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Verses 89-96

You word, O Lord, is eternal;

It stands firm in the heavens.

God’s word is eternally alive. It is timeless, neither running out of effects nor of time for its effects to take place. It stands in the heavens like the sun, moon and stars – eternal, unchanged, but how differently we see it day to day and month by month, when we care to pay attention.

Your faithfulness continues through all generations;

You established the earth and it endures.

Like the legends of the sky, told to grandchildren, tales of God’s faithfulness are intended to be told over and over again. But earth, sun, moon and stars exist in imitation of his Word, and not vice versa!

Your laws endure to this day,

For all things serve you.

God’s will – it is impossible for sun, moon or stars to disobey them, or move outside the realm of their control. Even human manipulation will only exist within God’s given physical and spiritual laws. And his law is so fur us, as people. To know him is to love and obey him – this is the unavoidable physical and spiritual law. We see his law by its effect on things, but not on a few things, rather on all things in all time. Therefore we know his law must be everywhere and eternal.

If your law had not been my delight,

I would have perished in my affliction.

The Psalmist says “I would be dead” if it weren’t for you – and depends on a joyful delight in following God’s self, not a grudging acceptance of doing what we are told. Death is to serve without love, to follow without understanding or to participate without any ownership. Gdo offers us something quite different in his Word.

I will never forget your precepts,

For by them you have preserved my life.

I won’t – can’t – it will not happen – for this experience of God’s precepts is indelible, physical, imprinted on me, body and soul. Brain is hard-written, spirit is changed. Continued life involves remembering. [Re-reading this in September 2015, originally noted 26-4-14, I am amazed that God showed me this and that so much of what I currently experience and understand can be traced to the effect of God’s word on my life as I studied Psalm 119.]

Save me, for I am yours;

I have sought your precepts.

I want to live in salvation – in being saved. That is the same as being yours, Father. And it increases my taste for instruction. I have gone looking for teaching to be changed by it. [Seeking God’s precepts marks us out as His. We belong to him because we seek him – what a privilege. What easy access to the Holy of Holies! Seek.]

The wicked are waiting to destroy me

But I will ponder on your statutes.

Every day, they are there with their temptations and a breath of death, but your law cannot be touched by such things – it is above the heavens. By even wondering at what you have said – by simply thinking to myself, “What does this mean?”, I allow you to preserve me from destruction, from falling into temptation, from giving into sin.

To all perfection I see a limit

But your commands are boundless.

Oh, Hallelujah! Ah! High,mighty and eternal are you, O God! Your very Word with us, eternal, perfect, all-encompassing, all-embracing, breathing through all, teaching through all… I praise you, God!

September 22

Verses 81-88

My soul faints with longing for your salvation,

But I have put my hope in your word.

That internal longing? That yearning after fulfillment of God’s promises? That’s the soul’s cry for a rescue that is of God. While it remains I have a healthy appetite, but my hope runs deeper than emotion. It is a fact – a completed act and vow that I can observe within myself.

My eyes fail, looking for your promise.

I say, “When will you comfort me?”

My body follows the pattern of my spirit and my mind, properly confessing that he will, that he has promised to save, but asking when. We are allowed to ask “When?” – but asked to trust he will.

Though I am like a wineskin in the smoke

I do not forget your decrees.

Losing weight, tanned, dirty, smelly, stinging eyes – all this is secondary. Though I am in pain and though my body tends cries for attention, I do not forget, for my knowledge of God’s laws is not simply the interest of my mind. My spiritual memory is formed of my past actions, which prove that I have not forgotten God’s way, because even now I long for him.

How long must your servant wait?

When will you punish my persecutors?

Asking these questions directly means that the only real answer comes with God’s action.

The arrogant dig pitfalls for me –

Contrary to your law.

Ridiculous, isn’t it Lord? What do they imagine they will achieve? Let me draw your attention to it, Father. Here are traps – illegal traps! For me! When I am following your decrees the path is firm and dry – but traps are everywhere.

All your commands are trustworthy,

Help me, for men persecute me without cause.

My persecutors do not know, follow or understand your commands. Help me by helping me to follow these trustworthy commands that will characterise my life so differently – by trusting, not imagining my own way, by doing, not worrying – and so within my own mind to remove those causeless, weak persecutors which I now know to be impermanent and senseless. My own self-indulgent habits and ways of thought that have become traps for me as I walk your path – help me to disregard such unholiness.

