Daily Meditations for August 11-20

In this vale of tears and sorrows where we live, our lives are characterized by ups and downs. We can, as children of God, be one minute on the mountain top of faith, and with David confess that God is our light and our salvation. The next minute we can slip down into doubts and perplexities. Then with David we cry out that God hide not His face from us, and put us not away in anger. The reason for this is not that God has changed. It is due to the fact that we still have a sinful nature, and that there is so much in our lives that reveals that in us there is no reason why God should be our light and our salvation. Looking at ourselves we see that there is no reason for us not to be afraid, not of men, but of God's holy wrath. When we fall into sin, we fall down from the mountain top of faith. We read in Psalm 15 that only "he that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness" shall dwell in God's house.

Therefore it is so necessary that we with David pray, "Teach me Thy way, O Lord, and lead me in a plain path, because of my enemies" Psalm 27:11. For God's way is the way of His commandments. The plain path is better translated as the level path, one without ups and downs, but instead one with a steady faith and righteous walk. A plain is a level piece of ground. Mountains may be in the distance, but there are no chasms and canyons on it. And it is when we walk on God's way, which is prescribed in His law, and we know what He demands of us in every circumstance of life, that we will enjoy the truth that He is our light and our salvation. When we walk on the level and do not fall into sin, we will have that assurance that God is our light and salvation. We will know how to please Him, and find in our walk that He has begun salvation in us.

And we need to be taught His way because of the temptations of deceitful Satan and his followers. Well may we then pray and sing:

    Teach me, O Lord, Thy way,
    Make plain to me Thy path;
    Because of foes, I pray;
    Protect me from their wrath:
    To false accusers, cruel foes,
    O, Lord, do not my soul expose.

C. H. Spurgeon: "... vow we made, too, when we united ourselves to the church of God. There was an understood compact between us and the church, that we would serve it, that we would seek to honour Christ by holy living, increase the church by propagating the faith, seek its unity, its comfort, by our own love and sympathy with the members. We had no right to join with the church if we did not mean to give ourselves up to it, under Christ, to aid in its prosperity and increase. There was a stipulation made, and a covenant understood, when we entered into communion and league with our brethren in Christ. How about that? Can we say that, as unto God and in his sight, the vow has been performed?"

August 12

Because God is our light and our salvation, our desire to dwell in His house, and therein behold His beauty, will most assuredly be fulfilled. There are times when it does not look that way. We have enemies exactly because He is our light and our salvation. Those who hate God will hate us and treat us as they treated His Son Who came into our flesh. Using false witnesses, breathing cruelty, they nailed Him to His cross. And in the measure that we reveal Him by walking in God's way, they will mock, torment, yea even kill us, if we do not fall into the temptations wherewith Satan tries to lead us away from a walk of love toward God.

That is why God Himself through David calls us to "Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart; wait, I say, on the Lord." Or as we sing it from our versification:

    Faint-hearted would I be
    Didst Thou not promise, Lord,
    I shall Thy goodness see
    While Thou dost life accord.
    Wait on the Lord, nor faint nor fear,
    Yea, trust and wait the Lord is near.

The truth here is that God will at His own appointed time make us experience fully that He is our light and our salvation. All the attacks of Satan and of the unbelievers only prove this to be true. But we must courageously wait until God sends His Son to resurrect our bodies that for a time lie in the grave, and gives us the fullness of salvation.

Now to wait on the Lord is not being idle, doing nothing. Those about to run in a race wait with their minds alert and their ears cocked so that they hear the signal that starts the race. So our minds must be fixed on that full salvation in the day of Christ when we shall fully know God as our light and our salvation.

Waiting courageously, then, means that we live in God's word. It is not a closed book for us but an open book. We wait with souls that are reaching out for that full salvation. We fear no disappointment or unfaithfulness on God's part. We know He is our light and salvation.

The great art and power of faith consist in seeing that which is not seen and in not seeing that which is nonetheless felt.” Martin Luther

August 13

One of the most precious powers God implanted in the human body is the gift of sight. How rich does not the gift of sight make life! How much would we not miss, if it were taken from us? But spiritual sight is far more precious and important than seeing with the fleshly eye. What the psalmist lifts his eyes to see, and of what he speaks in Psalm 123:1, 2, is of utmost importance. He writes, "Unto Thee lift I up mine eyes, O Thou that dwellest in the heavens. Behold, as the eyes of the servants look onto the hand of their masters, and as the eyes of a maid unto the hand of her mistress; so our eyes wait upon the Lord our God, until that He have mercy upon us.

