Psalm 51 - A Willing Spirit

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from Your presence 
or take Your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation 
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
Psalm 51:12

Several years ago, while I was preparing to preach a sermon on this psalm, I received an anonymous letter from someone in my congregation saying that he was a Christian but was involved in a very serious and continuing moral failure. The letter was an attempt to be honest and tell me the trouble in his life. I didn't know if that person would be in the service the next Sunday or not, but I hoped he would be.

I decided to refer to the letter in my sermon for two reasons: first, because it was anonymous, and I could do it without betraying a confidence; and second, because the problem was of such a serious nature that I wanted to help the person if I could.

The writer had acknowledged that he knew the action was wrong but finally excused himself on the basis that God had not yet given him the power to break away from it. That was self-deception. The truth is that God has given us the power to break away from these things. Peter clearly declares: "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness" (2 Peter 1:3). The very possession of the life of Jesus Christ in us is the power that it takes to break away from habits of sin. No one will ever be free from the awful grip of evil upon their lives until they understand that they already have from God all that it takes to be free, if they will but step out upon it.

David is also asking for help. "Lord, give me this willing spirit," he says, and God immediately gives it. Then it must be acted on. That is the point. Do not wait for a feeling to come that you are forgiven. God has said you are forgiven. Do not wait for a feeling of power to possess you. God has declared He has already given you the power. As you believe Him (and that is what faith is), you can do what you need to do and what God wants you to do.

That is what happened with David, and that is what happened with the anonymous letter writer. After preaching that sermon, I found out the person had been in that service, because he later wrote a second anonymous letter. This time he shared how God had used that message to deliver him from the grip of the evil relationship he had described before.

Prayer: Lord, thank You for giving me all that I need for both forgiveness and power through the Lord Jesus. Help me to act according to Your will and to have a willing spirit. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Life Application: We can choose to be helpless victims of ruinous habits, but God provides an alternative. Are we willing to be set free by Christ's divine power?

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Psalm 51 - A Cry for Mercy

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
Psalm 51:1-2

What a marvelous understanding of the nature of sin and the character of God's forgiveness is found in these verses! There are three things David asks for. First, he understands that sin is like a crime. If criminals are to be delivered from the effects of their crime, they do not need justice but mercy. Sin is an illegal act, a violation of justice, and an act of lawlessness and rebellion and therefore requires mercy.

Then he says, "Blot out my transgressions," and thereby he reveals that he understands sin is like a debt. It is something owed, an account that has accumulated and needs to be erased.

Finally he cries, "Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin." He understands that sin is like an ugly stain, a defilement upon the soul. Even though the act fades into the past, the dirty defiling stain remains a stigma upon the heart. So he cries out and asks to be delivered from these things.

Notice that David understands well the basis for forgiveness. He asks on the basis of two things: first, "according to your unfailing love." He understands that he himself deserves nothing from God, that God is not bound to forgive him. Some people are never able to realize forgiveness because they think they deserve it, that God owes it to them. But David knows better. He realizes that only because of God's love may he even approach God to ask. On the basis of that unqualified acceptance, that marvelous continuing love-that-will-not-let-me-go, he says to God, "I am coming to you and asking now for this."

Second, as David appeals to God "according to your great compassion," he again indicates his understanding of the character of God. God is not a penny pincher; He does not dole out bits of mercy, drop by drop. No, He pours it out. His are abundant mercies. When God forgives, He forgives beyond our utmost imaginings. Two figures of speech that are used in the Old Testament depict the forgiveness of God. "As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us" (Psalm 103:12). How far is that? Well, how far do you have to go east before you start going west? You never come to west. Then God says He will "hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea" (Micah 7:19). Someone has added that he puts up a sign that reads "NO FISHING." Do not go down there and try to fish old sins out once God has dealt with them. What relief comes when we begin to understand this fullness of God's forgiveness.

Prayer: Father, thank You that I can come to You with my sin and cry out for mercy and love. Your love is steadfast; your mercy is abundant. I trust that You are always willing to forgive. Help me to do the same Lord Jesus. In Your name I pray, Amen.

Life Application: The Word of God teaches the true nature of sin, and the astounding basis for God's forgiveness. Are we learning to live in these liberating truths?