They almost wiped me from the earth

But I have not forsaken your precepts.

Even King David risked being forgotten, it seems. But what is more permanent than wealth and Kingdoms? God’s law – and all those things that follow the pattern of God’s instruction share its security.

Preserve my life according to your love

and I will obey the statutes of your mouth.

These aren’t just any statutes! God’s spoken care for us is as eternal as his ancient rules – but we have a new promise of these rules, no longer rules to us but a conversation. And this is his preservation – to be with us and in us by his Word.

September 21September 21

Verses 73-80

Your hands made me and formed me;

Give me understanding to learn your commands.

From the same hands come creation and training, both acts of love. Initially we are made – and well-made – but spiritually unformed – and then formed by the growth of understanding as we learn to obey God and follow his law. His chosen method of explaining – his Spirit – is required to learn about his laws. That is unavoidable. To know of his commands is only the beginning, since we are designed to relate to them and to relate to him through them.

May those who fear you rejoice when they see me,

For I have put my hope in your word.

A ruler or king can be trusted when he hopes in God, which is enacted when he looks for goodness in God’s utterance. People around don’t simply receive pleasure but joy!

I know, O Lord, that your laws are righteous

And in faithfulness you have afflicted me.

We can have factual knowledge and know, without any experience, that God is good, but to be faithful to his promise to teach us, God will judge us in the law – and then in the new law. He couldn’t leave us thinking we knew him and his ways when we had never been tested or had opportunity to depend on him. So Jesus prays in the garden “Your faithfulness to your own plan requires this suffering.”

Let your compassion come to me that I may live

For your law is my delight.

Without his compassion, I would surely die, but I seek your compassion because I love your law – because I love your living word. I know what your compassion is like and look for it where it is likely to be found.

May the arrogant be put to shame for wronging me without cause;

But I will meditate on your precepts.

The causeless actions of the arrogant bring more actions – caused ones and reasoned ones. So God repays chaos with order, deceit with truth, evil with good. But meditation is not a reaction to the arrogant. It is separate, quiet, peaceful. Arrogant actions are slander, treating people unjustly and describing them inaccurately. Meditating on God’s precepts stops this in us.

May those who fear you turn to me,

Those who understand your statutes.

Everyone who really knows God’s way of business will be drawn to holy kings, good leaders and true servants of the Gospel. Our fear of God allows us to relate to people who have ordered their life that way.

May my heart be blameless towards your decrees

That I might not be put to shame.

How? My heart must be revived and renewed. I must have learnt your word – not simply know it or know about it, but I must have been taught by it, changed by it. I must be living a new life – I must be redeemed and sealed by the Holy Spirit – for that is the blamelessness promised to us, free of condemnation and living within the law.

September 20

Verses 65-72

Do good to your servant

According to your word, O Lord.

He will only do good, since for God to do is to do good. We can have no other expectation: he only does good and he only does it well. Scripture is our witness to this, that he has done good since the very beginning and will continue to do good endlessly. Scripture is to be trusted since scripture tells us of our Saviour – which no-one else and nothing else does. So we should seek those books and points of view that reinforce our understanding and show us God being good. And when we make ourselves his servant, this inevitable good is promised to us and his breathed Spirit confirms it.

Teach me knowledge and good judgement

for believe in your commands.

Faith is the key here: believing God’s word to be good makes us teachable. Without an attitude of wonder and gratitude, we won’t ever gain understanding. Here knowledge and good judgement are inescapably paired – for without one another, each is senseless. We are called not simply to know what is right but to exercise judgement and to use our knowledge to live differently, and so prove our faith, as James encourages. This is God’s teaching style: first he gives us faith to believe him, then he gives us better and truer information and the opportunity to embed it by using it. The more we follow this pattern, the more drastic the change in our life.

Before I was afflicted I went astray

But now I obey your word.

Yes indeed – conviction, shame and reshaping are God’s tools. He does not want us astray – better afflicted with grief or suffering and on the correct path than ignorant and in bliss- stupid bliss. Better the daily challenge to our self! Lord, how I thank you for this time – this rest. Remain in me, O Lord, so that I may continue to find rest.

You are good and what you do is good;

Teach me your decrees.

