A Cry for Help

Tuesday the 28th of November

in Meditations I

Psalm 119:173, 174

    It was the pride that Satan worked into Adam's and Eve's hearts that moved them to commit man's first sin. Man was moved to desire to be like God and not remain a servant of God. And every sin that we commit is due to that sinful pride that is in us from the day of our birth.

    Salvation, therefore, requires the removal of that pride. If we are going to be saved from breaking God's law, we must be humbled by the truth that He is God and that we were created to serve and praise Him as God. That is why the psalmist wrote in Psalm 119:173, 174: "Let Thine hand help me; for I have chosen Thy precepts. I have longed for Thy salvation, O Lord; and Thy law is my delight."

    God's hand must reach down and save us. We are like a drowning man with nothing on which to stand and in need of a hand that will lift us up out of the water and certain death. A cry for this comes out of a humble heart that wants to be lifted out of the sea of sin. Born again, we long for salvation; for God's law is our delight. We do have the old sinful nature, the old man of sin, but also the principle of new life that wants to keep God's law and to praise Him as God. And God, Whose hand put that new life in us, must reach down and strengthen it.

    We can see that hand of God more clearly than the psalmist. For we can see Christ, God's right hand, and the pouring out of His Spirit that works in us this prayer as versified in our Psalter:

    For Thy salvation I have longed,
    And in Thy law is my delight;
    Enrich my soul with life divine,
    And help me by Thy judgments right.

    We must have a divine life in the sense that we must be given the same sinless life that God's Son had when He came in our flesh.

    Try to keep God's law in your own strength, and you will not only fail but will drown in added sins. Look instead to Christ Who is not only God's Hand but also sits at God's right hand with power over everything in heaven and on earth. He will lift you completely out of sin into everlasting sinlessness in the day of His return. Cry to Him for help. In God's grace He will give it to you.

Read: Psalm 130 
Psalter versification: #342:3
(Words and Music of the Psalter)

Daily Meditations on the Heidelberg Catechism

Song for Meditation: Psalter #53
Why not sing along??

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Through the Bible in One Year
Read today:
Daniel 5:1-31 
2 Peter 2:1-22 
Psalm 119:113-128 
Proverbs 28:19-20 
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Quote for Reflection:

"God the Father not only gives his Son but also pours out his Spirit. The reference is to Pentecost (Acts 2:17, 18, 33). Organically speaking, the Spirit was poured out upon the church of the present and of the future; for, that Spirit having once established his personal residence in the church, never leaves it again. Hence, Paul can say, ‘whom he poured out upon us.’"   ~ William Hendriksen on Titus 3:6


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    Knowing God in His Faithfulness

    Psalm 9:10

        Although it may not look that way because we closed our eyes, yet God is always faithful and can be trusted to do fully all that which He promised us. Even though on a cloudy night we cannot see the moon or the stars, they are there above us in the sky; and it is folly to say that they are not there, just because we cannot see them. Yet so often we go by what our fleshly eyes see or cannot see and behave as though what the eye of faith sees does not exist. For we have closed our eye of faith and judge all things by what our fleshly eye sees.

        David warns us against this when in Psalm 9:10 he writes, "And they that have known Thy name will put their trust in Thee: for Thou, 0 Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek Thee.''  David here uses the name Elohim, the Almighty One, and that name says that all the creatures have strength only when and in the measure that God gives it to them. And therefore knowing God's name means that we know and see Him with the eye of faith as the one Who has every creature large or small, animate or inanimate, in the angel world or in the world of men, completely under His control. They can only do what He eternally decreed that they would do, and what He gives them the strength to do.

        No wonder then that David says that those who know God's name can trust Him and see that He never forsakes one of His children. And with David we can sing:

        All they, O Lord, that know Thy name
        Their confidence in Thee will place,
        For Thou hast ne'er forsaken them
        Who earnestly have sought Thy face.

        Consider then that, since our God is almighty, no one can prevent Him from doing what He promised us, and no one has the strength to make Him change His mind. See Him then in that name, with your eye of faith, as an unchangeably faithful God Who will destroy all your enemies and bring you to glory. And when things look bad, as far as the eye of flesh is concerned, look at Him with the eye of faith.

    Read: Revelation 20 
    Psalter versification: #17:2

    Meditations on the Heidelberg Catechism

    Through the Bible in One Year
    Read today:
    II Samuel 12 
      John 16 
    Psalm 119:65-80 
    Proverbs 16:4-5

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    Quote for Reflection:

    "… And assuredly, when we consider that the sluggishness of our flesh hinders us from elevating our minds to the height of the divine majesty, in vain would God call us to himself, did he not at the same time, on his part, come down to us; or, did he not at least, by the interposition of means, stretch out his hand to us, so to speak, in order to lift us up to himself."  –  John Calvin

    Last modified on 26 May 2019

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