Deal Bountifully With Your Servant

Gimel

¹⁷ Deal bountifully with Your servant, That I may live and keep Your word.

¹⁸ Open my eyes that I may see Wondrous things from Your law

¹⁹ I am a stranger in the earth: Do not hide Your commandments from me.

²⁰ My soul beaks with longing For Your judgments at all times.

²¹ You rebuke the proud-the curse, Who stray from Your commandments

²² Remove from me reproach and contempt, For I have kept Your testimonies.

²³ Princes also sit and speak against me, But Your servant meditates on Your statutes.

²⁴ Your testimonies also are my delight And my counselors. Psalm 119:17-24

Deal bountifully with your servant. Life and obedience are closely connected (see Luke 10:28).   This is the point Christ was trying to make to the lawyer that stood up and tested Him by asking, “Teacher what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”

Christ then illustrated the point in the true to life parable of the good Samaritan.  You see God gives us directions for the work He wants us to do.

Eli the Priest was wrong in many things, but he was right in the way he taught young Samuel to prayer, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening” (I Samuel 3:9 NASB).

But, first we must open our eye, or rather have God open them for us that we may see the wondrous things from God’s law.  Daily our prayer should be that God would remove whatever it is that covers out eyes, that keeps us from penetrating the deep things of God with our natural perceptive powers.  We in our natural state do not understand the things of God, but when the Spirit of God comes upon us, He will reveal that things to us that are necessary to our salvation.

Because of this association with the Spirit of God dwelling within us, we are not at home on this earth, instead we long for a better home.  Therefore we are sojourners as Christ was upon this earth.  Our stay here on temporary, for heaven is our home (Hebrews 11:13, 14).

But being a sojourner, a wanderer on this earth we need a chart or map to guide us. This the Psalmist finds in the commandments of God.  God’s law and commandments give us the road map to achieving the character of God, at least as far as it is possible for sinful man to achieve, and then guides us along the path to heaven.

Yet, daily it seems that our souls are overwhelmed with a longing desire for a better understanding of God’s judgments.  God delights to satisfy such yearnings for as Matthew in his gospel puts it when he quotes Jesus by saying; “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6).

The proud are self-sufficient and refuse to walk the way of God’s commandments. The humble know that “the way of man is not in himself.”  Jeremiah the prophet says O Lord, I know the way of man is not in himself; It is not in man who walks to direct his own steps.  O Lord correct me, but with justice; Not in Your anger, lest You bring me to nothing (Jeremiah 10:23, 24).

Although we do not earn salvation, for it is a gift given to us from God by the shedding of Jesus blood. But when I understand this and desire from my heart to follow you and all your commands, then remove from me reproach and contempt, for I desire to keep your testimonies out of love and not out of duty.

Although others, even in high places may speak against me, nevertheless I will be your servant and meditate upon your statues.  Psalm 1:1 states Blessed is the man Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, Nor stands in the path of sinners, Nor sits in the seat of the scornful.  But instead of doing these things, I find your testimonies are also my delight and they are my counselors.

Never should our life be modeled after the ungodly or should we conform to those who speak against us.  Our focus should instead be upon God and His Son, who have sent the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth, precepts, command, and testimony and give us the strength to resist evil.

Therefore I will rejoice and be glad that my sojourn on earth is short and God has redeemed me and removed from me reproach and contempt, because I desire to do your will and have a relationship with you on earth and in our heavenly home.

Please dear Lord, deal bountifully with Your Servant