Well tonight, if you would take your Bibles and turn with me to Psalms 119. Psalm 119, as you're turning there, we do have a ladies' prayer breakfast coming up, or ladies' Christmas Day, I should say, on Saturday, so check that out on the bulletin and encourage all the ladies to be a part of that. It's going to be at 1 o'clock for 16 and over, and then we have a men's prayer breakfast Saturday at 7.
We do have a funeral tomorrow here, if you could help out with a meal, you could see my wife afterwards, she'll be just down in the front, and so we'll need some food for that. Tonight we're going to be looking at the wonder of God's Word, and we're coming to the end portion of Psalms 119, and we're going to read verse 129 down to verse 144. The Bible says, thy testimonies are wonderful, therefore doth my soul keep them. The entrance of thy words giveth light, it giveth understanding unto the simple. I opened my mouth and panted, for I longed for thy commandments. Look thou upon me and be merciful unto me, as thou used to do unto those that love thy name. Order my steps in thy word and let not any iniquity have dominion over me. Deliver me from the oppression of man, so will I keep thy precepts. Make thy face to shine upon thy servant and teach me thy statutes.
Rivers of water run down mine eyes because they keep not thy law. Righteous art thou, O Lord, and upright in thy judgments. Thy testimonies that thou hast commanded are righteous and very faithful. My zeal hath consumed me because mine enemies have forgotten thy words. Thy word is very pure, therefore thy servant loves it.
I am small in despise, yet do not I forget thy precepts. Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness and thy law is the truth. Trouble and anguish have taken hold on me, yet the commandments are my delight. The righteousness of thy testimonies is everlasting. Give me understanding and I shall live. Father, your word is wisdom for us.
It grants us clarity. And Lord, I pray that to it our hearts would be drawn with a fervent love and desire. Help us to see the value and the wonder of your word that we might treat it the way it needs to be in our life, Lord, that it would be elevated, that it would be read, it would be memorized, and above all, it would be obeyed and lived out. God, I thank you for the faithfulness of these precious folks. Fill them with your word tonight.
Bless them. Be with those that physically were unable to be with us, and we ask your hand to be upon the kids and the teen services as well. And all this we ask in Jesus' name, and God's people said, Amen.
You may be seated. If you were to ask yourself the question tonight, do you wonder at the word of God? What I mean by that is do you marvel at it? When you think about Scriptures and when you're reading through the Bible, does it cause you to consider how wonderful God is, and does it draw your heart to long to know Him more? Would it be said of you that you marvel at the word of God and value the word of God?
I think anything in our life that is marvelous and wonderful, we would elevate to a priority, and that priority would be found in making sacrifices for it, longing for it. Just like when this last year there was some of the Northern Lights that were happening, and it's something that my wife has always longed to see, one of her bucket list items, and then nothing more painful than to find out you get the Northern Lights here in Ohio, and then people post these incredible 3D images of the sky and amazing, all this awesome stuff. Then she found out you might be able to see it the next night, or is there some other time you'd be able to see it? So she went out, and it was on a Saturday night, so I have to go to bed early. I get up really early on Sunday mornings, and I just don't want to be up late, and so she's out on a country road.
She's waiting for those Northern Lights, buddy. She is, because she wants to marvel at it, and I think most people would if you knew the sky would be as it is. Just to see something that would be so valuable to you and in your eyes to behold, and I think as we tonight think about our topic of the Word of God as Psalms 119 is such a special chapter in the Bible, because the 176 verses are allotted to this chapter, longest chapter obviously in the Bible, 22 stanzas built off of the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet, and each stanza having eight letters is where you end up with 176 verses, and so we cover two of the stanzas tonight, and this is a song. Psalms are songs. This is basically Psalms is the hymnbook of the Jewish people, and here he's so focused the entire chapter on the Word of God. It's his theme. It's his love.