It makes a world of difference, however, as to how we look unto God. The servants and the maids look to their masters and mistresses as their superiors. They look up to them, realizing that the hands of their masters and mistresses give them what they need. Our versification has it thus:

    To Thee, O Lord, I lift my eyes,
    O Thou enthroned above the skies;
    As servants watch their master's hand,
    Or maidens by their mistress stand,
    So to the Lord our eyes we raise,
    Until His mercy He displays.

The question is whether in our prayers we look to God as the exalted, almighty, sovereign God. If He is not above all creatures, what good is it for us to pray to Him? If we approach Him as though He is our servant rather than our master, we get no blessing, but only add to the reason why we ought to receive more punishment. In fact, then we are not praying to God but to an idol, a mental image we manufactured in our minds.

Our prayers must always be humble requests. We must look up to Him and not down upon Him. Surely then this means that we look to Him through Christ Who is at His right hand and has the universe in His land. In profound and sincere humility we must bow before Him. We must look up to Him as one enthroned above the skies. Prayer requires a humble upward look.

"The object of your study and growth as a child of God is not man and it is not how you feel. The object of your spiritual life is not your feelings... But the number-one priority of the spiritual life is to know God truly, to know God thoroughly, to know God in faith, to know Him reverently, to know Him with unreserved trust, with obedience and love. "Jehovah is my light and my salvation"... Faith is personal. It is the work of God in our hearts. It is the work of the Lord within us, uniting us to Him and giving us personally to stand in attachment, knowledge, and dependence upon Him. You see, faith is not theoretical. It is not merely emotional. It is not merely a system of corollaries, postulates, and principles. It is a knowledge of these things, of the truth of God’s Word. But it is a living knowledge. It is a heart-dwelling knowledge. It is the personal knowledge of faith.... That is why you are on earth right now, child of God. You are on earth to learn about God, to learn of God, to walk with God, to know Him in such a way that you repose in Him, you commit all your way to Him, you obey Him, you submit to Him, and you desire to glorify Him in obedience. Then you may be fearless. That is not recklessness. It is not a vain boast. It is truth. It is the confidence of faith." -C. Haak "He has not given you children and the means to support them, only that you may do with them as you please; or train them for worldly glory. You have been earnestly commanded to raise them for God’s service, or be completely rooted out, with your children and everything else; then everything that you have spent on them will be lost." --Martin Luther

August 14

In Psalm 123:2 the psalmist had said that his eye waits upon God until He has mercy upon him. Now in verses 3, 4 he writes, "Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us: for we are exceedingly filled with contempt. Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of those that are at ease, and with the contempt of the proud."

Now we are not told just what he suffered; but we do know that if we look to God in prayer, and before men confess that He is in the highest heavens, we are going to be scorned and filled with contempt. The world will ridicule us and deny that He created the world and has every bit of it in His hands. In their schools they will not allow prayers to be raised to Him. Soon in the days of the coming antichrist we will be forbidden to pray to Him in our homes and churches.

Then, but also today, there is need for us to pray to God for His mercy to bear that scorn and mockery and pain; we need His mercy to keep us faithful and continuously looking up to Him, never taking our eyes from Him as the God of our salvation, the almighty, sovereign, exalted God Who is high above all creation.

And when the psalmist prays to God until His mercy is upon us, he does not mean that he is trying to wear God out by constant praying till he gets his way. Rather the idea is that when we experience that mercy upon us our prayers are going to be changed to those of praise and thanksgiving.

    O Lord, our God, Thy mercy show,
    For man's contempt and scorn we know;
    Reproach and shame Thy saints endure
    From wicked men who dwell secure;
    Man's proud contempt and scorn we know;
    O Lord, our God Thy mercy show.

In all the ridicule and scorn that we suffer, we need to have God assure us that His own Son was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, in order that He might bring us to heavenly glory and everlasting blessedness.

