What Scripture Does #2

Psalm 119 itself is the Word of God. God is telling us through this the way that He wants His people to be, and we exist to obey. This is what discipleship looks like. It's been well said that the true mark of discipleship is an earnest desire to obey God.

Yet, we all fall woefully short in this area, don't we? So is there any hope for us? The answer is a resounding yes, and that hope is found only in God's Word. Welcome to The Truth Pulpit with Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. I'm Bill Wright, and today as Don continues in his series called The Magnificent Word, he'll take an in-depth look at obedience, discipleship, and repentance, as well as the inevitable joy that comes into our lives as a result of the faithful study of God's Word.

Turn to Psalm 119, and let's join our teacher for today's message from The Truth Pulpit. Scripture shapes our heart in affliction. It shapes our heart for understanding. Thirdly, it shapes our hearts for obedience.

It shapes our hearts for obedience. God is the ultimate and final authority in the universe. The Word, therefore what He speaks, carries inherent authority. The Word of God has moral authority. It comes from a sovereign God. Look at Psalm 119, verse 4.

Psalm 119, verse 4. Scripture is not simply a comfort to us. Scripture is the law to us. Scripture is authority. It is the embodiment of the authority of God expressed to us. And so Psalm 119, verse 4 says this, You have ordained your precepts that we should keep them diligently. Scripture exists to be obeyed, is one way that you could look at it. And throughout the Psalm, Psalm 119, the psalmist is expressing his desire to obey the Word. He doesn't want to simply know it in a mental sense. He wants his life to conform to the precepts and statutes of God.

And you see this throughout. Look at verse 9. How can a young man keep his way pure?

By keeping it according to Your Word. With all my heart I have sought You. Do not let me wander from Your commandments. Your Word I have treasured in my heart that I may not sin against You. You see the connection? The affections of his heart for the Word of God are tied to life obedience, faith-based life obedience to the Word of God.

It's not separate. Scripture formed in him a desire to obey, and so he repeatedly asks for help to that end. Look at verse 17. Deal bountifully with Your servant that I may live and keep Your Word. Verse 33. Teach me, O Lord, the way of Your statutes, and I shall observe it to the end. Give me understanding that I may observe Your law and keep it with all my heart. Verse 88.

Revive me according to Your lovingkindness, so that I may keep the testimony of Your mouth. And in verse 133, he says, Establish my footsteps in Your Word, and do not let any iniquity have dominion over me. He desires not only to be comforted in his affliction, he desires not only to understand the Word of God, his desires are followed through to obedience, to repentance, from turning away from sin and evil, turning away from indifference to the Word of God and the people of God, turning away from all of that so that he might be found as one who keeps his commandments.

And understand this, beloved. I'm describing it there from a human perspective of the psalmist's conscious desires as he's writing this psalm and as we're processing it in our own hearts. But understand that we're reading the Word of God. Psalm 119 itself is the Word of God. God is telling us through this the way that he wants his people to be, what it is that he is calling us to, what it is that a life of discipleship looks like.

It looks like this. It looks like trusting God in affliction. It looks like desiring to understand the Word of God.

It looks like a life of obedience. Affliction has its purposes, and our mind has purposes for understanding, and we exist to obey. This is what discipleship looks like, and it's far more than just simply going through a prepackaged set of materials that you go through for a period of time and then you move on to other things in life. No, the discipleship that Psalm 119 is showing us, this is full-orbed life throughout every day, being oriented in this way.

And the Word of God is our center of gravity in it all. And so, when we see these prayers of God, help me to obey, you see his prayers and his desires for obedience. It gives you perspective on the way that he expresses his commitment to obedience elsewhere in the psalm. Look at verse 8 again with me. Psalm 119, verse 8.

Look at the conviction. Look at the commitment that he's expressing here in response to the Word of God. He says, "'I shall keep your statutes. Do not forsake me utterly.'" Verse 32, "'I shall run the way of your commandments, for you will enlarge my heart.'" Verse 55, "'O Lord, I remember your name in the night, and keep your law.

This has become mine, that I observe your precepts.'" Verse 60, "'I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments.'" Verses 87 and 88, "'They almost destroyed me on earth, but as for me, I did not forsake your precepts.

Revive me according to your lovingkindness, so that I may keep the testimony of your mouth.'" Verse 101, "'I have restrained my feet from every evil way, that I may keep your word.'" Verse 115, "'Depart from me, you evildoers, that I may observe the commandments of my God.'" Verse 120, "'My flesh trembles for fear of you, and I am afraid of your judgments.'" And finally, verse 167 and 168, "'My soul keeps your testimonies, and I love them exceedingly. I keep your precepts and your testimonies, for all my ways are before you.'" All of my thoughts, all of my life, God, are before you. Therefore, I want all of my life to be lived in obedience. We'll see that he's not claiming perfection as he says that, but there is this spirit of humble faith that pervades the psalm, and this spirit of conviction that says, when I understand this should be the mark of every believing heart, my commitment, you say to yourself, my commitment is that when I understand scripture and the way that it applies to a particular aspect of my character or circumstances that I'm facing, my commitment is toward obedience.