It's what he writes about, because he longs for it. He loves it, and if you think about if you've ever written a song or a poem or an expression of something that is of great value in your life, you put that into words in some kind of a form of, you know, music or, again, a poem, and for this author of Psalms 119, the Word of God so captured his heart that no more than three or four verses in the entire episode here doesn't contain the Word of God. Nearly every verse has a reference to the Word of God, and there's eight different titles given to the Word of God. It's called precepts and statutes and testimonies, and in the Word of God it has different titles to it throughout this chapter, and so I have really enjoyed our study through Psalm 119. I know we took a break last week as we were focusing on the theme of Thanksgiving, but it's been such a blessing because when we rub shoulders with Psalm 119, we're rubbing shoulders with a man who was in love with the right things. He cherished the Word of God, and I'm telling you, our life, the greatest thing that we can fill our hearts with is the truth of God's Word, and I pray that you have cherished it, that even today that it would be said of you that you wondered at the Word of God, that you cherished the Word of God, that it marveled you, and that you're here tonight because of the value of God's Word. So tonight I want to look at four different thoughts that come off these pages, the wonder of the Word, the light that it gives, the longing, and then the dependence upon the Word from our text tonight. First we see in verse 129 what he says here, the wonder of God's Word.
Thy testimonies are wonderful, therefore doth my soul keep them. This is really a reminiscent verse from Psalm 119, 18, if you remember that familiar text. It says, Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.
It's actually the same Hebrew word, pelot. It speaks of the word being extraordinary, that it's marvelous, even hard to understand, but it's something that you would marvel at. It's breathtaking in a sense.
These testimonies, as G. Campbell Morgan writes in reference to this, are supernatural, they're superhuman. This word, this Hebrew word for this, pelot, is also used in reference to just the marvelous works that God did, say, upon Egypt and in creation. And so when you read the Bible, when you go into the text, you find that it is marvelous, it is wonderful, it is superhuman. And why is the Word of God wonderful?
The first thing, it's because of who it's from. The author of the text makes it wonderful. The same Hebrew word for wonderful is used in Isaiah 9, 6, when it says, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulders, and his name shall be called, what? Wonderful counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father. That everlasting Father always kind of confused me growing up, and I thought, Why does he say everlasting Father?
I thought he's talking about the Son. That could better be translated for clarity purposes as the Father of eternity. So it's not talking about God the Father, it's talking about the Father who is over eternity.
So Jesus is the Father of eternity, is what that's saying. But anyway, he is wonderful. His name will be called wonderful. If these were the words of men, we would say, well, they could be sufficient at best. Men can write things that can be pretty good sometimes, but to be wonderful. This is a wonderful book because the author is wonderful. Also, it's wonderful because it is without error. God's word is a fantastic evidence of the inspiration of scripture, that all scripture is given by Theophneustas, or God breathed it out. And we know in Psalm 119, 160, the author declares, Thy word is true from the beginning and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth forever.
It's an amazing thing. Whenever you create a document, we've written a lot of literature here for the church and studies and most of those are like 80 some pages long. And we've done maybe, I don't know, a couple dozen of those studies for the church.
Study on James, study on Ephesians, study on, I think Alex will get done with his Hebrew studies. It may be like 500 pages long, but most of us are normal lengths. So when you get done with those, we read through them. You have a Word doc program that makes sure you're without error. You can use Grammarly. You could use a physical editor.
We have that at our church. We edit those things. And at the end of it, there's always an error somewhere. There's always something that's off.
It's almost impossible. I read books and I'll laugh sometimes because I'm like, yeah, they have errors too. I found an error. It's a misspelling right there. Yes.
Yes. It makes you feel better. There's always that editor at church that finds an error somewhere. But the Bible is a book that God has given to us that doesn't contain errors in the things that it says. We have a Bible that is given by God that we can trust. And Jesus said to the point that every jot and tittle will be fulfilled.
We won't want it. Matthew chapter 5. Now the Word is wonderful also because it tells us things that we would never be able to discover.
And I don't know that we always consider the value of some of these things. I know we hear them and we can think about it, but if you didn't have the Bible, you would have to ask the question, where am I from? How did I descend to the place to where I am today? The Bible gives us the clarity of human origin. We are not some evolutionary development. And what a dreadful thing to believe that we came from raw material and descended from animals. It's a sheer joy to know that we are formed and fashioned in the image of God.
You just think about there has been a lot of people in the history of the world that did not have access to the Bible, that did not know, and they became worshipers of the sun or the moon or eagles or other pieces of creation. God's Word also tells us what our purpose is. We exist for the glory of God. We exist to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
God has designed us to be in a relationship with Himself. God is life. God is light. And when we come to Him, we have eternal life, and we come to the light of truth out of darkness into His marvelous light. He gives us purpose. He gives us reason to live.
