Psalm 119 Devotional

Psalm 119 and the Burden of God’s Law

Ok, so we'll take a few minutes and go back to Psalm 119. Look at one verse tonight, and if you were here last week you remember we kind of read a verse, and then I went somewhere else because I got caught up in my mind about the whole psalm in general.

If you remember we looked at the reality of the law of God and how the law of God affected the psalmist in his heart, and then the fruit or the yield of that, and I hope that you found that helpful. But tonight I'm going to look at Psalm 119 verse 136, which is the verse we read last week, and just to read it again together.

Psalm 119 verse 136 and the psalmist says this, he says, rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep your law. Rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep your law. And I'll say this as we, even for just a moment, consider this.

What the psalmist, I believe, is stating here is a deep well of thought. This is not some shallow minded thought from the psalmist. That it is something that really bubbles up from deep in his heart, and I think that that's something you and I need to think about.

And I'll admit this, and let me read the verse again. Rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep your law. And as I thought about it I had to admit to myself, and in that sense I'll, I have to confess it before all, that for myself, and maybe you will agree, that this experience of the psalmist more often than not escapes me.

Read the verse again and maybe you'll understand what I'm saying. It says, rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep your law. And the psalmist has a sorrow, the psalmist has a sadness, the psalmist has something that is, if you will, causing him to have great thoughts.

Not necessarily thoughts merely of joy, but they're thoughts of sorrow that cause him to have rivers of water run out of his eyes. And the reason for it is because men don't keep God's law. And that's where I began to think about my own walk before God, and I had to admit that more often than not, I have rivers of water that run down my eyes, but they're not always for this reason.

As a matter of fact, very seldom do I find myself in such a state of mind. We all have things that cause us to have deep thoughts, whether they be thoughts of sorrow, thoughts of pain, thoughts of hurt, thoughts of deep desire.

But I would suggest to you that more often than not, those thoughts are driven by what we seek to gain. In other words, let's just say again we have sickness, or someone else that we know we love is sick, or in need, or outside of Christ.

And we find ourselves in great consternation, and great sorrow, and great prayer, and great thought to have them come to know God. And I would admit I've had those experiences, and I would think many of us could say, yes we've had those experiences, where we've actually shed tears for those that we love that we know are outside of the grace of God.

Certainly as a parent, or as a grandparent, or if you can get to that level, great-grandparent, which I am at. But we get to that point where we have deep thoughts and desires, and even sadness and sorrow, but is it because men have forsaken God's law, and God is dishonored?

Or is it because we desire to see something take place? That's why I say to you, this is not a shallow thought. We really need to ask ourselves, and be honest with ourselves. So let me ask to you in this way, when he says this, rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep your law.

Here's a question for all of us. When was the last time we cried because men dishonored God? I'm not asking us when was the last time we cried because we were in a bad situation, or we were hurting, or we needed help.

When was the last time we shed tears that men dishonored God? I was watching the news today. You know how they were going to send the rocket ship up and all the news. And if you watched any of the reporting, probably there was numerous times where the weather came into the picture, right?

And ultimately they scrubbed the launch, and they were going to launch it again Saturday. But what struck me was everyone who reported, as they brought up the weather, what did they bring up? They brought up the fact that man's technology, and then they said, but you know what?

We can't control Mother Nature. And as I heard him say it more times than I wanted to hear it. And I actually began to, maybe this was on my mind, but I actually began to really feel sorrowful. And that God is dishonored, and God is dishonored in that, my friends.

You might not agree, but God is dishonored because God is the God of nature. God is the God of the creation, not Mother Nature. There is no such thing. And yet we say it so glibly, we say it so quickly, and it just goes right by the boards.

So again I ask this, when was the last time that you and I found ourselves actually with tears in our eyes and in our hearts, because God is being dishonored? And here's just another thought, and I want to keep my time very close to where it should be.

But I also thought this, how patient our God is, how very patient He is with us as creatures. Could you and I imagine if we had invented something, something spectacular, something that's stupendous, and then people reported on it, and every time they reported on it, and I'm the inventor, and every time they reported on it, they said Brother Gary had brought this to pass.

And I wonder how long it would take us before we'd say, hey wait a minute, what about me? I'm the one who did this, and I thought about how patient God is, how men dishonored God, and yet God allows men to continue on, and on, and on.

That's why I say to you this is not a verse that, if you think you can read this verse and just skip to the next one, then I think we've missed the forest for the trees. You think of the Lord Jesus Christ, and you think of that statement in the Gospels where it's, in the New Testament where it says that He sweat droplets of blood, striving against sin.