I get so tired of people who want to equivocate and keep their options open. Are you going to obey God's word? Maybe. Are you going to do what's right here? Maybe.

What do you mean maybe? How can the answer to that question be anything other than yes? Of course I'm going to obey. God's word is authority.

I love it. I want my life to conform to it. And so yes, I'm going to obey.

Just give me understanding so that I can do that. You see, and as you study Psalm 119 and as you read through it, it squeezes out of you that carnal desire to keep your options open. Maybe I'll obey in the future. Maybe I won't.

You know, I just want to all judge that when I get there. It doesn't work that way. That's not the Christian life. That's not the Christian conviction. The Christian conviction is I will obey. And when I fall short of that commitment, it grieves me.

And it's unacceptable. And I'm led to repentance when I do. You see, true understanding of God's word leads to obedience.

And my friend, I say it gently, but I say it truly. The person who is indifferent to his obedience to Scripture does not understand the Bible at all. Because understanding is given to us so that we would obey what we know. Understanding is given to us so that we would desire more understanding and grow better in obedience. But there is never meant to be a distinction between the understanding in your mind and in your heart and the obedience that your hands and feet produce. It is meant to impact your life.

And listen, another aspect that it does is it does this. A commitment to Scripture, genuine Christian living, develops such convictions of truth in your mind that you reject ungodly philosophies. You reject worldly thinking.

You don't try to have it both ways. The Christian is someone who has left the world behind. The Christian is someone who said, I was in that realm and now I reject it.

I leave it behind for the realm of God, the realm of God's word, the realm of the Spirit. And you cannot be double-minded and have it both ways. James rebukes the double-minded in chapter 1 of his text. Don't let that man expect a blessing from God.

He's a double-minded man, unstable in all of his ways. And so we don't flirt with people who are not our spouse, and we don't flirt in a spiritual way with the adulterous spirit of the world around us. We need to know the word of God. We need to turn to the word of God. We need to be faithful to the word of God. That's the only proper response for the Son of God to give to the word of God. Can't be any other way. Can't be any other way. And if you're trying to have it both ways, I plead with you, I plead with you to take these things earnestly and go alone with God and sort these things out with an open Bible in front of you.

This should be searching us. What am I living for? Who are my friends? Who influences me? What's playing in my house during the time that I'm awake?

What's my intake? So Scripture shapes our hearts in affliction. It shapes it for understanding, and it shapes it for obedience. And now, fourthly, it shapes us for repentance. It shapes us for repentance. We'll try to treat this a little more quickly.

You know, the older I get, the slower I go. That's okay. Point number four, it's for repentance. The psalmist's love of the word of God is not an assertion of self-righteousness. This focus on obedience that he has given is not an assertion that he has attained merit of his own or that he's arrived.

It's not like that at all. It reminds me of what Paul said in Philippians 3. Not that I've already attained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I might attain to the goal of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

This reminds me of that. Look at Psalm 119, verse 20. Psalm 119, verse 20. The word of God shapes us for repentance. And look at verse 20. He says, My soul is crushed with longing after your ordinances at all times. I long for it, I hunger for it, and I'm crushed that I fall short of what your word requires.

Verse 59. I considered my ways and turned my feet to your testimonies. I looked at my ways, I realized where I fell short, and I turned my life toward your word. Repentance is a turning away from something toward something else. A turning from sin and toward Christ as he's revealed in the word. Verse 101. I have restrained my feet from every evil way that I may keep your word. Verse 120, which I jumped ahead to last time. You get a double emphasis on it here today. No extra charge.

No extra charge. My flesh trembles for fear of you, and I am afraid of your judgments. 123. My eyes fail with longing for your salvation and for your righteous word. Verse 133. Establish my footsteps in your word, and do not let any iniquity have dominion over me.

136. My eyes shed streams of water because they do not keep your law. And the very last verse, verse 176. I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments.

This psalm ends on a call for God to seek him like a shepherd seeking a lost sheep. I've wandered away. Find me. I haven't forgotten your word, but I've stumbled into sin.

Find me. And he says, I've strayed. And he says, God, restore me to the flock.

Restore me to your fold. Conform my heart and help me to repent is what he is saying. And beloved, there's just so much bad teaching, so much false teaching, that the Word of God addresses so clearly. Understand that the initial act of repentance at the moment of your conversion, understand that that initial act of conversion gives birth to a lifetime of repentance. It gives birth to a lifetime of repentance.