Herman Hoeksema: "Not creation, not the fall, not the church, not the predestination of the elect, not even the incarnation, not the cross, are first in the good pleasure of God; but the firstborn from the dead, the glorified Christ, is first. He is the firstborn of every creature ..." (Reformed Dogmatics, p. 333).

August 15

A truth which we often brush aside and forget is expressed powerfully in Psalm 139:1, 2, where David writes, "O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising. Thou understandeth my thoughts afar off." Our lives, according to these words of God given through David, are an open book. We can look in only one direction at a time and must often close our eyes in sleep. But God never sleeps and is ever watchful over all His creation. He sees it all in every detail without one moment of ceasing from doing so.

God not only sees our outward deeds but reads the thoughts of our hearts, and He knows what is in our minds. He "knoweth our thoughts afar off." No one ever has or ever can hide one word, one thought or desire, or one action from the everywhere present God. We sing that this way in our versification of these words of David:

    Lord, Thou hast searched me, and dost know
    Where'er I rest, where'er I go;
    Thou knowest all that I have planned,
    And all my ways are in Thy hand.

Realize then what this means for us sinful creatures whose best works even are polluted with sin. Not only does God know everything that we think, will, and do, but He knows how filthy, how sinful all that we do is.

The name David uses here strengthens the awesomeness of this truth. The name Jehovah, which he uses, means I AM! This not only means that we depend upon Him, for we can only say, "I will be, if I am given life"; but it also means that I must constantly serve Him every moment of my life. And it also means that we cannot escape His judgment.

What an awesome truth! What an undeniable evidence it is then that we need His Son and His cross! For only as God sees us in Him, and what He did for us, is there any hope of salvation. His name, therefore, tells us not only that He can and does say, "I am God!" but He also can and does say, "I am your Savior." He sees all our sins, but He also sees us in His righteous and holy Son.

C. H. Spurgeon: "We would ply the Trowel with untiring hand for the building up of Jerusalem’s dilapidated walls, and wield the Sword with vigour and valour against the enemies of the Truth." (from the first issue of The Sword and Trowel magazine, 1865).

August 16

Not only does the name Jehovah literally mean "I AM," and expresses the truth "I am God," but it also means "I am the self-sufficient God, I need no one and have in My self all that I need.'' Further it means, ''I am the everywhere present God." You and I are here or there, but God is everywhere.

That is why David in Psalm 139:3,4 writes, "Thou compasseth my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word in my tongue, O Lord, Thou knowest it altogether." Using the name Jehovah here again, David writes what ought to fill us with the fear of reverence and awe.

So often we behave as though God is miles and miles away from us. We can do this and do that and need have no fear, because God is out of our thoughts, as though He were too far away to see or hear what we do and say. How seldom is it that we can sincerely sing:

    My words from Thee I cannot hide,
    I feel Thy power on every side;
   O wondrous knowledge, awful might,
    Unfathomed depth, unmeasured height!

There should be more of that in our lives. And as those redeemed by the blood of God's Son, we should have a fear of reverence and awe before the God of our salvation. Fear of punishment, because of all the sins He sees in us, must not be the end of our reaction to the truth that He is everywhere present and knows every word in our mouths which expresses the filthy thoughts and desires of our hearts and minds. We must have a deep reverence and awe coupled with a sincere thankfulness. Yes, we should be thankful that His name is Jehovah, and that He is all that which this name declares. For it also means, "I AM your Savior in Christ My Son."

We cannot get away from His searching eyes. Neither can we get away from His infinite love, mercy, and grace. These our everywhere present God has, and these He makes us taste and enjoy. Surely they are of unfathomed depths and unmeasured height. For they are the virtues of the I AM that I AM.

How can we convince our children that God is important, if we never give Him any of our time? How can we pretend to love Him, when we scarcely spend a minute with Him alone? Our children may dutifully learn their rituals, and chant their mealtime grace, “God is great, God is good, and we thank Him for this food”. But down in the heart, where the real attitudes are formed, our prayerless lives have taught another message: “God is great but He can wait; gotta hurry or I’ll be late.” L. Christenson

August 17

Bearing in mind that the God, Whom we were created to serve and called to walk before in love, punishes every sin committed, the first thing that enters our minds when we become aware of our sins is to try, as Adam and Eve did, to flee from that awful wrath. But, since He is the everywhere present God, this we can never do. David expresses that so emphatically when in Psalm 139:7,8 he writes, "Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, behold Thou art there." And our Psalter versification has it thus:

    Where can I go apart from Thee,
    Or whither from Thy presence flee?
    In heaven? it is Thy dwelling fair;
    In death's abode? Lo, Thou art there.