Here is the proof! We know God is good and free from imperfection, because we see his goodness in the things he does. His actions are essential to him – unsurprising (once you know him well) – suited – fitting – proper – and he must act to be true to himself. He is, after all, the Living God. And he wants us to mirror this integrity. O God, that my deeds befitted what you have made me! Teach me!

Though the arrogant have smeared me with lies

I keep your precepts with all my heart.

Lies are sticky, but only touch the outside. Lying is an act of arrogance – to believe that you are bigger than the truth. But a whole heart will survive that – and a whole heart is needed to follow God’s law, since it is not an outwardly thing but an inwardly, spiritual law of the heart.

Their hearts are callous and unfeeling

But I delight in your law.

A heart of flesh loves instruction from God – loves being changed, being directed, being contradicted, because it means relationship with one who is good and does only good. A fleshly heart is keen for its own changed life, for the effects on the people around. It is not only callous, unfeeling and insensitive to reject God’s purpose in sanctifying and changing us – it is stupid and selfish! Stupid because we cannot pretend that faith has any other purpose, selfish because it prevents others from receiving God’s truth. Every believer must whole-heartedly give themselves to God’s process of change.

It was good for me to be afflicted

So that I might learn your decrees.

Amen – even at a considerable price, to say this brings us determination and helps us to value what is valuable. Because even if I knew many things previously, then I had not learnt from them because I had done little It was good, Lord, that I should suffer and be prompted into action. Recalled to life!

The law from your mouth is more precious to me

Than thousands of pieces of silver and gold.

Now I can say this for real. Our true riches are the words of God spoken to us in Scripture, made living and real by his spirit. With them comes such wisdom that we can solve problems in the world, we can change our relationships for more beautiful and worthwhile ways. With these words come challenges to our selfishness, our egocentricity, our remaining sins. May it ever be so, Lord God! Not dead words recalling a past, as some think, but your living law that teaches me and explains everything I observe in the world around – your law that brings me now to an attitude of worship – shows your great love for me, Father, as so good! So good! Amen.

September 19September 19

Next Up…

The ground shakes… A season begins… Not obviously, since autumn always slips out from beneath summer’s train. Seasons are never well defined.

But in the few months since I’ve last written on here, a lot has changed. And now I’m about to take a new journey.

My friends know a quick way to get me excited is to ask me about IF – interactive fiction – or CYOA – Choose Your Own Adventure – the genre defining series. And over the summer I got very excited and spent about 15 full writing days learning to use an IF software tool called Twine, writing a non – linear Steampunk time – sensitive role playing interactive novel, simply called Steam Highwayman.

I’ll write a lot more about it soon, but the key to my excitement with using Twine is that it provides me with a very natural writing environment, meaning that my productivity and fluency were as great during those 15 days as at any time in my life. And the finished result published in html format, meaning that it can be read easily in a Web browser.

I’ve learned a small amount of html and css from the work I had earlier this and at the end of last year editing a website for Mary’s and then building my own. But if I can up my game, the prospect of downloadable CYOA apps that combine my love of writing with modern technology awaits me.

I mean then to be spending time learning more CSS skills to create a good looking page, learning how to use android studio to create an app that will use one of my finished-ish IFs, and then to release it here.

Will I succeed? God knows. How long will it take? I don’t mind. Because whether or not I’m posting a downloadable free IF within the year, entirely written and produced by me, I know I’m learning a lot. And that feels great.

In Psalm 119 it says “Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.” There’s nothing to blame in my desire to explore and create and I know that anything done for the glory of God can be an act of deep worship, so I’m looking forward to meeting Him and walking with Him along His road this season.

July 4September 19

Recalibrating Language

‘As like as peas in a pod.’

I’ve read it before, but real peas fresh from the garden are not alike each other. Miniscule though the differences may seem at first, the closer you look at these natural jewels, the more individual they are.

I don’t think lazy similes like the pea pods do justice to people or God’s creation. Though sometimes I might delight in the glory of the English language, it falls far short of what God promises us. Sometimes the wordless language of the open eye is a better way to receive revelation.

Jesus said “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light.” (Matthew 6:22).

January 25January 25

Graham Writes About Worship – Renewal 2015

I’ve been profiting from reading and dwelling on Graham Kendrick’s stacked-up blog posts. There’s some quality discussion of leadership as a worship leader and writer of songs on his site, as well as some great stories behind some of his songs. I find it so encouraging to read how directly the spirit moved him on many occasions to create a song we now take a bit for granted! Click the pic.

