Right, so we come back to Psalm
119 and verses 49 and 50 this week. My comfort in my affliction. This is my comfort in my affliction.
Remember the word unto thy servant upon which thou hast caused me
to hope. This is my comfort in my affliction for thy word hath
quickened me. There is, you might say, quite
a lot of repetition in Psalm 119. Have we not seen over and
over again the same sort of thing, that the Word of God is good
and that it does us good to look at it and learn it. But you know,
the more you look into the Word of God, as that hymn that we
just sang is saying, it's not like the things of this world.
The more you look, Although things superficially seem to be saying
the same thing over and over again, but the more you look,
a new vista appears, a new colour, a new shade appears. You see,
you read human writings, and have you not read a novel that
is a very long novel, and you think, gosh, why? You know, why
use two chapters when 15 will do perfectly well? You know,
it just becomes tedious, doesn't it, sometimes? It becomes overdone.
But the Word of God is unlike human writings. You know, human,
worldly things, in this world, honey is very sweet. Who doesn't
like honey? We all like honey, but you know,
One teaspoon of honey may be very sweet, but if you take several
tablespoons of honey, I guarantee even you young ones will be thinking,
oh I wish I hadn't eaten that, oh gosh that's too much. It becomes
too much, but not God's Word, because this is Holy Spirit inspired. Throughout this book, these which
speak of Christ is what he said, it's a united message but with
different slants and different perspectives of the same unified
message. Like different waves, we love
watching the sea, don't we? You watch the sea and you see
all sorts of waves, and not one wave seems to be exactly the
same shape as another one, yet they're all in the same sea.
These different perspectives of the same unified truth, breathed
by the Holy Spirit. And this book is all about God's
salvation of the people of His sovereign choice. The message
is variously described in this psalm as, remember I said right
at the start several weeks ago, 10 words keep being used. Thy
word, thy law, thy statutes, thy testimonies, thy commandments,
thy precepts, thy judgments, thy righteousness, thy truth,
thy weight. 10 different words keep occurring
over and over again in these 176 verses, but they're all speaking
of the same thing. They're speaking of gospel gracious
truth. The message of God to his people
concerning their salvation. God's eternal decree of grace
preserved in clear writing. Is that not remarkable? Preserved
in clear writing. I like to store things online
on a file store system called Dropbox, there are many others.
But I like to do that because I can always find things. But
do you know there's a slight nag in the back of my mind that
some catastrophic data occurrence can happen and it can all be
destroyed and I wouldn't be able to recover any of it. Whereas
writing, I know it can go up, paper can burn in fire, but you
know writing is remarkable. God has preserved this word down
4,000 years. And look, we still have it in
front of us. It embodies the expression of the mind of the
unknowable God. You know, sinful human beings,
the Scripture says we cannot know God. No man has seen God
at any time. You can't know Him. How can that fallen, sinful creature,
which is what we are, know the unknowable, infinitely holy God? We can't, but this word embodies
the expression of the mind of the unknowable God. No man can
see God and live, and yet people have seen God and lived because
they've seen Christ. They've seen the Lord Jesus Christ.
Philip, have I been so long with you and you have not known me?
He who has seen me has seen the unknowable God. The unknowable
God as he's manifested in Jesus Christ. Who is? What's the name
of the Lord Jesus Christ? The Word. He is the Word of God. He, our Lord Jesus Christ, the
Word of God, is the expression of the unknowable God. He's the
manifestation of the unknowable God. That's why John says, in
the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God. He made all things. You know, this is the One, the
Word. In Revelation, this is His name, the Word of God. The
Word of God. He is the sword of the Spirit.
He is all of these things. And this psalm expresses, David
writing it, probably as an old man, it expresses the believer's
communion with God. How do believers commune with
God? Answer? His Word speaks to us. God speaks by His Word. God never
speaks other than by his word. If it doesn't accord with his
word, you suspect it as not being true. But he communes, he gives
us his word and applies it by his spirit. And his people pray
to him and plead with him. and bring things before his throne
in accordance with the Word. Prayer in accordance with the
Word. Sinners who are alienated by
nature from God, by what we are, we're children of Adam and children
of the fall, yet we come in the right way. How do we come? What's
the way that we should come? How can we know the way? I am
the way, the truth, and the life, said the Lord Jesus Christ. No
man comes to the Father but by me. And we who are sinners and
cannot see God are enabled in the gospel to commune with the
living God, commune with God whom no man has seen nor can
see. And so prayer is believers communing
with their God on the basis of the word that he has communicated
to us. Verses 49 and 50 constitute a
prayer. It's a plea to God. Remember,
O Lord, remember the word unto thy servant in which you've caused
me to hope. This is my comfort for your word has quickened me.