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Psalm 50 - A Sacrifice of Thanksgiving

Sacrifice thank offerings to God, fulfill your vows to the Most High. And call on Me in the day of trouble and I will deliver you and you will honor Me...Those who sacrifice thank offerings honor Me and to the blameless I will show my salvation.
Psalm 50:14-15, 23

What does God want from us? He does not want mere hymn singing, although that is fine. Nor does He want only prayer, although that too is fine. He does not simply want our attendance, although that is fine. What He wants, first, is a thankful heart. That is what He seeks, a thankful heart. Each one of us is to offer to Him the sacrifice of thanksgiving. A sacrifice is something into which we put effort; it costs us. Have you ever asked yourself why the Scriptures stress thanksgiving so much? Both the Old and New Testaments emphasize that above everything else, God wants thankfulness. "Give thanks in all circumstances," says the apostle Paul, "for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus" (1 Thessalonians 5:18). Why is this? It is because thanksgiving only comes as a result of having received something. You do not give thanks until you have received something that comes from someone else. Therefore thanksgiving is the proper expression of Christianity, because Christianity is receiving something constantly from God.

Of course if you have not received anything from God, then you have nothing to thank Him for. Though you come to the service, you really have nothing to say. God is a realist. He does not want fake thanksgiving. I know there are certain people (and they are awfully hard to live with) who think that Christianity consists of pretending to be thankful. They think it means screwing a smile on your face and going around pretending that troubles do not bother you. That is a most painful form of Christianity. God does not want you to go around shouting, "Hallelujah! I've got cancer!" But there is something about having cancer to be thankful for. That is what He wants you to see. There are aspects of it that no one can possibly enjoy, but there are other aspects that reveal purpose, meaning, and reason. God wants you to see this--what He can do with that situation and how you can be thankful. Thanksgiving is the first thing He wants in worship.

The second thing is an obedient will. "Fulfill your vows to the Most High." Notice the kind of obedience it is. It is not something forced upon you; it is something you have chosen for yourself. A vow is something you decide to give, a promise you make because of truth you have seen. You say, "I never saw it like that before. I really ought to do something about it. God helping me, I'm going to do such and such." That is a vow. God says, "I'm not asking you to do things you have not yet learned are important. But when you have vowed something, then do it. Act on it. Obey it."

Prayer: Lord, I offer to You right now the sacrifice of thanksgiving. Thank You that You are at work for good both in me and through me. Grant that I might obey your truth out of a heart of gratitude. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Life Application: We can expend much energy complaining, blessing no one. How can we re-focus our thoughts so that we have an attitude of gratitude no matter our circumstances?

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Psalm 45 - The King in His Beauty

All your robes are fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia; from palaces adorned with ivory the music of the strings makes you glad. Daughters of kings are among your honored women; at your right hand is the royal bride in gold of Ophir.
Psalm 45:8-9

These verses describe a marriage service. Traced for us here is a remarkable series of preparations. First, the groom has prepared himself. The writer says, "All your robes are fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia." These are burial spices. You remember that when the women went to the tomb on Easter Sunday morning, they carried with them a quantity of spices--myrrh and aloes--in order to wrap the body of the Lord and preserve it in its death. And yet here these same spices are present at the wedding. What does this mean? This marriage is made possible out of death; somehow out of death comes this fragrant incense that makes glorious the scene of the wedding. You can see how beautifully this fits with what the apostle Paul describes for us in Ephesians 5:25 when he says that Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. He died for it. He went into the bonds of death for us. Why? In order that He might present to Himself a glorious church, a beautiful bride, without spot or blemish or any such thing.

Then, he has prepared a place. We read of where this wedding is to take place: "From palaces adorned with ivory the music of the strings makes you glad." It is a picture of a beautiful place, and it reminds us immediately of Jesus' words to His disciples before the cross. He said to them, "I am going there to prepare a place for you" (John 14:2). That place is being prepared now. It is a place of beauty and glory beyond any possible description. These terms used here are simply a way of suggesting to us what it is like: ivory palaces filled with music and gladness with a rejoicing company around.

