Daily Devotional – August 28, 2020

to the cooler temperatures. Looking forward to, I hope probably for you, a day off tomorrow.

Unless you're retired, then you're kind of have a day off every day, right? And looking forward to the

Lord's Day, gathering together in God's house to worship and fellowship with one another and hear from the

Lord, hear what He has to say to us. Again, from Ephesians chapter 6, we've been last few

Sundays in Ephesians 6 at the armor of God that we need to put on.

So we'll be going back there this Lord's Day. But during these devotionals this week, we've been looking at the song of the enlightened mind,

Psalm 19. And we have looked at it from the standpoint of revelation.

We have an enlightened mind because God has graciously revealed Himself to us and revealed truth to us.

He's revealed Himself to us through creation. We call that general revelation. And that creation praises

God for His supreme power in that creative work.

But then He's also revealed Himself to us in what we call special revelation, where God has taken the to speak to man and tell us about Himself and about ourselves and about how we can have a relationship with Him and so forth and how we can live in a way that gives

Him pleasure and so on. That's special revelation. And in special revelation, the

Lord reveals to us His personal power, His personal power. So we looked at the nouns and the adjectives that refer to God's word this week, the law of the

Lord, for example, the teaching of the Lord is perfect, reviving or converting the soul and so on in verses 7 through 9.

But the last part of the Psalm is kind of like so what of it all?

Okay, so how should I respond to this revelation that God has given to us about Himself or the revelation of creation and the revelation of the word?

How should I respond? And the Psalm ends focusing on how I should respond in relationship to the word that the

Lord has given. And I would suggest three ideas, three words. The first from verses 10 and following is the word appreciation or valuation, appreciating the value of the word.

So the psalmist puts it this way, more to be desired are they, that is the words of God, than gold, even much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.

We're at the honey harvesting time of the year, aren't we? I've been looking for some honey and talked to a couple of different folks recently about, can we get some honey?

We need to get some honey. I'm wanting to make some elderberry syrup and need honey for elderberry syrup. A couple of weeks,

I've been told it'll be ready in a couple of weeks. Well, we greatly appreciate honey, don't we?

Because of its sweetness and who doesn't appreciate payday? You get your paycheck and you need that.

You got to pay your bills. Ah, but how should I respond to God's revelation of Himself, the

Lord's revelation of Himself to me through His word? I need to value that revelation more than I value my paycheck.

I need to see it as being sweeter even than the honey that we're going to be getting here very shortly and the honeycomb that's stuck inside that jar of honey as well.

So I need to value it and the reason I need to value it so highly is explained in the next few verses.

We might say, here's our second word, application. I respond to His word, to God's special revelation, by appreciation and then secondly by application.

This is what makes it so valuable, the application. He goes on to say, moreover by them, the words of your special revelation, your servant is warned and in keeping them there is great reward.

Who can discern his, who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults.

Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins. Let them not have dominion over me.

Then I shall be blameless and innocent of the great transgression. And what the psalmist is recognizing here is the incredible value of God's special revelation to guide our lives, to protect us from our errors, to keep us from those hidden secret sins.

His word warns us, His word tells us, don't go there, keep this, do this.

There's great reward in this kind of living and in keeping of them there is great reward.

And if I see that and I understand that, if my mind is enlightened by His special revelation to receive the the teachings of the

Lord, the precepts of the Lord, the statutes of the Lord, if I will receive these things and properly value them, they will protect me, they will enhance my life, they will keep me from presumptuous sins that will be harmful to me, harmful to others, harmful to the testimony of Christ.

So I need to appreciate this special revelation that Yahweh has given and I need to apply it to my personal life.

But then what it really comes down to is the matter of submission, submission.

The psalmist ends this psalm that is the song of the enlightened mind by appealing to the

Lord with this prayer. He says, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight,

O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Now notice how he describes

Yahweh in those last two words, my rock, my redeemer, rock and redeemer.

A rock speaks of Him and the Lord being the fortress in whom you can trust, the redeemer, the savior of my soul, the one who redeems me from my sin.

And the prayer is a prayer of submission that I would be submitted in my words and my meditations to your truth, that these things would be acceptable in your sight.

On what basis would they be acceptable? What would be the objective standard by which the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart would be acceptable to the

Lord? His word. His word.

What he has revealed is acceptable. What he has revealed is virtuous and wholesome and righteous.

So as you wrap up this song of the enlightened mind, you come to realize that this isn't just about getting a bunch of head knowledge and being a theological genius, cramming your head full of Bible truth and Bible knowledge.

I've known in 40 years of pastoral ministry, I've known a lot of people who were able to do that.

They memorized Bible verses. I mean, I think of a guy off the top of my head right now who was a very intelligent guy and a church that I went to and served as a pastor when

I got there. He was one of the Sunday school teachers and was teaching at that time through the book of Romans.

And he knew. He knew the scriptures. Knew them well. Knew them better than I did at that time,

I think. It seemed. And yet, the guy died as an atheist.

Utterly rejecting all of that. Why? Well, because when he got right down to it, he wasn't willing to submit himself to the

Lord as his rock and redeemer and was no longer interested that his words and his meditations of his heart would be acceptable in the

Lord's sight. He was no longer allowing the objective standard of the special revelation that the

Lord, Yahweh, has given to be the standard by which his words and his meditations were judged.

May our words and our meditations be acceptable in the

Lord's sight. Such is the song of the enlightened mind. Such is the heart of one whose mind has been enlightened.

So, O Lord, as we have looked at this passage this week, this song, I pray that we've been challenged to appreciate your word, to see it as more valuable than gold and sweeter than honey because of its wonderful, wonderful application to our hearts and our lives.

So, Lord, I pray, give us a renewed appreciation for your word and may, indeed, the words of our mouth, the meditation of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, we pray in Jesus' name.