Remember, this is the plea, remember your word. to your servant. Remember it. It's a pattern for
all prayer that's acceptable to God. So I want to look at
the prayer, the requests made, and the comfort flowing from
it. So first of all, the prayer. Remember. Here is a prayer that
God will remember. Now do you find something rather
odd about that? We're praying that God might remember. Is God
likely to forget? God cannot forget. God can't
forget. God is God. God cannot forget.
He cannot forget the word unto thy servant. So what is he praying? Not remember as in remember as
opposed to forgetting, but basically fulfill. Carry it out. Remember your word. You've made
a promise in your word. Fulfill what you've promised
in your word. That's the prayer. Fulfill what
you've promised in your word. Act, Lord, act on your... I am
your child. You've made promises to me. Lord,
this is my prayer. Act on the promises you have
made to me. What promises? Well, think of
just a few. God has promised, has he not,
to supply the needs of his children? Hasn't he? Yes, of course he
has. We read that he does not suffer his children to go begging
bread. When there's shortage in the world for others, he says
he will not see I've grown old and I've not seen his people
begging bread. He promises to supply their needs. He says throughout the scripture,
Old Testament and New. In the New Testament, in Philippians,
my God will supply all your needs. Philippians 4.19, my God shall
supply all your needs. There, there is a promise from
God. The Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write that. So, we ask
God to fulfill that promise. You know, we tend to live in
an age of plenty in these days. But you know, in the past, God's
people have had real trials. You read The Mercies of a Covenant
God by John Warburton. And you find when he was a poor
weaver in the north of England, you, as a believer, he still
suffered great deprivation and often was praying to God, you've
promised to supply my needs, supply my needs. And you know,
again and again, God did supply his needs. Just when he thought
they were never going to be supplied, God supplied his needs. So we
ask God to act on his promise to supply our needs. Has God
promised to forgive sin? You know, your sin that separates
you from God, your sin that calls for your condemnation in an eternity
of hell, but God has promised to forgive sin. Ask God to act
on his promise, to give you a true sense of pardon, that my sins
are forgiven. Based on what? Not just because
there is a word that says it, but because he's shown how. He's
shown that He's satisfied justice in His Son. He's shown how He's
taken that sin which is such a burden for you, and He's placed
it upon His Son. He bore our sins in His own body
on that cursed tree of Calvary, and there paid the penalty, the
just penalty, that the justice of God and the law of God demanded
that the soul that sins it shall die, and He died for His people. And He satisfied justice and
redemption The price of freedom from the curse of the law was
paid by the Lord Jesus Christ becoming that curse for them.
And so there is the promise of God, and so we pray, Lord, forgive
my sins. Give me a true sense that my
sins are forgiven, that my name is written in the Lamb's Book
of Life. He promises to strengthen his people. We go through all
sorts of ups and downs in this life, of times of peace, of times
of trial, of times of where we feel the need for great strength.
Oh Lord, give us the strength that we need for the situation. He's promised to give strength
that we need for the situation. So we pray for strength in trying
circumstances. And it's all in accordance with
God's word of promise. Of course, we could go on many,
many more. But this gets close to what it is to pray in Christ's
name, to ask in accordance with God's will. You've seen those
scriptures that you've read many times and you can at first be
slightly concerned about them because they say whatsoever you
ask, you'll receive it and you think, well, what if I ask for
a nice big flashy swimming pool in the back garden? Am I going
to get a nice, do you know, we once heard somebody preach, do
you remember that? Some years ago. And he said,
prayer works. And he said, I prayed for a swimming
pool and I got a swimming pool in the back garden. Amazing.
Is that praying in accordance with God's will? Is it really?