And how He was eaten up with zeal. Remember? He cleansed the temple at the beginning of His ministry. He cleansed the temple at the end of His ministry. Remember what He said? This is My Father's house, and you've made My Father's house a den of thieves.

It was God's glory. It was God's honor that drove the Lord Jesus Christ. So I ask us to think about that. Do we ever even come close, in even such small ways to thoughts of that, that we could get to where the psalmist would say, we could say as the psalmist that rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not keep Your law.

Well let me ask us this question. How much does the glory and honor of God truly affect us? I know the things that happen to us truly affect us. And I even know that things that happen to those that I know affect us.

But how much are we affected by a desire to see God on it? And I will say this to you if you want to be the one to say, I do that. And then I, first I need to caution you in that thought. And then I also need to talk to you because you need to teach me.

Because I doubt that more often than not we are not truly able to do it. That we do not truly have a desire to see God on it. And that that's the motivation. And that the sadness is that God has decided, not necessarily us.

I just want to read a quote, and this is from a book. His name is Austin Phelps. He's long gone to be with the Lord. Some of you might have heard him. He's got a small little paperback book out. It's called The Still Hour.

Great book. It's a book about prayer. I just keep reading it over and over and over and over and marking it up. I figure by the time I'm done I will have underlined and put notes to every single word in the book.

But he has this quote about prayer. Let me read this to you and I'm going to bring it into this thought. Because to ask us to consider it. He says this about prayer. He says that the experience of prayer has delicate complications.

And a little thing secreted there may dislocate its mechanism and arrest its movement. And he went on to give an example. He said in other words like the eye. He was bringing up the eye. It might have been why it caught my attention.

And he said if you take just a little needle and stick it in your eye. He said it will destroy it. Right? A little thing in a very sensitive creation destroys it. And I thought about that in relation to what the psalmist is saying here.

And again I wonder sometimes when we are praying that we don't experience if you will the joy and the deepness of fellowship with God. Because really at the heart of it there's a problem in the mechanism.

And the mechanism is we're more concerned about ourself than we are about God. Or we'll confess sins. But do we confess that we do not have the zeal that the Lord Jesus Christ had to see his father glorified.

And if I had time I was going to take you but I don't. So I won't. But I will mention it. I was going to take you through the book of Lamentations. If you've not read the book of Lamentations in a while I suggest that you read it.

Because remember who wrote Lamentations? It was Jeremiah. Many people have dubbed, nicknamed Jeremiah the weeping prophet. And rightfully so. If you read through the book of Lamentations I believe you'll come away with an understanding why many have termed Jeremiah as the weeping prophet.

Because in Lamentations, especially in the opening words of it, Jeremiah is so sad and he's so struck down by the fact that God's people have dishonored the God that they say that they worship. And you and I have to ask ourselves that question as we go on in our lives.

Are we becoming more sensitive, more in tune with desiring to see God honored? And that we truly find ourselves sad when we see men dishonor God? Again I say to you as I heard those people today over and over again, smart people, intelligent people.

Well you know Mother Nature, and then one commentator actually, one journalist actually said, you know we can't control the weather but someday we will. You go ahead and try. But they never gave God the glory.

I think all of us would probably fall off our chair if they were talking about the launch today and then somebody said, you know what, God has decreed that the weather will not allow this rocket to go into his space.

I would have made headlines. So when the psalmist says those rivers of water run down my eyes because men do not break, because men do not keep your law, I ask you to think about that. And I ask you to think about this.

If we truly desire to press on, and I hope that's our desire, I hope our desire is not to hang on, but to press on. There's a big difference between hanging on and pressing on. It ought to be our desire to press on.

To press on towards the high calling, as Paul says, of the knowledge of the Son of God. And in order for us to do that, we've got to begin more and more to think God's thoughts after him. And again, as the psalmist says this in closing, where he says that rivers of water run down his eyes because men do not keep God's law, that the psalmist is captivated by something outside of himself.

And that you and I really have to pray, plow up our own hearts, as the prophet says, that we would truly ask God to search us, and where we are self-centered, which we probably don't even realize most of the time, that God would make us God-centered.

And I will go out on a ledge. If we begin to ask God that, number one, we better hold on. Be very careful when you ask God to reveal more of himself to you, because God's ways are not our ways, and God's thoughts are not our thoughts.

But, would it not be in line with the Lord Jesus Christ? Again, he sweat droplets of blood, striving against sin. So, again, maybe not in some people's minds the most joyful thought, but nevertheless, any thought about God, any thought about truth is well worth our time.

So, with that, we'll leave it. And then, Brother Keith will come now and continue his teaching in the subject of salvation.