The reason that people want to end their life in the world and they attempt suicide or whatever those situations can be in different outbursts of the emptiness of it is when they feel they have no purpose for living. When you remove purpose, you remove so much of what life is. So God has created us with a purpose to glorify Him.
And the wonderful thing is this. You can glorify Him in every aspect of your life. You glorify Him not just in the ministries of a church, but you glorify Him in the ministry of your home, when you go to work, the way that you interact with people. You glorify Him in your sufferings.
Sometimes people ask the question, why am I going through these physical things? Listen, you can through those hardships live to the highest purpose for which you were created, and that's to give glory to God. What seems like a small thing that is very obsolete in this world, and maybe a lot of people you don't feel like it's going to impact them, God is glorified by your faith and faithfulness to Him in spite of the trials of your physical life. There weren't a whole lot of people that saw Jesus suffer in the garden. But He glorified the Father in that, didn't He? And I can tell you, your life on this earth, many of those faithful areas will ring into eternity, the faith and the faithfulness.
Do you think Job thought as he said in dust and ashes, what did I do, and what benefit to the glory of God would this ever have? And yet here we are thousands of years later reflecting upon that even now. And God's word also tells us what will happen after we die. I mean, what a dreadful place to be that you would be at the end of your life and you don't know what's coming.
And you don't know what's going to happen the moment you close your eyes, you're not quite sure, you're scared, you're nervous, you're fearful, you don't know. And the Bible comes along and says in 2 Corinthians 5 to be absent from the bodies to immediately be present with the Lord. Is that good news? Is it good news to know that today the thief would be with Him in paradise?
That's fantastic news isn't it? It's great news for us tonight, it's the best news in the world when you're laying on your deathbed. And a preacher comes beside you and reads Psalms 23 and whispers in your ear to be absent from your body is to be immediately in the presence of God. That's the greatest thing I could ever hear in my life. That makes God's word wonderful doesn't it?
It's wonderful, it's comforting. We can know that we're saved. The Bible tells us in 1 John 5 13 that these things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God that you may know you have eternal life. I don't guess if I'm going to heaven, I know I'm going to heaven.
That's not prideful, that's just faith. I know what God said and I believe it. They that come to God must believe that He is, right, and He's a rewarder of them to diligently seek Him and He said that you can know you have eternal life. The thief on the cross wasn't arrogant by saying when I die I'm going to heaven. He's just saying I believe what Jesus just said. Now all the great questions of life are answered in God's wonderful book. The word is wonderful because of who they are for. I find it interesting that there's never in the eternal record of God's word any book that He wrote for the angels.
He never made any type of document for them to study. But He spent over 1,500 years and 40 different human authors, three different languages, three different continents, and He wrote this Bible that we might have it tonight and He wrote it for us. And because of the value of the word, the psalmist declares there in verse number 129, he says, thy testimonies are wonderful, therefore doth my soul keep them. Spurgeon says the wonderful character so impressed itself upon the mind that He kept them in His memory. Their wonderful excellence so charmed His heart that He kept them in His life.
The more He wondered, the more He obeyed them. I think the word of God should be something that we are so in love with that it is the early priority of our day. It should sadden our hearts to say I've gone through the day and I haven't spent any time in the word of God. It's like how could I be cherishing the word of God and not be digging into its truths early and often. God's word is treasured and the psalmist treasured it. I can tell you, you read through Psalm 119 and you'll fall under conviction. He said in verse 14 of Psalm 119, I've rejoiced in the way of thy testimonies as much as in all riches. The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver. Thy testimonies have I taken as a inheritance forever. They are the rejoicing of my heart. It says in heritage but it means an inheritance.
Psalm 119, 127, therefore I love thy commandments above gold, above fine gold. I had somebody at the Y that was working out the other morning said, did you hear about that jackpot thing in Ohio? Powerball or something?
I don't know about this stuff. I said, no. He said, yeah, they hit the jackpot and they lost their ticket. I was like, well, good for them. You know, they're wasting money.
No, no, but that's, I thought, oh, that's unfortunate. But I can tell you if people hit the jackpot, they'd be pretty excited. Be pretty excited. And I think most Christians would be pretty excited if they found out that, hey, somebody just gifted you a million dollars.