In other news, I’m going to the Renewal Conference in Woolwich next weekend. I know GK and other British worship leaders tend to be there. If you haven’t heard of it, click the pic and check it out.

January 11January 2

Seeing God’s Power in the Natural World

Do you remember the fantastic story of Solomon in the third chapter of the First Book of Kings? God appeared to him at Gibeon while he slept and promised to give Solomon whatever he wished…

Solomon asked for wisdom, of course, and the First Book of Kings later describes some of the wisdom that he received in revelation from God, along with his fabled wealth:

And he spake three thousand proverbs and his songs were a thousand and five. And he spake of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. [1 Kings 4 32-33]

It seems that part of Solomon’s wisdom, rather than simply his knowledge, was his interest in the world that God has created and his hunger to understand natural history. The longing to see God’s power in the world is a driver for many beautiful writings, songs, paintings, studies and disciplines, and I feel it strongly. I wonder whether this was the wisdom that led Gerard Manley Hopkins to seek the inscape of every created thing, to understand its unique character and the song it sings to God the Father?

And Solomon had time – made time – to study and write this natural history while ruling Israel at the height of its prosperity! God can give us so much when we ask and when we are ready to receive what he gives us.

January 10January 2

Verses 57-64

You are my portion, O Lord;

I have promised to obey your words.

He is what we are allotted, now; not a thing, but a person, not a future idea or a dream of success but relationship – this follows on from our promise to obey, and then sustains it – which began by inspiration and continues by inspiration as we give over our will to his spirit in us.

I have sought your face with all my heart

Be gracious to me according to your promise.

The writer’s past has been one of seeking God’s face – can we say it is our past too? Our heart will divide if we do not give it over to God and still then we have to seek him – like being in love and wanting to see your friend, not being content to know they are there! But God’s promises of grace from the beginning of all things to now are the things that will allow us to have this undivided heart.

I have considered my ways

and have turned my steps to your statutes.

That really is the only option! To turn again onto the path and keep walking. The statutes are a stairway in places, every step forward taking us a step up, in other places a meadow or a rocky cliff-edge.

I will hasten and not delay

to obey your commands.

It is a rush! Like a man hurrying home, shifting his pack high. As I read this now, I feel convicted, but I also remember the adrenalin of running after the Lord’s ways. Do you? Nothing else feels like that!

Though the wicked bind me with ropes,

I will not forget your law.

Like a man off the path, longing to be walking the high ways, over the hills, even though he is restrained, his mind and his spirit still travel with the Lord. It’s not the destination, but the company…

At midnight I will rise to give you thanks

for your righteous laws.

Relevant at midnight and at all other times. Rising in the body is good – it prepares us to rise in our spirits as well.

I am a friend to all who fear you,

to all who follow your precepts.

By virtue of the grace given to all of us – and don’t I love being in brotherhood! Finding a new brother is sweet, and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the brothers are wise if they set out to go walking together.

The Earth is filled with your love, O Lord,

teach me your decrees.

The view from the top of the hill. Our response has to be awe: how did you do it, Lord? Show me what makes you so good. I want to be where you are!

January 9January 2

Freedom and a Light Heart

Our mind seems to be directly connected to our heart and our emotions. I’ve noticed that to put something in your heart, you only need to think about it seriously – but that once something is embedded there, it is a lot harder to remove! For example, simply to fantasise about having a certain sort of house or garden is a quick way to set your heart on a worldly treasure, and I’m constantly finding things which I’m surprised to find I have a strong attachment to – even though some are really very long shots!

Yet to release something from my heart, if I do what I planned and complete the dream, I find I’ve lost the burden that I hold myself to. Consequently I have these two conclusions:

Guard your heart by preventing yourself from dreaming about or planning to do things that you cannot be sure are right.

When you have decided that something is right, do it as soon as possible! By keeping short accounts, perhaps you can keep a light heart?

This feels right in my spirit, and I’ve been doing my best to do this before God in the past year. There’s a big backlog of things I once set my heart on though – some of which I’m letting go of, and some of which I’m pressing on to complete the best I can. Will I ever be free of the obligations I set myself? Maybe not in this life… But come the glorious day of my resurrection, I know I’ll enjoy the completeness of the freedom I’m beginning to see now!