Well, for a while this evening,
before we come to prayer, I want to direct our thoughts into this
Psalm 37 and principally verse number five. These well-known
words of verse five in Psalm 37. Commit thy way unto the Lord. Trust also in him, and he shall
bring it to pass. Well, we need a word like this,
don't we, when we come to times of prayer. We need this word
to encourage us to pray and to remind us that God, through his
word, exhorts us to prayer. And we need that because we often
find it hard to pray. We do not always find it an easy
thing And we do not always find in our hearts the desire to pray
that we think we ought to have. And we can be tempted with thoughts
such as these. Well, God will not hear. Will God listen? Will God even
hear my prayer? And we can give up or not pursue
prayer. We can be tempted by thinking
that God expects that we don't need him. That is, that we should
be stronger, or we should be able to cope with these things
ourselves. And the Lord doesn't want us to keep coming with the
things of life or the needs of our soul. He expects us to be
better or stronger. Or we can be tempted to think
we're just too bad. Too sinful, the Lord wouldn't
hear us. He would cast us out if we came to him. And all of
these and many others, these thoughts can come to us and can
drive us away from prayer. And I think every Christian will
confess that prayer at times is hard and we can feel discouraged,
which is why we need texts like this. which is why God, through
David, had these words to be written. Commit thy way unto
the Lord. It's an exhortation. We could
go as far as to say it's an invitation to pray. God is calling us to
commit our way to him. And so we can look at three very
simple points as we consider this text tonight. Firstly, commit. Commit thy way. And thy way refers
to the path of life. And there is really nothing which
goes outside of this. We could say commit everything
unto the Lord is really what we're being told. There is nothing
outside the scope of this text. There is nothing that we should
not commit to the Lord. There is nothing. that we cannot
bring to him in prayer. And of course, this refers to
our life, nothing in our life, but also refers to our soul.
Nothing in the needs and concerns and of course, that most eternal
state of our soul, which we cannot bring to the Lord in prayer,
because he calls us to commit this to him. The word commit,
as I'm sure you know, speaks really of rolling something on. The same word is used, if it
helps us to understand it, when Jacob goes to the well and meets
Rachel, and they roll the stone away from the well's mouth. This
is the word that's being used. It's to roll something away. And so really, the picture we
are being given is a burden or a need or something that's being
rolled off us and onto him. It's being given to the Lord. And of course the implication
of something rolling is that it might be heavy. It might be
something that we're struggling to carry. And yet to roll it
onto him is to give it entirely to the Lord. And that's the sense
that we're having here. It doesn't mean keep some of
it yourself. It doesn't mean tell the Lord,
but still hold it yourself. It means give it to him. Commit
it to him. And it means to pray. Because
how often do we find that we may have an issue, but what we're
doing with it is we're musing on it. We're thinking about it,
we're pondering it. And it fills our mind But we're
not praying. And so this doesn't mean think
on your needs or dwell on your needs. It means to give your
needs to him. It's an active word, isn't it?
It's a thing you do. And so prayer is an active thing. Prayer is to give something to
God. It's to cast it to God. Commit thy way unto the Lord.
And so it's a call. for us this evening to pray.
And we have our private needs that we might not bring to a
public prayer meeting. And we have our private prayers
and it's our call to do that, but it's our call also to publicly
come with our communal needs and joint concerns and commit
them unto the Lord. So commit thy way unto the Lord. But flowing directly from that,
secondly, is a call to trust. also in him. Trust in him. Trust also in the Lord. Who better to commit our way
to? Who better to trust? The Lord here, of course, is
directing us to the Almighty One, Jehovah, the I am that I
am. the eternal, self-existent and
glorious God. Who else would we want to commit
all our needs to? Who else could possibly take
on our burdens? And who else can we really trust
like the Lord? But the glorious thing, if we're
a believer tonight, is that the Lord is not just the glorious
I am that I am, but the Lord is the lover of our soul. The Lord is the one who throughout
all eternity has held us in his heart. The Lord is the one who
came to suffer and die for our soul. He is the one we're called to
commit to. I say again, who better? Who better to commit our way
than to the Lord? But we're also to trust him. Trust him. And so this tells
us that to pray is not just to talk and then forget about it.
It's to recognize who you're coming to. is to trust in the
Lord. And we can trust in him because
he is trustworthy. I think that's an obvious point,
but we need to remember it. Why would we trust in the Lord?