Look at John's gospel. Look at John chapter 14 with
me. Let me just show you a few verses
here. John chapter 14 verse 13, Jesus
said this, this is the chapter, I am the way, the truth and the
life, no man comes to the Father but by me. Have I been so long
with you, Philip, and you have not known me? He who has seen
me has seen the Father. Verse 13 of this chapter, whatsoever
ye shall ask in my name, said Jesus, the Lord Jesus Christ,
that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. No. Are we sure that we're asking
in accordance with His will? Oh, you know, ask that our children
should pass all of their exams with flying colours and top marks.
No, no, I don't think so. Not exactly that. Not exactly
that. That I should have material prosperity
and everything that I need. No, I don't think so. Not that.
Look on in chapter 15 and verse 7. If ye abide in me, and my words
abide in you, listen, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall
be done unto you. But look, there's an if there,
isn't there? If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, then
you ask in accordance with that word, and it shall be done for
you. And then down in verse 16, Ye have not chosen me, but I
have chosen you, and ordained you that you should go and bring
forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain. That whatsoever
ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it. He may give it. This is asking
in accordance with the will of God. The prayer that God accepts
is one that is in accordance with God's revealed will in his
word. It's in accordance with Christ's
name. Praying in his name is to pray
in accordance with everything he is, to pray in accordance
with what he has revealed. You see, You can't pray, there's
an article in the bulletin that I've written, and Spurgeon said
this, you can't pray an inch beyond the tether of the promise
of God with any assurance of being heard. Do you know what
I mean by that? You know what a tether is? A tether is if you
put a stake in the ground, you don't want your dog to run away,
so you put a stake in the ground and a lead on the dog's neck,
and that's a tether. And the dog can't go beyond the
length of that tether. It can go in a circle, but cannot
go beyond that. Spurgeon said, you can't pray
an inch beyond the tether of the promises of God with any
assurance that you'll be heard. God has promised so far, you
can't pray beyond what God has promised with any assurance of
being heard. Imagine that there's a powerful
person. Imagine that, let's give this
as an example. You're trying to persuade the
bank to lend you a large amount of money to buy a house or something
like that. And you line up all of your arguments that you've
got a good job and you can pay and you've been careful with
your money and all of these things. And you go and you try to persuade
the bank to lend you the money. And you might or might not succeed. But if you've got a letter from
the bank from several months ago that says, we've already
examined you and yes, we can assure you that come the day
that you need it, You present this letter to us and we'll honour
it. And so you've got the letter
in your hand that says, here's the bank's promise to you to
lend you the money. And you say, can I have the money
that you've promised to lend me? Do you see what I'm saying?
It's like that with the word of God, with the promises of
God, we bring his promises before him. We bring his promises before
him in accordance with his word. And he honours his promises.
Might not be in our timing, but he certainly honours them. This
is, This is what it is to truly pray. We show him the promise
in his own handwriting. So many people think that prayer
is sinners trying to change God's mind or purpose because of what
good people they are, or what good things they have done, or
how hard they pray. Oh, if we have an all-night prayer
meeting, God is bound to give in to that. God doesn't really
want to do this thing, but if we all get together and deprive
ourselves of sleep and have an all-night prayer meeting, God
is bound to honor that prayer. That is such a trivial, naive
view of what prayer truly is, and what the revealed will of
God truly is. It isn't, give me what I want,
but what you hadn't intended to give me unless I asked for
it, and unless I asked for it often enough. I know there's
the teaching of Jesus about importunity in prayer, but you know what
I'm saying? It isn't sinners trying to change God's mind or
purpose. We don't pray to change God's
will. Why not? Because God's will cannot
be changed. God's will is unchangeable. What
did he say? I am the same yesterday, today,
and forever. Who is the same yesterday, today,
and forever? The eternal God, the Lord Jesus
Christ, unchangeable. You cannot pray to change their
will, but prayer is the shadow of God doing what he's promised
in his word. Look at Ezekiel chapter 36. Ezekiel
chapter 36. and verse 37. Thus saith the
Lord God. Listen, this is what God says.
Thus saith the Lord God, I will yet for this be inquired of by
the house of Israel. What? It doesn't really matter.