And finally the bride herself is prepared: "At your right hand is the royal bride in gold of Ophir." In Oriental custom, the bridegroom himself, who paid for the golden dress, always presented this golden dress to the queen. This is also a wonderful picture for us. Who is it that is preparing us for this day, for this sharing of life together? It is He who is preparing us. He has clothed us with His own righteous golden robe. Gold, in Scripture, is always the picture of deity, and this is a hint of what Peter speaks of: "You may participate," he says, "in the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4). Do you really grasp this? This is true! Jesus Christ is blending our lives with His and giving us all His position and all His privileges. All that belongs to Him belongs to us. One of the things that is most seriously wrong with the church today is that we are forgetting the privileges we have. We do not reckon on them, we do not think about how tremendous they are. Yet here stands the bride, ready to join Him, dressed in gold that He has provided.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, You are our beautiful King, and we long for you like a bride longs for her husband. Thank You for adorning us in Your own righteousness that we might dwell with You forever. We love you Jesus. In Your name we pray, Amen.

Life Application: Do we truly by faith grasp how we participate in the divine nature? How does Jesus blend His Life with ours to give us His position and all His privileges?

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Psalm 40 - A Song of Resurrection

He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD.
Psalm 40:2-3

The Holy Spirit spoke marvelously through David, causing him to record his own experiences and yet express truths that were beyond his experience. His language grew greater than the event he was trying to describe. The only ultimate fulfillment was to be in those coming days when the Messiah would appear among men in the flesh. Psalm 40 is, in a sense, our Lord's own autobiography. He Himself tells us why He came to earth, what was accomplished, and what His experiences were.

This is a description of resurrection. "He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire" or, as the Hebrew has it, "out of the pit of tumult," out of a terrible experience, out of a place of desolation and despair and death.

Life is often filled with death. Every experience that is opposite to what God has designed for us is an experience of death. Bitterness and shame and sorrow, hate and greed and loneliness, are all forms of death that come into our lives right now. That is what our Lord was experiencing. He understands these things because He has been through them Himself. Ultimately they led Him, as they will lead us, to that final moment when life ends and death is before us--the deep, dark desolation of death. But, He says, the Lord drew me out of that. He lifted me up from a slimy pit, out of the mud and mire, and set my feet upon a rock and made my steps secure.

That is a beautiful description of the experience of resurrection. None of us has ever been resurrected. There is a great difference between what happened to Lazarus and what happened to Jesus. Lazarus was really resuscitated; he was restored to this life almost as though he had been given mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. But Jesus was resurrected. He was the firstborn from the dead. He stepped into a whole new experience of life that God had designed from the beginning for humanity. That is what the Messiah is describing here. The result is, "He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God."

A new song describes a new experience. When God does something great for you, you do not sit down and recite a proverb or compose a paragraph or devise a recipe. You write a song, because singing is one of the best ways we have of expressing what is happening to us. And so He has a new song to celebrate a new kind of living, resurrected life. The effect of that resurrection life, He tells us, is going to be widespread. "Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD" (Psalm 40:3). The effect of the resurrection of Jesus was that the story of Christianity, the message of the Christian gospel, exploded in the Roman world as the church literally thrust out in every direction and shook the world of that day.

Prayer: Oh Lord, You have the power to bring life from death. Thank You that through the resurrection of Jesus You have given me new life. May I proclaim Your saving acts to others. May I not hide Your righteousness in my heart but speak of Your faithfulness and saving help. I love you Jesus. Amen

Life Application: Bitterness, shame, hate, sorrow, and loneliness are all forms of death. Do we believe and act on His indwelling Presence to dispel every form of death we experience?

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Acts 4 - Astonished

Intentionally Posturing Our Hearts & Lives in Surrender to the Holy Spirit


Acts 4:1-16
Astonished
 
My father used to have a saying. Well, he had many sayings, but this is one of my favorites:

“There is a man impressed with the sound of his own voice”.

A man so enveloped in his own pride, he loved his thoughts and his intellect and thought them superior to anyone else. I have a feeling many members of the Sanhedrin in Jesus’ day loved the sound of their voices too.

And then there’s Peter. An unschooled ordinary man. These prideful leaders could not wrap their minds around how an uneducated common fisherman could preach so eloquently and assert himself so boldly. They were astonished.


I love how Luke tells us they had “been with Jesus”. There is no amount of education that can replace that. We can know all about Jesus. We can study every word He’s ever said and every miracle He’s ever performed. We can listen to a thousand sermons, but until you sit at His feet and ask Him to teach you through His Holy Spirit, you’re just an unschooled ordinary person.

