Prisons

“Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise your name!”

Psalm 142:7a

There are many prisons in this life.  Sickness is a prison; fear is a prison; confusion is a prison; ignorance is a prison; being surrounded by people who slander and hate you is a prison; the human body itself is a prison; and death is a prison.  

The Son of God from heaven came into our prisons.  But the Father set him free from them all, and He promised the Son that he would be surrounded forever with the people who followed him out of the prisons of this life.  That precious promise thrilled the Son.  It is what the Son was speaking of in the last half of the verse quoted above, when he said to the Father, “The righteous shall compass me about, for you shall deal bountifully with me” (Ps. 142:7b).

Demons Love Holy, Joyous Singing

“By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down.

Yea, we wept when we remembered Zion.

For there, they that carried us away captive required of us a song,

and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying,

‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’ ”

Psalm 137:1, 3

The wicked who take God’s people captive love their holy, joyous singing, and want to hear it.  The singing of the children of God reminds demons of the music they once heard in heaven before they were forever cast out.

A Living Testimony

“Let my prayer be set forth before you as incense,

and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.”

Psalm 141:2

This was the Son, asking the Father, for our sakes, to replace worship in ceremonies with worship in spirit and truth.  God answered His Son’s prayer, but for it to happen, the Son first had to come to earth and pay the awful price of the cross.

To worship in ceremonies denies that God ever answered the Son’s prayer.  Ceremonial worship is a testimony that the Son prayed that earnest prayer of Psalm 141:2 in vain.  But every time we worship in spirit and truth, we are part of God’s answer to the Son’s prayer, and living testimonies to God’s love for His Son.

If Our Life Is Good

“The upright shall dwell in your presence.”

Psalm 140:13

It is useless to spend time worrying about whether or not we will be saved in the end; that decision is not ours to make.  It is wiser to give our attention to how we live our lives.  If our lives are good in God’s sight, our eternal peace will be secured.

The Best Way To Cover Your Head

“O GOD the Lord, the strength of my salvation,

you have covered my head in the day of battle.

As for the head of those who compass me about,

let the mischief of their own lips cover them.”

Psalm 140:7, 9

To have God “cover your head” with His strength is to have Him protect you.  But He can also cover heads with trouble and sorrow by causing the ungodly to reap their sinful deeds.

The safest thing to do is to have Jesus as your head.  He will always be covered with God’s greatest blessings, for God has made him “most blessed forever” (Ps. 21:6).

Perfect Hatred

“Do not I hate them, O LORD, who hate you?

And am not I grieved with those who rise up against you?

I hate them with perfect hatred; I count them my enemies.”

Psalm 139:21–22

Hatred, like anger, can be a holy thing.  After reproving the pastor in ancient Ephesus, Jesus told him that there was something about him that was pleasing to God; namely, “You hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate” (Rev. 2:6).

Pray for the wisdom to hate what God hates, and for the power to hate the way God hates.  His is perfect hatred.

Choose Good Companions

“You will surely slay the wicked, O God.

Depart from me, therefore, you bloody men!”

Psalm 139:19

God will indeed slay the wicked.  That is why it is not wise to have wicked companions.  Companions are those with whom you have such a close relationship that they influence you.

Show respect and do good to everyone, but choose your friends, your companions, carefully.  Solomon told us why: “He who walks with wise men shall be wise, but a companion of fools shall be destroyed” (Prov. 13:20).

The First Thing Created

“You created my inner parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.”

Psalm 139:13

The word translated “created” in this verse is not the usual word for “create”, but since God is the One doing the work, “create” is appropriate.

“Create” is also appropriate in Proverbs 8, where the Son of God is talking about how he came into being: “The LORD created me the beginning of His way, the first of His works.  I was anointed from eternity, before the beginning, before earth existed” (Prov. 8:22–23).

What wonderful things about our heavenly Father are revealed in the fact that in the beginning, of all the numberless possibilities available to Him, the first thing He created was somebody – a Son – to love!

He Knew You

“In your book all my members were written . . .

when as yet there was none of them.”

Psalm 139:16

The Son of God was declaring in this verse from Psalm 139 that God wrote the name of every member of the body of Christ in His Book of Life before there was a body of Christ.  In the New Testament, this is confirmed for us by John when he said the names of those who are in Christ were written in God’s Book before the world began (Rev. 13:8; 17:8).

God knew you, and loved you, and wrote your name in His book a very long time ago.  When you were born again into His family, He was very glad to finally have you actually be here.  It was His good pleasure to give you His Spirit.

The Rod of God

“For the rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the lot of the righteous,

lest the righteous put forth their hands to iniquity.”

Psalm 125:3

It is always God’s chastening rod that is upon the righteous, not the rod of Satan, or of evil men.  If the wicked were in charge of chastening God’s children, they would be so abused that they would be driven to resort to measures that are not godly.   God chastises His children, not the wicked, and in doing so, He never goes too far or provokes His children to do evil.  David was comforted by God’s rod, not tormented by it.  He even sang a song about it: “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters.  Your rod and your staff they comfort me” (Ps. 23:1–2, 4).

Before the Gods

“I will praise you with my whole heart! 

Before the gods will I sing you praise!”

Psalm 138:1

The “gods” before whom David said he would sing praise to God were men who were in high positions on earth.  They were the wealthy rulers and judges in Israel.

Only a few are so consumed with love for God that they are not concerned with who is watching when it is time to pray or praise God.

Our Jerusalem

“If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.

If I do not remember you, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,

if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy.”

Psalm 137:5--6

“But the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all.”

