Would you turn to the 119th Psalm? I can't tell you exactly why,
but in the 119th Psalm, this eight-verse stanza has always
been my personal favorite. And it still is. I hope they're
all that way to me when I read them. Beginning in verse 33 of
Psalm 118. Teach me, O Lord, the way of
thy statutes, and I shall keep it unto the end. Give me understanding and I shall
keep thy law, yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart. Make me to go in the path of
thy commandments, for therein do I delight. Incline my heart unto thy testimonies
and not to covetousness. Turn away mine eyes from beholding
vanity, and quicken thou me in thy way. Establish thy word unto
thy servant who is devoted to thy fear. Turn away my reproach
which I fear, for thy judgments are good. Behold, I have longed
after thy precepts, quicken me in thy righteousness. Let's pray. Lord, we ask that the things
the psalmist prayed for we might be enabled to pray for and that
you'd answer our prayer. Lord, make this the prayer of
the heart of everybody listening according to your will. Accept our thanksgiving. We're
so thankful for the salvation that's in your son. We're so
thankful for the forgiveness of sins, we're so thankful for
his perfect righteousness. Lord, we give thanks for who
you are. Now bless us, speak to us from
your word for Christ's sake. In his name we pray, amen. Now in this eight verse stanza,
the psalmist asks for eight different things. And it's my prayer that
this is going to be what you and I are asking for as we consider
this. You ever wonder what you ought
to pray for? Well, this is going to answer that question real
clearly. He says in verse 33, teach me,
teach me. Oh Lord, the way of thy statutes. Look in verse 34. Give me understanding. Oh, I want understanding, don't
you? I want to understand what the Bible actually says. I want God the Holy Spirit to
be my teacher. Give me this understanding. Look what he says in verse 35. Make me to go in the path of
thy commandments. Cause me to. Do you understand
that prayer? Cause me to. I know I won't do
it unless you cause me to, so I'm asking you to cause me by
invincible, irresistible grace. Cause me to go in the way of
thy commandments. Look in verse 36. Incline my
heart unto thy testimonies. Make my heart to be inclined
that way. Incline my heart. What a prayer. Incline my heart. This is the cry of a believer
to his heavenly father. Incline my heart. Make it be
inclined in this direction. Look at verse 37. Turn away mine
eyes from beholding vanity. Can you pray that prayer? I'll
behold it. Deliver me from that, turn my
eyes away. Now look at the way he's asking
the Lord's grace to reign in him. Turn my eyes from beholding
vanity. And quicken thou me, give me
life in thy way. Quicken me, quicken me. Verse
38, establish thy word. Cause it to be established. Cause
it to be set, unmovable. Establish thy word unto thy servant. Verse 39, turn away my reproach,
which I fear. The reproach of my sin, turn
it away. Young's little translation says,
remove it. Remove it. Make it not to be. His last request in the last
part of verse 40, Quicken me. Once again, quicken me. Give
me life in thy righteousness. Make thy righteousness my very
life, my very breath. Quicken me. Give me life in thy
righteousness. Now, can you see why this psalm
is so glorious, the things he's asking for and the way he asks
it? Well, let's look at it. Verse 33. Teach me, O Lord, the way of
thy statutes. Not just teach me thy statutes,
teach me the way of thy statutes. I love that scripture where it
says he taught the children of Israel his acts, his ways unto
Moses. I want to know the way, don't
you? Teach me Oh Lord, the way of thy statutes, and I shall
keep it unto the end. Now you teach me that Christ
is the way, the only way, the sufficient way, the way of righteousness,
the way of peace, the way of holiness, the way of grace. Teach me that Christ is the way,
and as you teach me, if the Lord's my teacher, you know what I'm
gonna do? I'm gonna keep it all the way to the end. I'm gonna
continue in the faith, grounded and settled, if he teaches me.
It's not enough for me to be taught by man, because what man
teaches me, I can unlearn. But if he's my teacher, Lord,
teach me. Don't leave me to myself and
my own understanding. Teach me, oh Lord, the way of
thy statutes, the way of Christ, the way of grace. and I shall
keep it unto the end. I will persevere all the way
to the end, continuing in the faith, grounded and settled,
if you teach me. Verse 34, give me understanding. And look at the next phrase,
and I shall keep thy law. If you understand the gospel,
You understand how you personally keep the law through Christ keeping
it for you and you're in him to where you actually kept it.