Oh, man, you know, it's pretty amazing. And there's probably some people in here that are so spiritual that they go, oh, I won't even take it. Sure you wouldn't.
You'd be the first to take it and go on a vacation for two years, right? Yeah. So he says, I have rejoiced in your word more than anything the world has to offer me. Do you know why? Because the word is a greater treasure than all of that. I think if we were to pause and go through just and ask those who've lived more than 50, 60 years and said, is the word of God more important to you than the money the world has to offer? The testimonies would be very heavy.
Yes, yes, yes. God's word is so much more valuable. Because sometimes youthfulness can think, you know, the material things, you know, I need to have this and I got to work for that. And obviously you need to provide for your homes, but providing for your soul is even much more important. And to know that your loved ones are with the Lord, to know that you can see them, makes it all the more valuable. So we should marvel at the word of God. Can it be said of you that you wonder and marvel at his word? Secondly, we see the light of God's word in 130 here. He said, the entrance of thy words giveth light and giveth understanding into the simple. You know, I always find it interesting after Jesus gets baptized at the end of Matthew three, immediately the Holy Spirit leads him up in the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.
Right? He goes right into an Ephesians six battle. He wins that to authenticate his holiness. And then he starts his ministry. Do you notice that he didn't start his ministry until he went through the faithfulness of getting baptized to set an example for us. And if Jesus got baptized and somebody professes to be saved and are not willing to follow his example, what do you think that says of that Christian? And then he goes through testing, which friends, before God can use us, there has to be some testing typically.
There's got to be a validation. Nobody's going to go on a boat unless it's been tested. They're like, hey, we made this boat.
It looks good. We haven't put it in the water yet, but would you want to go ahead and load all your stuff in there, get your gear in there. We'll put you out there a hundred yards and drop you down in the ocean. There's great whites and stuff. Who would go for that?
You're like, I ain't going to go for that. So in the same sense, those who cannot be tested, as it's been said, can't be trusted. God puts us in test. And Jesus went through that and then he went and began to preach. But what's interesting, when he began his public ministry, the first thing the Bible says in Matthew 4 16, it says, the people which sat in darkness saw great light. And then that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up.
And then Jesus began to preach and say, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. God is a light giver. God is light. James first John one and in him is no darkness at all. It is interesting that the first words that God says in the Bible are Genesis one three, which state and God said, let there be light. The first thing out of the mouth of God, obviously all of scripture is God breathed. But specifically speaking, when God spoke himself, let there be light.
Isn't that interesting? Have you ever thought about that? God's word gives light but notice one 30. He said the entrance of thy words giveth light, the entrance of thy words give light.
It's an interesting thing because in the early days of the formation of the Hebrew language, the Jews were Bedouins, and they would live in tents. And the only opening the tent had was a flap of skin that was at the door. So when the door was open, that flap of skin was open, that's when the light came in. And what he's saying is, is in the same sense, it's the same word for door, the entrance or the door of thy words give light. When that door is opened, it gives light, it produces light. One thing that darkness does is it causes you to be unsure of your next steps. Sometimes people are walking with certainty without the word leading them. And they're really walking with a false confidence in life.
You know, darkness deceives reality. One morning, I remember getting up at night and walking through the living room. It was a previous home we lived in, or first home actually. And my girls were young at the time.
And at that time, I had to walk across the house to get to the bathroom. And I don't know about you, but I don't want to like, I want to stay in a coma. From the time I get out of bed, go to the bathroom and come to anybody else with me, you stay in a coma, which means that half of an eye opens, right? Keep the other one shut. You don't want to open your eyes much.
And so I'm not going to turn lights on. We're walking by faith here. It's all by faith.
So we're just moving in that direction. And I remember coming out in a bedroom and I'm walking with great confidence, barefooted across that living room floor. And then my foot met reality as one of those sharp-edged Lego pieces of death were left onto the floor, angled up. And I can tell you, man, that hit the top of my foot, I think.
It came right through. It felt like, and man, the darkness had deceived me. It veiled the pain that I was walking into.