Galatians 4:26

“And I [John] saw the holy city, new Jerusalem,

coming down out of heaven from God,

prepared like a bride adorned for her husband.”

Revelation 21:2

Nothing in this world compares to our hope of entering the new Jerusalem.  It is so precious that many have given up their lives for it.  In everything you do or say, remember the new Jerusalem, a place of perfect peace and joy, where there is no sadness, pain, or death.

What a happy day it will be when we enter into God's beautiful new Jerusalem!

Becoming Like What You Worship

“The idols of the heathen are silver and gold,

the work of men’s hands.

They have mouths, but they do not speak;

they have eyes, but they do not see;

they have ears, but they do not hear;

neither is there any breath in their mouths.

They that make them are like them;

so is every one that trusts in them.”

Psalm 135:15–18

You become like what you worship.  Your soul is shaped by the object of its praise.  Those who worship falsely become false.  Then, worship the true and living God so that you may become true, and live.

God is Ahead of Us

Talking with my wife Barbara early this morning about the section of the Iron Kingdom manuscript we read last night, my soul was awed, again, by a realization of how great God’s work is!  “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are His judgments, and inscrutable His ways!  Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counselor?” (Rom. 11:33–34).  I had to write and tell you about it.

It was about twenty years before Jesus was born that God changed Rome from a Republic governed by Senators into an Empire governed by one man, a king whom the Romans called an emperor.  In making this change, God was setting up a choice for His people between His dear Son and the Empire of man, a choice between the Spirit and the flesh.  We know that God’s New Testament people chose the flesh instead of the Spirit because they rejected Paul’s gospel of the Spirit and devised their own fleshly religion, Christianity, instead.  But the following portion of Scripture shows us that the Jews chose the Empire over the Son first, years before the believing Gentiles did:

John 19

13. Pilate led Jesus outside and sat on the judicial bench,

14. and he said to the Jews, “Behold your King!” 

15. But they cried out, “Away with him! Away!  Crucify him!”  Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priest answered, “We have no king but Caesar!”

Before God changed Rome into an Empire, there was no Caesar for the Jews to choose as their king instead of His Son.  Before God changed Rome into an Empire, they could not have said, “We have no king but Caesar!”  But decades before He sent His Son into the world, God had prepared an alternative king for those among His people who would not have His Son.

God is ahead of us all, creating paths for our feet that will accommodate the hidden desire of our hearts.  When we make our choice, whether it be right or wrong, the choice will seem right to us, whether we be among the few who choose the Son of God or among the many who choose the Empire of man.

No wonder David prayed that God would put right desires in his heart.  And he warned his son Solomon to make every effort to keep his heart pure, “for out of it”, he said, “are the issues of life.”

Somebody help me praise God!  Who would not fear Him?

The Power of Unity

“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is

for brothers to dwell together in unity!

It is like the precious ointment upon the head

that ran down upon the beard,even Aaron’s beard,

that went down to the skirts of his garments.”

Psalm 133:1–2

The anointing oil that was poured on Aaron’s head made Aaron the high priest of Israel.  It gave him great authority.  In some cases, he even had the power of life and death over his fellow Israelites.

In this Psalm, David is saying that when the people of God are united in His light, their decisions carry weight equal to that of the high priest of Israel.  Unity in Christ brings the anointing of Christ to the body of Christ.

Jesus said it this way: “Again, I tell you truly that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything at all that they ask, it will be done for them by my Father who is in heaven.  For where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there, in their midst” (Mt. 18:19–20).

God’s Power To Forgive

“If you, LORD, should mark iniquities, O lord, who shall stand?

But there is forgiveness with you, that you may be feared.”

Psalm 130:3–4

God’s power to forgive sin is a reason to fear him, just as David said.  For if God can forgive, He can also choose not to, and the salvation of your soul depends upon your being forgiven.

Jesus was right, as always, when he warned his disciples, “Don’t be afraid of those who kill the body but can’t kill the soul; rather, fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.” (Mt. 10:28).  In other words, “Fear Him who is able to forgive you.”

God’s Fear Blesses

“Blessed is every one that fears the LORD, that walks in His ways.

You shall be happy, and it shall be well with you.”

Psalm 128:1–2b

“The transgression of the wicked says within my heart,

that there is no fear of God before his eyes.”

Psalm 36:1

Those who fear God will be blessed and happy because the fear of God keeps them from wandering away from righteousness.  When David saw someone living a wicked life, he knew that person had no fear of God, for he knew that no one who fears God can live in sin.

Pray to have, and to always keep, the fear of God.  It will save you.  Jesus feared God, and look at how blessed he is today!

The Invisible Hills

“I will lift up my eyes to the hills, from whence comes my help.”

Psalm 121:1–2

The eyes David lifted up were the eyes of his soul, and the hills were hills that human eyes cannot see.  David said in the next verse, “My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.”

Children Facing the Enemies

“Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD,

and the fruit of the womb is His reward.

As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man,

so are children of the youth.

Happy is the man that has his quiver full of them.

They shall not be ashamed,

but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”

Psalm 127:3–5

By “speaking with the enemies in the gate,” David meant that those children had matured in wisdom and integrity and faith to be able to fearlessly withstand the enemies of righteousness at the city’s weakest point.  It is a wonderful feeling for parents to see their child grow up and confront the enemies of righteousness, and deny the wicked access into the city.

Vain Works

“Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it;

except the LORD keep the city, the watchman wakes, but in vain.”

Psalm 127:1

Nothing will stand or succeed unless God does it.  The grandest works and best ideas of man are doomed to eventual failure before they even begin.  Only God’s thoughts and deeds are eternal.