You will notice that our versification speaks of death's abode rather than of hell. The Hebrew word is often translated that way, or, as in Psalm 141:7, it is translated as grave in these words, "Our bones as scattered at the grave's mouth." It really makes no difference, for in death and the grave we are not hidden from God's eyes and have not escaped His awful wrath, and in hell as the lake of fire one is in that awful wrath.

If we keep the word death or grave instead of hell-fire, we still have the word of God condemning the idea that death is the end for man. Never, no never, get the idea that death takes the sinner away from the everlasting punishment which he deserves. One cannot hide from God in his grave. Death does not mean that this is the end of his existence and thus of his suffering the wrath of God. If one makes one's bed in the grave or in physical death, one does not hide from God's Spirit and presence. There just is no way of escape, no possibility of fleeing from God's holy wrath other than through the cross of His Son and in His sovereign grace.

There is no place where man can hide from God's holy wrath. But there is a Person, God's Son, in Whom God hides us, and Whom He punished as our Covenant Head and representative, so that our sins are paid for in full. God's grace does not hide our sins but removes them from us, placing the iniquity of them upon His own Son.

O. Palmer Robertson: "Israel was unique among people of the world in that God himself appointed a priesthood for the nation—with accompanying laws of sacrifice and ritual—which carefully defined the right way to approach God. The laws of the Levitical priesthood, along with its festival days and sacrifices, contained touches of glamour and glory. Colorful robes, impressive ceremonies, feasts, washings, the waving of recently harvested grain, and the chanting of divine benedictions all contributed to the allurement of the priestly order of the old covenant. So it should not be surprising that throughout the centuries the Jewish people have had difficulty relinquishing these treasured ceremonies. They all contributed to making them feel right and good in the presence of God. Furthermore, when the new covenant came along with its minimal ritual, it seemed as though something significant had been lost" (The Israel of God, pp. 53-54).

August 18

In jet aircraft man can travel faster than the speed of sound. But he can never in any way do anything faster than the speed of light. The sun comes up in the morning, and the rays of light swiftly race westward over the face of the earth. Over the sea, that light races unhindered by hills or mountains to a very distant point at tremendous speed.

Way back in the days of David men knew of this speed of light. David spoke of it in Psalm 139:9, 10 in these words, "If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me."

Here David emphasizes the truth that man cannot hide from God or flee from His holy wrath against sin. Wherever we go, we will find that God is already there before we arrive. He does not catch up with us, but He is there waiting for us. We may flee far out into the sea where no people dwell; but God is there dwelling in all His power.

Now, however, David presents another facet of the truth as well. God is not only in all things but He gives life to all living creatures, and existence to the rest. He makes it possible for man to travel from one point to another. Man gets where he arrives because God led him and upheld him. Man depends upon God and continues to live there only as God gives him everything he needs. Our versification has it thus:

    If I the wings of morning take,
    And far away my dwelling make,
    The hand that leadeth me is Thine,
    And my support Thy power divine.

The truth we ought to take hold of here is that in Him we live, and move, and have all our being. We cannot flee from Him; but we cannot live apart from Him either.

We therefore owe Him everlasting thanks for every heartbeat and breath of life. We also ought to see more clearly how worthy of punishment we are, for we have used very few heartbeats and breaths of life to serve Him. What grace then does He bestow upon us that blots out all these millions upon millions of sins through the blood of His own Son!

John Calvin on Hebrews 7:3: "... Melchisedec is not to be considered here, as they say, in his private capacity, but as a sacred type of Christ; nor ought we to think that it was accidentally or inadvertently omitted that no kindred is ascribed to him, and that nothing is said of his death; but on the contrary, that this was done designedly by the Spirit, in order to give us an idea of one above the common order of men. There seems therefore to be no probability in the conjecture of those who say that Melchisedec was Shem the son of Noah; for if we make him to be some known individual, we destroy this third likeness between Melchisedec and Christ ... It seems not to be worth one’s while to refute the delirious notions of those who dream that Christ himself, or the Holy Spirit, or an angel, appeared at that time ..."