And I think about that. And you know, the truth is there's a lot of people who could be walking with a false confidence. It's a flawed confidence. They think the path before them is good, but the reality is they can't see the trials and the pains that can come because they're walking in the dark. You're about to come across some painful things that you don't see because of that.
If I simply turned on the light, I would have been okay, but I thought I could make it in the dark. But darkness can deceive reality. And the truth is, without Christ, people are in the dark.
And they believe things that they should not believe. So 1-30 says, the entrance of your words giveth light. And then it says it gives understanding unto the simple. The simple speaks of those who are inexperienced, Hebrew, pete. The same word is used in Psalm 19-7, the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the souls, the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple, or the simple ones.
The one who the world would see as a teachable youth, somebody who is a simpleton, somebody who is youthful, somebody who is teachable as well. Proverbs 1-4, to give subtlety to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion. Bridges states, it is a most striking instance of divine condescension that this word, so wonderful, in its high and heavenly mysteries, should yet open a path so plain that the most unlearned may find and walk in it. And Spurgeon writes, those whom the world dubs as fools are among the truly wise if they're taught of God. You know, God gives his truth to the simple. It's people who come to God humbly by faith. They don't come and say, oh, I've been elevated by degrees, or I've been elevated by IQs, but I have been elevated by his grace. And to lean on God and to long for that truth, you don't have to be a very intelligent person to know the word, you just have to be a humble person.
You just have to long for it. You have to desire the word of God more than your necessary bread. God's word lights our way, Psalms 119, 105, the word of God, it says, is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. Before we were saved, the Bible tells us we were in a real darkness. Think about Ephesians chapter 5 verse 8, it says, for ye were sometimes darkness, but now are you light, and the Lord walk as children of light. It's interesting there that he says ye were darkness. He doesn't say you were in the dark, but you were the dark. For you were sometimes darkness. We were darkness.
We were blinded. It goes on in Ephesians chapter number 4, it tells us in verse number 18 of the unsaved, it says they had their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart. 1 Peter 2, 9 says God called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.
The one who spoke and the first words he says let there be light. When you come to Christ, he gives light to your inner man so that you can understand what you did not know before. The entrance of his words giveth light and it gives light to the simple and the simple are the ones who humble themselves and recognize I don't know it all.
They don't stand as a judge over the word, they stand under the word as it is their judge. And Jesus is light. Think about John 8, 12, it's a fascinating study. They had in Jerusalem a feast that went on there, a feast of tabernacles, and they had four massive candelabras that they would climb up and they would light these candelabras at this feast. And during this Jewish feast when they were lighting these Jesus cried out I am the light of the world, anybody who follows me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life. He claimed to be the real light and they were looking at those as a reflection and a remembrance of Moses leading in the wilderness and the Shana kind of glory leading and so forth. But Jesus Christ in John 12, 46 reiterates I am come a light into the world that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness. It is indeed the faith of the simple in Christ that causes them to go out of darkness into his light.
And when we become children of God we become children of light. Like you're a light giver. You know when the electricity goes out, and I always forget how painful it is when electricity goes out and don't look down on me for this.
You know I lived in the country, I used to cut wood and burn wood for a living, you know not for a living but that's what we would use to burn. But I tell you when the electricity goes out I don't mind it for a few hours but you start rolling into like a day and a half, two days. You know I'm on a well and I don't even have water.
Kids that flushed every time you can flush down it's like oh man I got to get water now for the bathroom. And then you got refrigerators you got to I mean it's just we live in a very needy culture right now right. I mean you need to back up generators you got to get some of that stuff set up and but what happens is when it goes out you know my wife's always like oh it's so romantic you know we can light candles and stuff.
It's romantic for like one hour here let's get this thing back on you know. So but you get the candles out and then what happens is you don't just light one you got to light another and you begin to light those up and it's a cool setting like that. But it takes a light to create a light in the fire in that sense and Christ was that light and it's really an awesome thing when you think about it. Jesus Christ light went into lights in his first century world and those lights passed on the light passed on the light passed on the light just like a little torch would and they just kept passing and somebody passed it on to you is why you're sitting here tonight. That's a direct connection throughout history. Wouldn't that be a fascinating thing in eternity one day to know how did the gospel get from Jesus to me?