The point is this. God wants to be inquired of. He wants to
be prayed to, to do it for them. The thing that he's intending
to do, he wants his people to pray for him to do it. The thing
he's intended to do, he's revealed in his word, but he wants his
people to pray for it. Is that not exactly what we're
seeing here? He intends to do it for them, but he will have
them pray for it. God has given his word, his promises
to his servants, his believing people, and so they pray. Remember, fulfill the word unto
thy servant. They pray that he would fulfill
what he certainly intended to do. He must remember them. God cannot forget them. Look
at this. Promises of God. God cannot forget
them. Isaiah 49 and verse 15. Can a woman forget her sucking
child that she should not have compassion on the son of her
womb? Yea, they may forget. Some women, you can't imagine
how hard-hearted they must be, or without compassion. But they
may forget, yet will I not forget thee? God says, you know how
strong is the bond between a woman and her child? She may forget
even, but I will not forget. My care for you, my people, is
stronger than that. I have graven thee upon the palms
of my hands. That's permanent. That's particular. Thy walls are continually before
me. The walls of salvation of Zion
are particularly, always, continually before God. God has given his
word. God has promised to remember.
God cannot forget. Jeremiah 2 verse 2, Thus saith
the Lord, I remember thee. This is God speaking to his people.
I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth when you first believed
me, the love of thine espousals. God remembers these things. God
cannot forget. Has God revealed to you His intention
of taking you to eternal glory when you die. Peter was mentioning
it in his prayer. That we've got this certainty
of going to heaven, to the kingdom of God, the eternal, unending
kingdom of God. That state of bliss outside of
time that we cannot, it doesn't yet appear what we shall be.
We know that we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as
He is. But this is just such And awesome, words fail me, it's
such a stupendous promise for mere sinful mortals to grasp
hold of and take comfort in. Has God promised that to you,
child of God? Yes he has. How many times did
Jesus said, he that believes on me has eternal life. Though he die, he shall live.
How many times did he say that? How many times does the Word
of God talk of salvation and of grace? How many times are
we told that we're fitted for heaven in the Lord Jesus Christ?
His Word tells us, 2 Corinthians 5.21, that He has made His sinful
people, who are unfit for heaven by nature, He has made them the
righteousness of God in Christ. That's the promise of God. I
pray, Lord, fulfill your promise. Remember your promise to your
servant. He's fitted us for heaven. He's made us the righteousness
of God in Christ because he made Christ the sin of his people
and paid for it in him. He's qualified his people for
God's kingdom. Do you believe it? Do you believe
it? This is the promise of God. Well, bring it before him in
prayer. It is certain. He cannot lie, nor fail, nor
forget. So we can confidently pray that
God will fulfill all his promises of grace to us. And what things
does he pray? What things are in this little
prayer, the request? Remember thy word. Remember thy
word. Fulfill your word. You see, Pentecostals
and Charismatics see their tongues, their speaking in tongues, their
prophecies, their visions and all such things as equivalent
to, if not superior to the Scripture. They really do, they really do.
But you know, it's all a complete delusion. The Old Testament has
some clear guidance on evaluating claimed prophecy for whether
it's true or not, and how to completely ignore that which
is not true, because it doesn't come to pass, because it isn't
fulfilled. I remember that we used to have lots of pressure
to accept charismatic kind of teaching and all sorts of weird
prophecies about the Holy Spirit coming down a certain road in
the northwest of England. It now seems so laughable and
trivial to think back on it. It's delusion. It's false prophecy. It's empty words. It's without
any foundation in the Word of God. Because God's Word is not
a competitor to those things. God's Word is unique. God's Word
is unique. Let me say that God's Word is
unique. Psalm 138 verse 2, I will worship
towards thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness,
for thy truth. Why? For thou hast magnified
thy word above all thy name. How important is the Word of
God? The Spirit of God says that the Word of God is magnified
above all His name. Thou hast magnified Thy Word
above all Thy name. If it's in writing, in God's
Word, it's the standard by which everything else must be judged.
This is the standard. How firm a foundation, ye saints
of the Lord, is laid for your faith in His excellent Word.