Now that's understanding. Only the Lord can teach that.
Give me understanding and I shall keep thy law, yea, I shall observe
it with all my heart. Now, I think of this understanding
that he's speaking of. I want understanding, don't you?
And what came to my mind was Solomon. Do you remember in 1
Kings 3 when we're given a story about the wisdom of Solomon?
And there were two harlots that both had children living in the
same home, newborns. And one night, one of the harlots
rolled over on her baby and smothered it and killed it. And so she
gets up and takes her dead infant and puts it in the place where
that other woman was asleep. She put it by that woman and
took her infant and said, this is mine. And so when the woman
woke up the next morning, she has a dead infant by her and
she knows it's not hers. That's not mine. And the woman
who stole her baby said, no, that's yours. This one's mine.
So who's going to Both of them are saying the infant is theirs.
Who's going to be able to show whose it really was? Well, Solomon,
the wisest man to ever live, said, here's what we're going
to do. We're going to take the live baby and cut it in half. And we're going to give one half
to one woman and one half the other. That way, we can find
out it's going to be fine. And so who objected to doing
that? One woman said, OK, that sounds good to me. Cut it in
half. Who objected to doing that? The woman who loved the baby.
You see, when I have understanding, I love the truth. It's the whole
truth. And I will not let it be divided. Everything in God's word is of
critical importance. There is nothing that's of secondary
importance. You don't let the truth be divided
when you love the truth. And that is understanding when
you love the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. May the Lord give us that understanding
and that discernment to where we can discern the difference.
And that's what he's asking, give me understanding and I shall
keep thy law. I understand through the gospel
that I personally have kept the law. When Jesus Christ kept the
law, I kept the law. You know, the only way you can
not fear the law of God is if you've kept it. I've kept it,
and we love God's holy law. Yea, I shall observe it with
my whole heart. Now look what he says in verse
35. Make me. And that word is literally cause
me to go in the path of thy commandments, for therein do I delight." There's
nothing more delightful, and I love that word, delightful.
That's the way I delight. There's nothing more delightful
than being enabled to believe the gospel. And that's what it
means to go in the path of his commandments. It's to do what
he says, believe his gospel. love one another as he gave his
commandments. And there's nothing more delightful than that. I
love that scripture in Romans chapter 15, verse 13, that speaks
of the joy and the peace of believing to believe that you have kept
God's holy law perfectly in the person of Christ. And it was
you doing it in him because of this union. Oh, how delightful
that is. How joyous it is, and notice,
though he says, make me to go in that path, Lord, make me believe.
I love that language. Cause me to believe. I know this,
if you don't cause me to, I won't do it. That's why I'm asking
this. Cause me by irresistible, invincible grace. I remember
one time somebody said, I don't like the term irresistible grace.
I thought, I do. I like it a lot. This is what
I want. I want him to cause me. Don't
even give me, don't even give me a choice. Cause me to. Cause
me to. Make me to go in the way of thy
commandments, for therein do I delight. Verse 36, this speaks
on such a grassroots, powerful level to me. He says, incline
my heart. Now, the only way my heart is
going to be looking in the right direction and going in the right
direction is if he inclines it in that way. Lord, incline my
heart. What are the inclinations of
your heart? Well, you know that your natural heart, your inclinations
are bad. You know that. You know your heart won't be
inclined to the right way. So you're asking the Lord, incline
my heart. Incline it. Make it to go. Make this to be its inclination.
Holiness. Obedience. Love. the fruit of the spirit. Incline
my heart to be poor in spirit. Incline my heart to mourn over
sin. Incline my heart to be meek before
you. Incline my heart to hunger and
thirst after righteousness. Give me this pure heart. Incline
my heart to be a peacemaker. Incline my heart to be merciful. Incline my heart to rejoice in
being persecuted for righteousness sake. Incline my heart. What a prayer. May the Lord make
this my prayer and your prayer even right now. Incline my heart
into thy testimonies. And look what it says next. And
not to covetousness. These hearts are naturally inclined
to covetousness. Desiring what you don't have.