Who were the 5,000 people that that journey down through history to? Wouldn't that be a neat thing to know that oh my that that went all the way up to Ireland went down here and went over that mission I was actually a part of the descendants of that missionary who brought the gospel and you put all those pieces together. Isn't that going to be a neat thing one time in eternity to look on?
I think we'll know that. But the Bible says word of the light of the world in Matthew 5 14 through 16 that's why we're called Lighthouse Baptist Church. We're to be a light in this city and I don't know folks I don't know that there's a better place in Xenia that God could have put this church right? I mean right here on this corner 14 acre property to be a light into our community and we praise God for that. And 2 Corinthians 4 tells us that if our gospel is hit it's hit to the lost. I ask you the question who's the last person you shared the light with?
Who's the last person? I had a guy the other day in the community every time around him he drops a dozen cuss words around me and my ears are burning to death but I'm like he's getting the gospel. He just keeps on going and I thought you know so pray for this gentleman he say he's going to come Sunday so I didn't tell him I'm the preacher hope he might be surprised and probably stop cussing around me. But people need the Lord don't they? And let me say this too I would be slow to ever rebuke somebody for talking like the world if they don't know Christ right? You don't try to clean up the outside until the inside knows the Lord. Now if you're a Christian you come up you know I may not say something the first time you say something but you keep on rolling cuss words out you know I might have to say hey you know you clean up that language all right. Now so the marvel of God's Word the light of God's Word and thirdly the longing for God's Word look at verse 131 he says I opened my mouth and panted for I longed for thy commandments. I remember when I was young growing up I sound like a sissy to even say this but I would never drink after anybody I always thought that was like gross drink after somebody I'm like ah you're going to drink after that guy? What kind of sick person is that? And then I was around 10 years old and I went out and bailed hay and the only thing they had was one like jug of water and I did not care who lapped on that thing I didn't care there was straw on it there was dirt on it you know three of my brothers had already lapped their lips on there I didn't care like just give me the water man you get thirsty enough and you'll drink almost anything I mean it is I have drunk out of creeks before being so thirsty out working in places just you like oh you'll get sick okay I'm still alive okay so I know it's not wise but I was young then. So this is this is this is the idea that this psalmist is saying that he is he is like someone who is dying of thirst his longing for the Word of God is he's panting for it reflects off of Psalm 42 verse one and two as the deer pants after the water brooks he calls it the heart or the deer pants after the water brooks so painteth my soul after thee oh God my soul thirsteth for God for the living God when shall I come and appear before God and so the psalmist longs for God's commandments like a wild creature panting open mouthed for water he puts to shame our indifference if his longing was not excessive how defective is ours he wasn't overboard how does that reflect upon our lives so there needs to be a longing here there needs to be a value of the Word of God that we wake up and we say you know what I am thirsty for truth I am thirsty I can I want to be careful in saying these things but I don't want to keep myself from being in maybe an encouragement and admonition to you but I have so loved memorizing the Word of God that it's hard for me to stop it in the mornings over the last 10 weeks I've been able to capture 10 chapters of the Bible and I was quoting through those this morning takes me about 35 minutes to walk through all of those and it just is so fulfilling to my soul that if you just begin to do that I'm telling you it is a life changing experience it is a life changing experience and anybody can say well I you know it's just hard for me and all of those things I have just found God's supernatural grace to allow us to capture the Word of God in our hearts and in our minds and in how your mind and your thinking begins to just just helps it it just governs it it's you know the you know Psalms 119 how wherewithal shall the young man cleans his ways by taking heed thereto according thy word the Word of God is a lamp to my feet a light to my past someone 19 1 of 5 it guides you it protects you it cleanses you it washes you it sanctifies you it just it does every there's it's only beneficial it's like there's nothing better that you can fill yourself up with I I talked to people regularly about just when you're on your drive listen to the Bible you know listen to the Word of God open up your church app if you don't have a good Bible app let me know and I'll text it to your but but you versions a great Bible app I listen through the New Testament probably every two weeks so about every two weeks I'm going through the New Testament I read the Bible as well but I but I listen when I'm when I'm doing other things not here at church but when I'm usually when I'm working out or if I'm outside at home working or doing something I listen to the Bible so it's amazing it just doesn't take long I mean if so if you have like an hour drive somewhere you'll read through the Bible and just think about what that's going to do to your mind after you listen to it a couple dozen three four