What more can He say than to you He has said, you who unto
Jesus for refuge have fled? Isaiah 8 verse 20, to the law
and to the testimony. The law and the testimony, this
book, all of it, 66 books in it, all of it, to the law and
to the testimony. If they speak not according to
this word, it is because there is no light in them, no truth
in them. God can't lie. People can lie. You say, I'm not a liar. Come
on, you always twist your account of a story to set yourself and
your experience in a good light. Numbers 23, 19. God is not a
man that he should lie, neither the son of man that he should
repent. Hath he said and shall he not do it? Hath he spoken
and shall he not make it good? Of course, everything he has
said, he will do perfectly. So bring God's promises given
in his word before God in prayer. Again, in that article in the
bulletin that I wrote, Isaiah 43, 1 and 2. This is just an
example. In Isaiah 43, 1 and 2, listen to this. But now thus saith the Lord,
promises from God, but now thus saith the Lord that created thee,
O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel. Listen what God is
promising, people of God. Listen what he's promising. Fear
not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name,
thou art mine. When thou passest through the
waters, I will be with thee, and through the rivers they shall
not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. Do you remember a couple of hundred
years later, after that was written, that promise of God was written
down in Isaiah, in the time of Daniel and the Babylonian exile,
the companions of Daniel who were given those Babylonian names
of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and they would not bow down to
the idol that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. And the penalty for
not bowing down to that idol, Gosh, wouldn't you just look
in the world in which we're living these days, this dystopian society
that we're living in, how many similarities there are to this
sort of thing. This is what the wonderful kingdoms
of men do to their people. They set ridiculous standards
for them to achieve, totally illiberal standards for them
to achieve. And then they impose severe penalties.
You will be thrown into the fiery furnace. And those three young
men told Nebuchadnezzar, you can say and do what you like,
but we worship the living God and we're not bowing down before
your idols. And you can do what you want. And if God wants to
preserve us, he'll preserve us in that fire. Because they remembered
what God had said via Isaiah. When you walk through the fire,
And I'm sure they must have prayed, Lord, be with us and take us
to your eternal kingdom. If that be your will or preserve
us through it now. But when you walk through the
fire, I will be with you. I will be with you. The fire
shall not burn up your eternal soul, I will be with you. There
was the promise of God, and they prayed. And you know, they came
out of that fire, didn't they? Because they weren't in there
alone. You know when Nebuchadnezzar looked in that furnace, what
did he see? Three young men walking? No,
he saw four, and one like the Son of God, for the Son of God
was with them. Who had said that? Isaiah 42
verse two, when you go through the fire, I will be with you. Who will be with you? God will
be with you. Who is our God? Our Lord Jesus
Christ is our God. He was there with them. And then,
secondly, so the Word of God. Remember your Word, the blessedness
of the Word of God. But it's the Word unto thy servant. The Word unto thy servant. How
did I become God's? Would you count yourself as a
servant of God? As one who believed God, one
who is seeking to follow Christ, one who is seeking to live in
the good of the salvation of God that He's shown you. How
did I become God's servant? Was it that I, as opposed to
other people, You know, I did so much better than the rest.
I did that which was right. I weighed things up and using
my own intellect and my own goodness, I decided to do God a favor and
go following Him, not in the slightest. If you know God truly,
you know that it was God who irresistibly called you out of
worldly darkness into His heavenly light. Lord, remember that. Lord, remember that it was you
that set your love upon me from before the foundation of time,
that it was you that wrote my name in the Lamb's Book of Life.
Lord, remember that. Lord, fulfill your promises concerning
that. You took me into your service.
I was going along quite blithely doing my own thing in this world
along with everybody else, but you called me out of that darkness
of this world into the marvelous light of the knowledge of the
salvation of God. If you took me out of that… as
your servant, surely you will provide for my every need. You
know, when young people join the military, the army, the navy
or the air force, you know, they're given a uniform. They're given
all their provisions. They're given all the equipment
that they need. As soldiers in military service,
as servants of the crown, as servants of the state, as servants
of the nation state, they're given what they need to do that
service. Will God not give His servants
what they need? Whatever service it might be,
Lord, equip and provide me in that service to fulfill it. You
made me Your servant. You called me by Your grace.
You promised every spiritual blessing to me in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Lord, remember. Lord, fulfill it. Lord, fulfill
it. We can pray that. On the strength
of God's Word, we can pray it. Whatever it is that I'm called
to do as the servant of God, whether I'm called to preach
the gospel publicly, whether I'm called to write, whether
I'm called to listen. Do you know that's a service?