Do you know there's an element of covetousness in every commandment
when you break it? There's something you're coveting.
You know, most people don't think much about covetousness, but
it's, what was it Paul said when he learned sin? What did he,
he said, I'd not known covetousness except the law had said, thou
shalt not covet. All of a sudden I found out that's
all I did. Covetousness is, and you try to, you know, the only
time I'm not covetous, is when I don't have anything
to covet. Christ is all. There's nothing
to covet. Now, if there's something I don't
have, I'm going to covet it. But if I have all, let your conversation
be without covetousness, the writer to the Hebrews said, and
be content, satisfied with such things as you have. What do you
have? Perfect justification before God, acceptance in the beloved,
The promise of Romans 828, salvation by grace in Christ. What is their covet? Incline my heart unto thy testimony,
it's thy word and not to covetousness. Now look at this next verse and
I know you can relate with this. Turn away mine eyes from beholding
vanity. You know what that means? Turn
away mine eyes from looking anywhere but Christ alone. Turn away my eyes from beholding
vanity. Now what is vanity? Everything. Behold all is vanity. That's what the wise man said.
But you know, the first time the word is used is in with reference
to taking the Lord's name in vain. The third commandment,
God is so glorious, so other that to even use his name in
my mouth without proper reverence is a sin worthy of sending somebody
to hell. That's how glorious he is. Turn
away my eyes from beholding that which is contrary to that holy
fear of God, that reverence for his person, where you're so aware
of his glory that even speaking his name in some kind of flippant
way, it's like hitting you. Turn away mine eyes from beholding
My self-righteousness and my works are looking at other people
and all the things that are involved. Beholding vanity, the vanity
of the world, being impressed with this world's goods and this
world's way. Turn my eyes from that. I won't
look to Christ alone, except he causes me to look to Christ
alone. And I'm asking him to do that
for me even now. Lord, turn my eyes away from
beholding vanity. I'll behold it. I'll be looking
at vanity. I'm just as vain as the next.
I remember one time Scott Richardson said, I'm just as vain as the
next fella. Well, I am too. So turn away my eyes from beholding
vanity. And quicken thou me, verse 37,
quicken thou me. Give me life. Make me to live. That's strong
language, isn't it? Quicken thou me. Now, if you
feel like in and of yourself, you're dead, this is what you're
going to pray. And you know, it's only a living heart that prays this
prayer. A dead heart never prays this prayer. It's not even interested
in life. But a living heart prays, quicken me in thy way. I, the Lord said, am the way. Lord, quicken me in that. Make
me to see where the way of Christ, the way of grace, the way of
righteousness, the way of peace is my way that I'm living in. Quicken me in thy way. Verse 38. Establish. Settle. Make unmovable. thy word unto thy servant. Now, what I thought about when
I thought about this statement, established, settled your word. Well, the word of God is the
Lord Jesus Christ. The word of God is his written
word. The word of God is the gospel message. The word from
the word that reveals the word. Oh, the precious word of God
caused that to be established and settled and unmovable in
me. And what I thought about was
the Lord saying in John chapter six, after those people said,
these are hard sayings, they heard the message in Capernaum.
These are harsh sayings. These sayings are unsympathetic
toward humanity. We don't like hard sayings. These
are harsh. Sayings. And the Lord tells him
the words that I speak unto you, these sayings that you find harsh,
they're words of spirit and they're words of life. Do you find his
words truly spiritual? Beyond the flesh. Words of spirit. He's the father of spirits. Spiritual
men love his spiritual words. Words of spirit and words of
life. Now, the people he was preaching to
left. 5,000 people. He fed them miraculously. They
left. They don't like these harsh sayings.
And the Lord looked at his disciples and said, will you also go away? What's those people leaving?
