The Unfolding of your words give light

Psalm 119

פ Pe

¹²⁹ Your statutes are wonderful;
therefore I obey them.
¹³⁰ The unfolding of your words gives light;
it gives understanding to the simple.
¹³¹ I open my mouth and pant,
longing for your commands.
¹³² Turn to me and have mercy on me,
as you always do to those who love your name.
¹³³ Direct my footsteps according to your word;
let no sin rule over me.
¹³⁴ Redeem me from human oppression,
that I may obey your precepts.
¹³⁵ Make your face shine on your servant
and teach me your decrees.
¹³⁶ Streams of tears flow from my eyes,
for your law is not obeyed.

I have been thinking a lot about this particular verse:

Psalm 13:3

"Consider and answer me, O Jehovah my God: lighten my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death:"

I do not think I am alone in saying this, but depression is something in which I am prone to wander. I tend to wonder in my own thoughts and let the molehills become mountains, I let my inner doubts and calculations dictate the light of my life and it shows. You know you are around someone who thinks to much when there seems to be a dull haze that fills their eyes. There is life there certainly, but it is far from appealing.

I could give a thousand reasons to pick oneself up from the bootstraps, to change modes of thinking, to focus on the positive, but in the end too many of these fail. Because the truth of the matter is this, where there is no light there is no life.

So how does one address this issue? Are we alone in these feelings?

The psalmist cries and I find myself joining his his cry. "Consider and answer me," haven't we all prayed this? Haven't we all at some point thrown our hands up in exhaustion and said hear me now! I could give biblical examples, but in the end they are just that, examples. Here, in these words, I am asking have you reached this point. The point at which your own honestly compels you to cry out, "Hear me and answer me now." The point where you stop seeking others to bear you up and change your thoughts. Hear my and answer me, Jehovah, my God.

Jehovah my God, what a phrase that is to read. Hear me now, Jehovah, my God. In a very real sense, it is to lay all down and cry out to my God and my God alone, not to men, not to circumstances, not to an opaque deity, but to my God. This is to recognize He is our own, a recognition of his authority, and his willingness to aid us.

"Lest I sleep the sleep of death" have we reached this point? Do we know in our bodies, not just our minds what is the need of a savior; the need of having my God. I don't want to scratch lightly this issue. It is one thing to know you need help mentally, it is another completely to have this need become the hunger of your being, mind body and soul.

The psalmist cries lighten my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death. Give me life, give me your person or I die! This cry is the ultimate confession that all in life is vain unless it is true life, given not obtained.

So now I arrive back at my initial psalm, "The unfolding of your words gives life." Do I know, do we know the full depth of these words?

We like quick fixes, quick answers, quick solutions and I'm hear to say we have these. But receiving and answer and following through on the solution or two different matters.

The Lord says in this passage the unfolding of his word gives life. I must cling to this answer, I must pursue this word. I must as these verses go on to say long for the decrees of the lord. I am not here advocating ideas of commandments, but rather a person. Christ, the beginning and the word made flesh.

Why do we fail when the light has left our eyes? We fail because we look to decrees to give us life, we look towards our own understandings, our own interpretations. Stop it! I must stop it! Christ himself is the unfolding word. This is not to discount the others, not by any means, but it to shift our focus to the power of the author. His words are our life, take them as such. Lean on his person to unfold and reveal himself, his holy spirit to guide and comfort. Stop believing that by reading enough, praying enough, and confessing enough things will change. Start believing first and foremost, believe not just that Christ is able, but is willing, that he is! Only then, when based on a foundation of belief, will reading the word, praying, and confessing his truth bear fruit.

Arise shine for the light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon us. Do we have a realization of this truth or do we hope for it? I have spent to much time trying to wrap my head around the idea of a light shinning on me and where has this lead me? only to further darkness. Why? because I don't turn to that light, I just try to understand it. I look to the promise of peace without a relationship with its author.

So here I am now, I'm turning away: not from sound council, not from searching the word, but from the excuse of these. The excuse that these give me to not first seek their author, an author who will unfold their truth to me and make this simpleton wise with complete disregard to his own abilities.

The unfolding of your words brings light, I want to know this. I want to know that the unfolding of Christ himself within me brings light to my eyes.

Atrophy in a state of Grace

I Samuel 17

2 And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered together, and pitched by the valley of Elah, and set the battle in array against the Philistines.

3 And the Philistines stood on a mountain on the one side, and Israel stood on a mountain on the other side: and there was a valley between them

8 And he stood and cried unto the armies of Israel, and said unto them, Why are ye come out to set your battle in array? am not I a Philistine, and ye servants to Saul? choose you a man for you, and let him come down to me...

Matthew 11

12 From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it.

It is simply to easy to say the church needs revival. If only only the church would awake. My friends this is the coward's answer to his own hearts cry. He lays this burden at the feet of other's because he too often lacks the conviction to take up the mantle himself. A coward's cry to an idle of hope.

The battle is arrayed. Philistia stands across the valley in full array. My challenges present themselves fully, they don't hide as I would pretend. They are enemies both within myself and without, but they are there. But where am I? I am sitting in the midst of my brethren; safe and comfortable talking of the power of my God, the strength of my convictions. But still I do not move. I am unmoved. I am scared and I am complacent. The side of the Valley on which I camp is still a mountain and to meet my enemy I must cross the valley and take from him what is mine. But I don't cross. I sit and I stare.

So there am I, cold, and still. Arrayed for the battle, given arms, given commission, but still I sit. I sit to afraid to move because my comfort makes me grow small while all the while my hope grows ever stronger because that hope is never tested. My faith is never tried, so why shouldn't it grow stronger in its own convictions?

Faith never tried will atrophy into the vain hopes of a man to afraid to realize what true hope and faith are.

I atrophy. I atrophy in this state of grace where God has said all my promises are yours through my son, Christ Jesus. I atrophy because in my DNA is this new creature, remade into the image of God's own son who rather than join the fight after his hands have been taught to war, sits on one side of the Valley waiting for this great host of the church to rise. But I know unless I lay a hold of the one who is the author of my faith, I will never rise and I will always be looking for a David who is willing to make my faith real, show me what hope really is. I will always look for Gideon to tear down my idles of hope and force me to realize victory.

My heart's cry will never be realized until I stand up as David did and say "who is this....this challenge," and "whose am I."

So today I stand, and I know I am not the only one standing, in the middle of a great host raising cries of hope, but never acting. So today I must change my cry, I must no longer cry to hope, cry to God, but cry out as David did, "I am come in the name of Lord." My faith must become real. My faith must be tried.

The full might of Israel may have been in the army for they are the ones who pursued and crushed the enemy. But the victory of faith was in David, because he stood and rebuked the decay of hopes deferred.

If our God is real and if he is who his promises claim him to be: if my faith is as he said it can be, I must arise and shine for his light has come upon me. I have no more excuses not to run the race and fight the fight of faith. I have no more reasons to build alters to hope, alters that destroy my faith rather than worship the author of the victory.