Because he's trustworthy. And so as we come to prayer,
we remember that we come to a God who is faithful. And the faithful God keeps his
promises. And so when he promises to hear
our prayers, he means it. When he promises to forgive the
sins of those who confess, he means it. When he promises to
appear for those in need, he means it. And so we trust him
because he's faithful. We can also trust him because
he's wise. Because he never makes a mistake.
And so the answers he will give will be good answers. And the
things he may do in response to prayer will be wise things
and the best things. And so we can trust him with
our needs because he will do what is right and what's good. We can also trust him because
he's the Almighty God and there is nothing that's too hard for
him. If we bring our impossibilities to one another, we will find
that it's impossible for them too. Probably the things that
I cannot solve are also things that you cannot solve. But our
God is not like that. He's a God of impossibilities. Nothing is too hard for the Lord
and so we can trust him because we don't bring anything which
is too hard. We can also trust him because
he's gracious, because he doesn't deal with us as we deserve, because
he doesn't cast us out of his presence as we deserve. But for
Christ's sake, he is gracious and accepts and hears the prayer
of the needy sinner. So you can trust him. And rather
like committing is an active thing, so trusting is also an
active thing. It's something we do, and it's
something we keep on doing. And it's something we have to
keep doing. And it's something we have to
really keep stirring up, this trust in the Lord. Because the
reality is that very often the Lord doesn't answer our prayers,
in the time that we had hoped. The Lord delays. The Lord, in
his wisdom, delays. And remember that. It's in his
wisdom, not in unkindness. But there may well be a waiting
time. And a waiting can be hard. But as we wait, we need to pray
for help to actively continue to trust. to continue to trust
that he is still wise and faithful and almighty and gracious. And
as we wait we have to believe that he will do what is good
and he will do what's for his glory. And so this evening if
perhaps we're in that Gap time with committing the way unto
the Lord. Oh, continue tonight to trust and continue to remember
reasons to trust in him. Commit thy way unto the Lord.
Trust also in him. And then thirdly, he shall bring
it to pass. Well, here's the promise that
comes with the text. Here's the promise of an answer.
that we don't pray to the heir or to an unknown God who is unable. We don't come like the worshippers
of Baal and find that there is no answer when they pray to him. We come to a God who does answer
and there's a promise here that he will. He shall bring it to
pass. And we can believe he will do
what he's promised to do. We can think, of course, that
greatest of promise of the need of salvation. If we confess our
sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That's a promise. And God keeps
his promises. And so we can believe from his
word that in the matter of our soul, if we have committed our
soul to him, If we have trusted in Him and Him alone for salvation,
then the word is true and must come to pass that He forgives
those sins. And so there are certain things
we can say He shall bring it to pass because He has promised
to do so. There's our root. There's our
foundation for assurance tonight. that if we have come and committed
and trusted in him by his grace, then he shall bring it to pass.
And so there are certain things we can say with a certainty that
God will do that. But you might be saying this
evening, he shall bring what to pass in some things. That
is, what about things of our life? What about prayers we've
been bringing to him? What about petitions that we
may have been praying over? Does the Lord always answer the
way we expect? Does the Lord promise here to
do everything we ask? Whatever we say, he will do it? No, of course not. God doesn't
always do everything we ask because we don't always ask rightly.
We're not always asking for good things. He doesn't bring everything
to pass that we ask. And so this, I believe, is again
where trust comes in. This is where trust comes in.
We have to believe he will do what is good and what is wise. He shall bring that to pass. And so, perhaps we receive answers
which we had hoped we wouldn't. Or the Lord is directing in a
way that we hoped would not be. The Word calls us. Yes, He's
bringing that to pass. But you are to trust in Him.
You are too to trust in His love. Still trust in His grace. Still
trust that He is sovereign. And rest in Him, in His character,
in His being. and in his love, and then believe
that he has brought that to pass. He has brought that to pass. You often can think, can't we,
of the words of Eli when he was delivered bad news about his
sons. Samuel, really trembling, comes
to him and gives him the message of what God had told him. And
Eli's response, for all the wrong that Eli did He was not a perfect
character by any means, but his response was good. It is the
Lord. Let him do what seemeth him good,
because he trusted in the Lord. And so as we pray, we believe
in a God who answers prayer. He shall bring it to pass. But
we also believe that what he brings to pass is for good. Commit thy way unto the Lord.
Trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass. Well, may God bless our time
of prayer together this evening.