dozen times a year like what what's that going to do it's not three four dozen but you're going to you're going to listen listen through a lot and it's going to it's going to begin to affect you in a very dynamic way and I would encourage you to to begin to prioritize time take that versus like listening to 700 WLW think about that listening to the Joe Rogan show think about listening to Fox News or CNN or MSNBC which would really be a waste of life fill your heart up with something that's valuable you know time is time's running out guys you think about that time is running out you're closer to heaven right now than you've ever been Jesus is coming back is closer than it's ever been it's not it's not a day to waste time it's a day to put our hands to the plow fill our life up with truth and be lights in this world let the world be busy about the world let's let us be busy about the kingdom and I really want to encourage you with that let's go to the final point tonight the dependence upon God's Word this is verse 132 he says look thou upon me and be merciful unto me as thou usedest to or as you have been would be another way you could say that unto those that love thy name now in this section he begins to speak of the trials and hardships he's enduring if I could mention a few of those in verse 134 he says deliver me from the oppression of man verse 136 rivers of water run down mine eyes because they keep not thy law verse 139 my zeal hath consumed me because my enemies have forgotten thy word for Psalm 140 verse 141 I am small and despised verse 143 trouble and anguish have taken hold on me here we see over and over in this section the psalmist is facing real battles he's being oppressed he's lived among people who violate the Word of God who look down and despise him he is being troubled and anguished and what does the psalmist do when he's put to the test in verse 132 he says look thou upon me and be merciful unto me as thou uses to or as your custom is is a better way of saying that or more clear way I should say of saying that unto those that love thy name God's look he says look upon me he says look upon me and then he says and be merciful unto me because God looking on us would be a curse if it were not for his mercy right you don't you think you'd be worried about your getting caught by your parents you take the holy God who's the earth would flee from his face you would be like don't look at me ignore me but he says look upon me and be merciful and God is and so the psalmist was an obvious student of the Word of God and what is interesting here his view of God was born out of God's historical work among people he says be merciful unto me as you have been as your custom has been to those that love your name it's very comforting when you look upon the God of the Bible and you see how gracious he was with the nation of Israel I mean if there was ever a nation he's like you know I'm just done with you guys would have been Israel I mean they you read through the Old Testament it's just one after another God was merciful to David David sin very greatly God was merciful with him God was merciful with Samson God was merciful with Rahab the harlot he was merciful to Jonah you know Jonah fled from the presence of God and God brought him back into his will he was merciful to the woman caught in adultery when everybody said stoner to death and Jesus said he that is without sin cast the first stone and he grant her forgiveness his mercy is shown to the thief on the cross he gave him eternal life he was merciful to Peter who denied him three times and allowed him to preach you know just two months later three thousand souls were saved God's mercy to Paul who killed Christians and God used him to be a great preacher authoring 13 of the New Testament books and so to look back on the great mercies of God in Scripture friends is what will allow you to get a right view of the kind of God we serve your view of God will be painted by Scripture not your past sometimes people will say things like this to me it's hard for me to view God as a loving father because I never had a father and I get that like that could be it's hard for me to put myself in your shoes because I had a loving father but but you don't have to God's not defined by your past God's divine by his word so you look in the word and you see how he's dealt with people and how he's treated people and you lean into that truth and that grace that you find there so he depended upon God's word to direct his steps after God's truth and he also prayed that God would keep him from being led away into sin he says in verse number 133 order my steps in thy word and let not any iniquity have dominion over me sees iniquity is like being something he that will trap him that it's it's something that that will ensnare him sin wants to dominate his life and he longs for victory over it he sees personal attacks that are coming against him that are on his heels that are that are chasing him down and he says Lord direct my steps so that these things don't overcome me he also God's word he finds teaches him who his deliverer is in verse 134 in verse 35 how many times when we get into trials and hardships we try to work things out on our own you know I'm gonna well at least you can pray about it kind of an idea but he says here in verse 134 deliver me from the oppression of man so I will keep thy precepts make thy face to shine on thy servant teach me thy statutes God's word is tells us what should grieve us I think verse 136 is a powerful truth he says rivers of water run down mine eyes I mean this is this is hyperbole this is drastic you know like a river pouring out of his eyes of tears and he's he's not grieved over all