Nothing in Peter’s circumstances had changed during the last fifty days. What changed was his understanding and perspective. His priorities shifted. His focus sharpened. His purpose paved a mission that he relentlessly pursued. His whole sense of reality expanded and Jesus’ resurrection became his abiding reality.

Circumstances became inconsequential, resulting in Peter’s becoming filled with courage and faith and the urgency to tell others about Jesus. Maybe the most unexplainable thing in our lives wouldn’t be changed circumstances, but a change in us. As we allow the Holy Spirit to change us, the way we handle circumstances is bound to change as well, because our perspective toward them and our reaction to them will be different. By the power of the Holy Spirit we are able to walk through those circumstances with a confidence, peace, or joy that becomes unexplainable apart from God to those who are watching us.

What are some of the circumstances you need God’s perspective and power to react differently?

A fractured marriage?
A failed relationship?
Victory over a recurring temptation?
Development of a healthy habit?
Peace with a difficult circumstance?
Boldness to share your faith with a loved one?
Something else?

As we allow the Holy Spirit to fill us with His peace, joy, and confidence in God’s goodness, our enemy’s hands become tied. (I love how these religious leaders knew there was nothing they could do to stop Peter- and you and I become unstoppable when we are driven and empowered by the Holy Spirit!). When we submit to Jesus, the enemy loses control. Just as in Acts 4 and Luke 20, those opposing the work of God stood by astonished, wringing their hands.

Will you and I come and sit at Jesus’ feet and allow Him to teach us? To make us people who live unexplainable lives? Will we “be with Jesus”?

Today’s reading is an excerpt from An Unexplainable Life: Recovering the Wonder and Devotion of the Early Church 

Psalm 22 - The Suffering Savior

The Suffering Savior — Psalm 22

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?...
a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. 
All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me.
They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment...
I will declare Your name to my people; in the assembly of men I will praise You...
They will declare His righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it!
Psalm 22:1, 16-18, 22 31

In many ways this is the most amazing of all the psalms. In it we have a picture of the crucifixion and resurrection of the Lord Jesus painted by the psalmist David one thousand years before Jesus Christ was born. It constitutes one of the most amazing predictions of all time.

At least nine specific events or aspects of the crucifixion are described here in minute detail. All of them were fulfilled during the six hours in which Jesus hung upon the cross. Moreover, the latter part of the psalm clearly depicts the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. The probability that the predictions of these nine events would be fulfilled by chance in one person, on one afternoon is inconceivably small. The chance that all this could occur by accident is beyond any realm of possibility our minds could imagine. Yet all was fulfilled as predicted in this amazing psalm.

It is common knowledge that on November 22, 1963, President John Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, while riding down a Dallas street in a car. Suppose there had been in existence a document that predicted this event, and we knew it had been written in AD 963. That was about the time of the height of the Byzantine Empire, when most of the Western world was ruled from Constantinople, much of Europe was only sparsely inhabited by barbarian tribes, and America was not yet discovered.

Suppose that a document had been prepared in that ancient day that predicted that a time would come when a man of great prominence, head of a great nation, would be riding down a street of a large city in a metal chariot not drawn by horses and would suddenly and violently die as a little piece of metal hurled from a weapon made of wood and iron penetrated his brain. This weapon would be aimed at him from the window of a tall building, and his death would have worldwide effect and cause worldwide mourning. You can imagine with what awe such a document would be viewed today. Such a prediction would be similar to what we have in Psalm 22. That hypothetical prediction would have been made even before the invention of the automobile or firearms and five hundred years before the discovery of America. It would be regarded as fantastically accurate. Yet we have that very sort of thing in this psalm.

The psalm has two major divisions. The first twenty-one verses recount for us the torments of an unknown sufferer who is entirely alone and is crying out to God in His agony. Many scholars assert that these first twenty-one verses represent the thoughts that went through the mind of the Savior as He hung upon the cross and suffered there. From verse twenty-two to the end the sufferer is no longer alone but is in the midst of a large company and is praising God and shouting in victory. It ends with His claiming the worship of the entire world.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, it is unfathomable to me what You endured on the cross. Thank You for Your willingness to suffer and die. I worship you as my Savior and Lord. In Your name I pray, Amen.

Life Application: When Jesus became sin for us He endured unthinkable separation from the Father fulfilling amazing prophecy. What implication does that have for us today?

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