I don't think there's anything more sobering than this. He didn't
ask, he didn't say, well, let me rephrase that. You all listen
to this. No. He watched them leave. He
didn't ask them to come back. Is he being harsh? No. But he
watched these people leave the gospel. And he looked at the
12 and he said, will you also go away? Here's your opportunity. They're leaving. You can if you
want. Will you also go away? And Peter's reply, Lord, to whom
shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. And we believe and are sure that
thou art that Christ, the son of the living God. That's his
words established in the heart. Oh, this is my prayer. Lord,
cause your word to be established, settled, to take root. In my
heart, establish thy word and thy servant who is devoted to
thy fear. Now you'll notice devoted is
in italics, but it certainly implied in that statement, thy
servants devoted to thy fear. Now, what is the fear of God?
It's the beginning of wisdom. It's the beginning of wisdom.
It's the end of wisdom. What's the whole duty of man
to fear God? The wise man said in Ecclesiastes
chapter 12, to fear God and keep his commandments, the commandments
of the gospel. That's the whole duty of man.
Now, um, the fear of God is not, um, Oh, I've seen, he's going
to punish me. I'm probably going to wreck my
car or I'm going to lose my money or somebody's going to get sick.
I'm going to get punished for this. You look at somebody else,
something bad happens to them, you think, wonder what they did
that the Lord caused that to come into their life. That's not the fear of God, that's
self-righteousness. That's all that is. There's no
true fear or reverence for God in that kind of attitude. The
fear of God. is believing him to be so altogether
holy and glorious that you're afraid to look anywhere but Christ
alone. You simply want to be found in
him, and you're afraid to stand before him in your own merits
or your own righteousness or your own works in any way. Now,
every believer is devoted to that fear. Oh, I want to be somebody
who fears God. I've heard people talk about
good God-fearing people. You know, just that phrase lets
you know you don't know anything about what it really is. The
fear of God that makes a man look nowhere but Christ alone
as everything in salvation. Verse 39. Turn away my reproach, which
I fear. Now let me tell you what I do
fear. I fear being found anywhere but Christ. I fear the reproach of my sin,
the reproach it brings on the name of the Lord, the reproach
it brings to me. And when he says, Turn away from
my reproach. The word is literally remove. Remove my reproach. Remove my sin. Remove the reproach
it brings. Cause it to not be. Remove it
from me. And isn't that what we're praying when we pray for
the forgiveness of sins? We're praying more than just
that they might be forgiven, but they might be removed. that
there will be no consequence to them whatsoever, because Christ
bore all the consequences of them. And I'm, remove, turn away
my reproach, which I fear. And here's his ground for asking
that, for thy judgments are good. Now, what is the Lord's judgment? The cross. The cross of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Oh, how God's justice is magnified
in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. That reproach, which
I fear, he bore and he put it away and he caused it not to
be. And that's why I can make this
cry, turn away my reproach because of thy good judgments, the good
judgments of the cross. Don't you love the cross of the
Lord Jesus Christ? I love the way Paul said, God
forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Behold, verse 40, behold, I have longed after thy
precepts. With regard to a verse of scripture
like this, not one time have I ever longed the way I ought
to long and desired the way I ought to desire. The Lord longed after the precepts
of his father completely. And that's the longing I'm trusting.
I long to long more, don't you? I want to have more of a longing
for him. I'm ashamed that I'd even say
that. I mean, it's shameful that anybody would say, well, we ought
to long more. Well, I know, it is shameful.
But I am trusting his longing. He longed perfectly. All how
he longed after his precepts. Behold, I've longed after thy
precepts. Well, I have too. I have too,
but I trust his longing a lot better than mine, don't you?
And here's his final request in this eight verse stanza. Quicken me. in thy righteousness. Make your righteousness to be
my life. I'm not talking about just my
motive, but my actual life. When the Lord said, I am the
way, the truth, and the life, he's saying my life is the life
before God. And the only way you're going
to get to the Father is if my life is your life and you're
quickened in the way of my righteousness. It's the gospel. You know, the
gospel throws a whole lot of light on this psalm, doesn't
it? Gospel throws a whole lot of light on everything. But this
is my prayer. Lord, give me life in thy righteousness. Now, if you don't get anything
else we've said, I want you to remember this. His righteousness
is the only righteousness there is. Quicken me. in thy righteousness.