August 19

In the first ten verses of Psalm 139 David makes some true and very profound statements. God not only sees every move we make, but hears every word we speak. Yea, He reads our thoughts and is right next to us no matter where we go. Our lives are an open book to Him, and we just cannot hide from Him. We can do nothing behind His back. We cannot cover our sins, nor hide to get away from the punishment we deserve.

And now in Psalm 139:11, 12 David presents another reason why we cannot hide from God. There he states, "If 1 say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from Thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee." And we sing that truth thus:

    If deepest darkness cover me,
    The darkness hideth not from Thee;
    To Thee both night and day are bright,
    The darkness shineth as the light.

How hopeless then escape from punishment seems to us! Yet even in this awesome truth there is tremendous comfort for the believer. Remember that God's Son came into our flesh, and for three hours hung in darkness that could be felt. During those hours and that darkness He suffered the hellish agonies that we deserve, while He in flawless obedience and unwavering love to God brought to God the perfect obedience we failed even to begin to do since the day Adam fell into sin. But God saw it all! The darkness did not hide this marvelous work of our Savior. No, the night shineth as the day. That night did not hide from God's eyes what His Son was doing for us! And it did not escape Him that His Son suffered all this as our Head and representative. He saw His Son bring our everlasting punishment to its end, and the perfect works of love demanded of us brought in full measure.

We cannot hide from God or cover our sins from His view. To try to do so is to add to our guilt and to the punishment we deserve. But God covered them and made a day of light for us, a day when we shall see fully His love and mercy unto us in His Son.

The cross was before Him with all its horrors; the joy of returning to the Father was before Him with all its bliss; yet neither the fearful prospect of woe nor the hope of unspeakable rest and gladness shook His love for His own. He is the same yesterday, and today, and forever, therefore His love never varies. He is eternal, therefore has He loved us with an everlasting love. He is Divine, therefore is His love different from all others, passing human knowledge. (Arthur W. Pink)

August 20

What an awesome truth David now presents to us! He had, as we already saw, made plain in Psalm 139 that we cannot hide ourselves, or even our inmost thoughts, from God Who is everywhere present. He hears every word we speak, is before us and behind us, is in heaven but also in hell, and sees very clearly in the deepest darkness we can imagine. Now in verses 13, 14 he adds the truth that not only is God all around us but also in us! He writes, "For Thou hast possessed my reins; Thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are Thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well."

David confesses here that God was in his mother as he was being formed. And God was also in that body that was being formed, causing all the organs to come into being in the right place, with the right cell structure for the right capabilities. We were, indeed, fearfully and wonderfully wrought by God's hand!

What a truth is it then to commit to memory and to sing as we do in our versification of David's words! They are these:

    All that I am I owe to Thee,
    Thy wisdom, Lord, hath fashioned me
    I give my Maker thankful praise,
    Whose wondrous works my soul amaze.

God does not only know all things that man does, but He made man to be exactly what he is. This presents to us another awesome truth, namely, that we are in debt to God for all the powers and abilities we possess. We are wonderfully but also fearfully made. That means that we were made to live in the fear of reverence and awe before God. We are to be one hundred percent, and in every sense, His possession with an unavoidable calling to serve Him always with all that we have.

Surely there is no room for boasting on our part. Never for a fraction of a moment should we think that He owes us anything. As far as our salvation is concerned, we bring Him nothing; but it and its faith are God's gifts to us. As our versification stated it, we owe Him everlasting praise. He formed us to show forth His praise (Isaiah 43:21).

All (the disciples, MD) are within the sphere of Jesus’ attraction. But the bosom is reserved for, it is the throne of, the Johns. They feel the throbs of the Savior’s heart. They know Him as He knows the Father. Whose is the Gospel that leads to the Holy of Holies, that opens the door into the Lord’s innermost self? I imagine that none but he who lay on Jesus’ breast had the outline of the last discourse and the last prayer complete in its links, complete in its clothing, in His remembrance. The secret of the Lord was with him—“the disciple whom Jesus loved.” (Lang)