who loved his brother but couldn't really do anything to help him.
While the book, as a whole, has much interesting biographical material, I found it a so-so read. I likened it much to a conversation with your great grand parents. You ask them about their past and they begin to talk, and talk, and talk. Soon they are so lost in the stories that they don't realize they are repeating themselves and making little sense. Though the language is easy to read, the author's style made the book cumbersome. I am interested in learning about Lewis, but Gresham didn't make it easy or fun. If you are a die hard Lewis junkie, you need this book if for no other reason than to say you have it. If you are just interested in learning more about Lewis and enjoying your time doing so, avoid this book. I give it
out of 5
The second book I want to speak about is a devotional biography of Rich Mullins entitled An Arrow Pointing to Heaven. I have been a fan of Rich's music since he began. His powerful lyrics and melodies have captured many a heart. Like the previous book, I was looking forward to learning more about the man, Rich Mullins
I liked this book more than the book on Lewis. I guess I felt as though I learned more about where Mullins was coming from, who he was inside, than I did of Lewis in the previously reviewed book. This book also suffered from rambling writing. At times it was difficult to follow where the author was headed. I don't know if it is the current style of writing or what, but it seems that rambling too and fro is good literature. Frankly, I prefer smooth reading. Any how, using previously unpublished writings from Mullins and lyrics to many of his songs, the author paints the song of a traveling troubadour He tries, and succeeds for the most part, to help us see not only the outer struggles Rich had, but the inner battles also.
One thing that stands out was Mullin's eclectic theological background. The book takes you from the Quakers, to fundamentalism, to Brennan Manning's teachings and finally to St. Francis of Assisi. Mullins was not your typical churchman/musician. He was not afraid to pick and choose what he felt was the Biblical way to go. While not agreeing with much of the theology discussed in the book, the example of Mullin's desire to walk close to God, to maintain a vibrant faith that others can see, was encouraging and challenging. If you are a Rich Mullins fan, this is a good read for you. I give it
out of 5