the negativity that's coming against him of people despising him looking down on him what he's grieved by is that people are offending God it's breaking his heart and and that is the definition of what meekness means if you were to ask what does it mean to be meek it means that you only get offended when God is violated so that no matter what comes against you you don't defend yourself but you defend God so let me ask you are you are you more protective of yourself or God you think about Jesus Christ he faced a lot of things that came against him but what turned up the anger in Jesus when his father's house was dishonored wasn't it and he says the zeal of his house has eaten me up and it's actually a quotation out of verse 139 he says my zeal hath consumed me because mine enemies have forgotten thy word that is that is brought into the light of Jesus's life in John chapter 2 verse 15 through 17 when Jesus makes a quarter whips and and cleanses the temple you know we say that and we just kind of let it go in our minds and kind of flutter through but I can tell you that Temple Mount was like a size of 11 soccer fields thousands and thousands of people he ran them all out you think about what kind of forceful man he had to be to pull that off with a whip kicking over flipping tables and I mean we'd have been like whoa I'd like to get to heaven one day and say you got a rerun on that see that anybody else I mean that'd be pretty powerful Jesus meek and lowly right you you don't hear a lot of songs today being sung about Jesus cleansing the temple but that went on and that's a reality is a righteous God God's Word keeps our view of God right in the midst of trials in verse 137 and 38 he talks about how God is righteous and I can tell you sometimes we feel like God is unfair we may not always verbalize that but when we go through difficulties are like how is this fair you know why am I going through this and and and you see here that really the theme of that whole stanza from verse number 137 down to verse 144 is the righteousness of God God you are just you are good you are upright that's why he says in verse 137 righteous art thou O Lord and upright in your judgments and then God's Word is proven is a proven source in verse 140 thy word is very pure therefore thy servant loveth it very very pure there literally means refined shown pure by trial what he's saying there is God when your word is put to the test it has gone through the fire it has been proven to me to be true how has God's Word proven trustworthy to you when you've gone through trials in life and then God's Word is our refuge and delight in trials in verse 141 and 143 just read verse 143 says trouble and anguish have taken hold on me yet thy commandments are my delights trouble speaks of here in verse number 143 trouble speaks of external afflictions anguish of internal so it's really also you think about Matthew 11 28 through 29 coming to me all ye that labor and are heavy laden those who have external and internal weights he says and I'll give you rest here he's saying if you have trouble and anguish you have external and internal trials he's saying yet the commandments are my delight they are my deep affection in my affliction and so here he says trouble and anguish have taken hold on me it's interesting the phrase taken hold on me literally they have found me like he sees trouble and anguish as though they are trailing him and they finally caught him you know the reality is trouble and anguish trail all of us even death they're on our heels every day like we could die today still not a pleasant thought but I mean but we would be with the Lord and absent from the body to be present with the Lord but those things trail us in life trouble and anguish and when life difficulty becomes overwhelming sometimes those things can grab a hold of you they can catch you and that's what he sees them as and it's when they grab a hold of you then you and I need to grab a hold of God's Word and allow that to be the source and that's exactly what he's talking about here God's Word is what you can trust forever he says in verse 142 and 144 he says thy righteous judge righteousness is an everlasting righteousness 144 the righteousness of thy testimonies is everlasting this is eternal this is something that lasts forever and and week in and week out I just want to continue to cast our eyes on what will be forever live now like you would live then if you knew the things you would know that right in a hundred years from now what would you think and then live now like you would want to have lived live with eternity in mind live for what really matters don't waste time don't waste life Psalms 119 129 thy testimonies are wonderful therefore doth my soul keep them do you wonder at the Word of God have you allowed its light to enter into your heart every day can it be said of you that you long after the Word of God and and we've seen tonight how the psalmist just depended upon the Word of God he just when life grabbed him he grabbed the book your life will face trials and I don't know what those will be you know they can come in different seasons in different ways the sustaining ability of your life is not your personal fortitude it is the Matthew 7 24 they that hear my word and do them are like a wise man who built upon a rock you have to take the Word of God you have to read it you have to study it you have to apply it and as you do those things I can tell you your life will make an impact you will you will live a life that people will know that you have been impacted by the Word of God you only get one shot at this thing called life and fill your life up be one who wonders at the word if you would stand with me tonight.
