Psalm 119:169-176: God Seeks Us by His Word | Psalm Devotional

Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible, and it ends the way it has been speaking all along: with a cry for help that is answered by the word of God. In this episode of Morning Psalms and Prayers, we finish the psalm with verses 169 through 176 and notice the rhythm of the psalmist's prayer. He cries, he pleads, and each time the answer comes "according to your word."

The devotional looks at why we cannot be saved or made holy apart from the word, and how the Spirit uses it to create and strengthen faith. It also lingers on the final verse. The psalmist has wandered like a lost sheep, yet he still knows the commandments. That knowledge is where conviction begins, and where the gospel meets us with healing.

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Good morning and welcome to morning Psalms and Prayers for Tuesday, May 26th. We begin again with another prayer from Leading in Prayer by Hughes Oliphant Old. Let us pray.

Blessed God, eternal goodness, righteousness and truth forever. Blessed you are, God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Grant to us that pure and holy spirit that our hearts may be right, with your law written on them, that the inspiration of our thoughts may be true and all our ways truly righteous. Pour down your spirit that we might be lifted up into your presence, that we might dwell in righteousness and live forever bathed in your truth. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Alright, as we today finish up Psalm 119, we are in verses 169 through verse 176. Hear the word of the Lord.

Let my cry come before you, O Lord. Give me understanding according to your word. Let my plea come before you. Deliver me according to your word. My lips will pour forth praise, for you teach me your statutes. My tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments are right. Let your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight. Let my soul live and praise you, and let your rules help me. I have gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments.

Well, here we are at the end of this very long Psalm, 176 verses strong. And as you can see, I would like to focus on two little patches of verses here. First 169 and 170 together and then verse 176. Verses 169 and 170 say, Let my cry come before you, O Lord. Give me understanding according to your word. Let my plea come before you. Deliver me according to your word.

Now, the reason I read those again is because we sort of get the rhythm here. What is happening? We talk about this cry coming before the Lord, and then we get understanding according to your word. And then he pleas, and then according to your word. Notice the rhythm there. Notice the theme. We cry, we plead, and where do we get our deliverance? Where do we get our understanding? According to God's word. That is the thrust of this Psalm. Psalm 119 is constantly going back to we need God's word. We need God's law to have understanding. We need God's word to be delivered.

And we know this. We know that we can't be saved apart from the word of God. We would not have faith without the word of God coming to us and the Holy Spirit using that proclaimed word to create faith in our hearts. That is not only how we come to faith, but that is how we are sanctified. That's how we become holy.

You know, we often pray for sanctification. We pray for holiness, but then we kind of step away from God's word. We don't think it's vital. We kind of like to think that God can show up and poof us holy. But that's not how it works. It works according to his word. That is how we come to faith, and that is how we are built up in faith. The word and spirit working together.

And so the psalmist sees this here, that if he's going to get some help, if he's going to get understanding, it's going to come from God's word. If God is, if God's plea, if he gives his pleas to God, where is his deliverance going to come from? He's going to hear it from the word of God according to his word. That is how we know that God is the one who rescues us. That's where we have confidence. That's where we have our peace.

And one of the best parts of this is as we look at 176 is I have gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments. Our prayer here is that even when we go astray, that we ask God to seek us out. And that's what he does. And again, he does that through his word and through his spirit. And that's why it's important that we're proclaiming the word of God so that when, whether we go astray or someone else does, they are doing and hearing what they need to hear to be brought back. God seeks us and he will bring us back. But we need to hear that word. We need that law piercing our hearts and convicting us of our sin and unbelief. We need that gospel from the word to come and refresh us and let us know that the solution to our pierced hearts from the law is the salve of the gospel giving us life.

But notice here one other thing that it says that I just love as I read it, for I do not forget your commandments. He talks about going astray, but yet he doesn't forget the commandments. Don't we know this? Often when we sin, don't we know we're sinning? Don't we know we're going against the commands of God? And so what is happening here? We've seen this happen before. He's saying, "I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant." He knows what his sin is.

And that's again why we need to be in the word so that it convicts us. We know God's commands. We know what we're doing is wrong. But we need that conviction of our sin for the Spirit to come to us and bring us back to life and to restore us and give us that assurance of the salvation that we have in Jesus Christ. So important and so vital.

And as we finish up here in Psalm 119, this is what the word of God does. This is why we need to be digging into it on a regular basis so that it can do its work. It can pierce us with the law, but also deliver the healing salve of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

Before we go to prayer today, I want to talk about something we're going to do to sort of continue to keep ourselves focused when we do these morning Psalms and prayers. As I've said, we were going to go through Psalm 119 and then start at Psalm 1, which we will start tomorrow. But also I've been struggling, well, not struggling with what to pray with, but keeping things focused on what to pray for, how to be organized. And so I decided the best thing to do would be to break out our prayer guide. And so on Tuesdays, I will pray for the special prayer item in the book. And then on Wednesdays, I will pray for the missionaries that the prayer book suggests that we pray for. Just a little way for us to be focused. If you would like a copy of the prayer book, I will make it available digitally. And we have a few extra here at church. Just let me know. We're happy to get you one.

But we will be doing that to sort of make this time of Psalms and prayers a little bit more sustainable, a little bit more organized and focused. And so again, if you'd like a prayer book to do for yourself during devotion time or with your family at a meal, hopefully you already have one. But if you don't, I'll make it available digitally and we'll have some extra copies here. I found a stash of them just the other day and we can always print more. So let us go to prayer.

Merciful God. We cry out to you today and pray that you would give us understanding according to your word. We bring this plea before you and ask that you would deliver us. Our lips pour forth our praises to you because you have taught us your statutes and your holy word. Today, we pray for the mothers of our faith community. We thank you that they are a blessing to their children and we pray that you would bless them with faith and perseverance. Strengthen them to be examples of faith to their families and to our community as a whole. Bless them as they have been a blessing to us. We especially remember those among us who are mothers to be. There's a lot of uncertainty in our world and we pray that you would bless them with peace and help them to keep their children safe.

As we step out into your world today, we long for your salvation and your law is our delight. We know that your hand is ready to help us and we trust in your promises. Even when we go astray like lost sheep, we know that you still seek us out. By your word and spirit, bless us with the continued desire to continually return to you and keep your commandments. We pray all of this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Well, I hope you have a fantastic Tuesday and we'll see you tomorrow on Morning Psalms and Prayers. Thank you for joining us.

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