Whether I'm called to listen, just to be there, just to support. Whether I'm called to listen,
to support the preaching of the word, to help, to facilitate
its happening. to follow where Christ leads
along with the rest of his sheep, to bear witness to God's truth
in an alien world. We pray this, Lord, fulfil your
scriptural promises to me concerning the service to which you call
me. Here at the moment, I mentioned at the start that we're so pleased
to be able to meet here, but we would so much prefer to find
a public meeting place where we can hold services on a Sunday
morning. And we know who it is that opens and shuts. God says,
I am he that opens and no man can shut, and I am he that shuts
and no man can open. And so we pray in accordance
with God's promises, Lord, show us the place that you have for
us. Open the doors, facilitate it
to happen. It is because they're God's unchangeable
promises that we can have a good hope, confident expectation of
their fulfillment. Is that not what it says? Upon
which thou hast caused me to hope. The hope of the child of
God is a good hope. What makes it a good hope? Confidence. confidence and expectation. We
have confidence in God that He will do and cannot not do what
He has promised. And we have, because of that
confidence, we have that expectation that He will do it. We have a
good hope upon this, the promises of God in His Word. And finally,
what a comfort this gives us. Look at the resulting comfort.
Verse 50. This is my comfort in my affliction,
for thy word has quickened me. Your word has made me alive.
Your word has filled me with the life of God in my soul. Comfort. Life is characterized
by affliction, isn't it? Life in the flesh. There's the
curse on this world in providence and in health. The general curse.
You know, when Adam sinned, And they were driven out and they
were told that thorns and briars and thistles it would produce.
Being metaphorical of all of the issues and problems that
come across us. You know, as the man colloquially
says, that you just butter your toast and you spread your jam
or your marmalade upon it and it slips out of your fingers,
guess which side it's going to land on the carpet? It's going
to land jam side down, isn't it? That's the basic idea of
Providence and health and all of these other things, there's
a curse on this world and it causes affliction for all. Believers
and unbelievers alike, we're all afflicted with these things.
But secondly, there's other affliction, particularly to the children
of God. Look at verse 53. Look what David says, horror
hath taken hold upon me because of the wicked that forsake thy
law. Especially in these days, and I know it's always been the
case, but in these days, don't we look around and we just see
the unbelief, the stubborn unbelief in this world in spite of the
truth, the glaring emblazoned truth of God all around. Oh,
it's a horror, it's affliction to the people of God. And it
goes further than that in terms of persecution from the world
versus gospel truth. The world hates the truth. The
world doesn't hate gentle Jesus, meek and mild. The world hates
Jesus. God who is sovereign in salvation,
who says that he will choose whom he will choose, who says
to those Pharisees, you do not believe because you are not of
my sheep, who has sheep who he has called from the foundation
of the world. There's persecution in this world, to believers.
There's affliction in this world from persecution. There's my
own soul's condemnation of me. You know, my own soul. I see
very clearly the person that I am, and my own soul condemns
me and afflicts me. People in this world, they try
to mitigate these afflictions. They try to mitigate them with
wealth and surrounding themselves by things that take their mind
off the afflictions of life. They pursue a life of frivolity
and lightheartedness to avoid the consequences of these afflictions. They intoxicate themselves with
drugs and with alcohol to take away the sharpness of the affliction.
But all of those things are man-made, broken cisterns that, as Jeremiah
2.13 says, they try to hold water. Man has hewn out for himself
cisterns, but they're broken. They can hold no water. They
can give no satisfaction. It's only the fountain of water
of life, which is in God, that can give true satisfaction. For
the child of God, called into God's service, guided by His
Word, enlightened by His Spirit, that solid foundation, that unchangeable
purpose, the unfailing promises of God, they all hold me fast
like an anchor in the storm. The storm of all the afflictions
of life come and toss me around, but there's the anchor of God's
saving grace. And I'm made alive by the precepts
of God's Word. This is what David's writing
about. I'm made to sense their truth and their certainty. And
in it, This is my comfort. I find immense comfort. I find
inner joy. When the hap of life, you know
the things that happen, when the hap of life seems so difficult
to handle, there's an inner joy. The difference between happiness
and joy is this, that happiness bubbles along according to what
happens, whereas joy is that which is deep and inner. And
that comfort from God that the true believer has, what Peter
read to us earlier, 2 Corinthians 1, 3 and 4, that comfort which
we have as believers from God enables us to comfort those around
us with that same thing. So then, We're taught to imbibe,
to take in the promises of God and bring them before him in
prayer that he might do them for us. I will be inquired of
by the house of Israel to do this for them as he has promised
and then we rest in the comfort that he causes all things to
work together for his people's good. Amen.