You know how you know that's true? You never stop repenting in true Christian living. You never stop repenting because you never completely stop sinning. We all stumble in many ways, and therefore repentance is an expected ongoing part of the genuine biblical Christian life. And those people who tell you that you don't need to worry about the Ten Commandments because they have nothing to do with you, those people who model a lifestyle of being in ministry, disqualifying themselves morally and then jumping right back in it, they're conditioning people to think that repentance is no big deal, that sin is actually not an important aspect of to be put to death in your Christian life. It's all lethal. It's all poison. I have a former classmate who's the subject of a high-profile lawsuit because he committed adultery with the wife of a husband-and-wife couple that he was counseling.

This is awful. And his theology had tempted people and told people. The effect of it was, don't be that worried about sanctification. Everything's covered by grace. Well, you know what grace does? What grace does is grace inspires you to obedience. Grace gives you a heart that wants to obey. Grace gives you a heart that grieves when you sin.

It's not a license to disobey. Real grace, true grace, transforms your heart into one that wants obedience. And when you fall short, you repent. You don't boast in it.

You don't continue in it. These are matters of highest and most basic fundamental priority. Scripture shapes you for repentance, shapes you for affliction, for understanding, and for obedience.

Finally, point number five here, saved the best for last in some ways, saved the cherry on top of the dessert. Scripture shapes you for joy. It shapes you for joy. This whole matter that we've gone through, how Scripture leads us through affliction and obedience and understanding and repentance, this is not a grim-faced, sorrowful, morbid way to approach life. This is the life of joy.

This is the life of contentment in the deepest part of the inner man. And the psalmist makes that plain as well. Go back to verse 14. Psalm 119, verse 14.

Earnest repentance is accompanied by a deep joy. Verse 14, I have rejoiced in the way of your testimonies as much as in all riches. Verse 16, I shall delight in your statutes. Verse 24, Your testimonies are my delight. Verse 35, Make me walk in the path of your commandments, for I delight in it. Verse 47, I shall delight in your commandments, which I love. 1-11, I have inherited your testimonies forever, for they are the joy of my heart. 1-62, I rejoice at your word as one who finds great spoil. 1-74, I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight.

Scripture comes to you today and asks you this basic fundamental question. Is God's Word a joy to you? Do you love it? Do you delight in it? Is understanding sweet to you?

Do you have time for it because you love it so much? It doesn't do any good to say, but I'm not a reader. For a Christian to say, I'm not a reader, therefore I'm not interested in the Word of God, is like a living human being saying, I'm not an eater. I don't eat. Just not interested in it. Something's wrong there.

Something seriously, profoundly wrong there. Because true salvation produces a joy in Christ, the Word incarnate. We rejoice in Christ because we see His love, we see His imminent worth, we see His glorious essence, and we realize that when He went to the cross, He died for us, He died for our sins, He died for my sins, and we love Him in response to that. Well, genuine understanding of biblical salvation understands that Christ, who is the Word incarnate, is the source of the Word written. And so there is a marriage of love for Christ with the written Word of God. The Word written reveals the Word incarnate.

The Word incarnate gave His blessing and stamp of authority to the written Word. They're interdependent. You can't separate the two. And so what do we do in light of all of these things? Scripture forms us for affliction, and Scripture forms us for understanding and obedience and repentance and joy.

What do we do? Well, what we do is we come to this word in humility, and we do this. We rely on it.

We trust it. We rely on this word in our afflictions. We rely on the written Word of God for understanding.

We rely on the Word of God for obedience and for repentance, and we rely on it for our deepest joy. Men and women, husbands and wives, children, they're all going to come and go. Friends come and go. Health comes and goes.

Finances come and go. Whatever it is about earthly life, it comes and it goes. And so we never repose our final hope and aspiration in such passing things.

Even though we love our families, they're not the ultimate source of our joy because we understand that eventually, one way or another, we're going to part in the end. The Word of God, it abides forever and therefore becomes the source of our joy. My dear friend, do you know Scripture like we've discussed here today from Psalm 119?

Do you know it as a source in affliction? Do you desire to understand it? Do you desire to obey it? Do you repent when you don't? Do you find joy in the Word of God? Do you know Scripture like that?

That's the question. There you'll find a whole library of free study materials. Please be sure to share our website and this broadcast with a friend or loved one.

Again, go to thetruthpulpit.com. Now, just before we bring our time to a close, here again is Don with a word of encouragement. Well, as we close today, my friend, I just want to assure you that you are in our prayers as you listen to The Truth Pulpit. You know, whether you're facing adversity in your home, your work, your school, or even in your spiritual life, my friend, know that Jesus Christ is a sympathetic friend to you in your weakness. The writer of Hebrews tells us that we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. My friend, turn to the Lord Jesus Christ in your trials. He will receive you in kindness and in love. Thanks, Don. And friend, we hope you'll join us next time for more from The Truth Pulpit.