Part Two, You and you alone

DEVOTION

PSALMS

YOU AND YOU ALONE

Ps 86

86:1 A prayer of David.

Hear, O LORD, and answer me, for I am poor and needy. 2 Guard my life, for I am devoted to you. You are my God; save your servant who trusts in you. 3 Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I call to you all day long. 4 Bring joy to your servant, for to you, O Lord,I lift up my soul.

5 You are forgiving and good, O Lord, abounding in love to all who call to you. 6 Hear my prayer, O LORD; listen to my cry for mercy. 7 In the day of my trouble I will call to you, for you will answer me.

8 Among the gods there is none like you, O Lord; no deeds can compare with yours. 9 All the nations you have made will come and worship before you, O Lord; they will bring glory to your name. 10 For you are great and do marvelous deeds; you alone are God.

11 Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name. 12 I will praise you, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify your name forever. 13 For great is your love toward me; you have delivered me from the depths of the grave.  

14 The arrogant are attacking me, O God; a band of ruthless men seeks my life — men without regard for you. 15 But you, O Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness. 16 Turn to me and have mercy on me; grant your strength to your servant and save the son of your maidservant.   17 Give me a sign of your goodness, that my enemies may see it and be put to shame, for you, O LORD, have helped me and comforted me.

NIV

Day two in this song which has so much about the Almighty God, our Lord and Savior. He is forgiving and good. How could we ever live if our sins were not forgiven? But they are, even David understood that God forgave sin. But we have even a greater understanding because we have Jesus who took our sin upon himself. God does not desire to hold us accountable for our sin.

Rom 4:7-8

7 "Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. 8 Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him."  

NIV

Because of God's abounding love for those who call upon him, Jesus covers our sin. God will never count our sin against us. Now that does not mean we should go about sinning as much as we can, just because it seems like we could. But the fact is as hard as we try not to sin, we are still going to fail at perfection. So then when we do, we call upon God, we seek forgiveness, we make every effort to repent of that attitude, that type of response, that certain behavior that keeps creeping back into our life. In reality all of them are a decision of our will, we decide to commit that sin. We can’t help ourselves as hard as we try, we are subject, almost prisoners to this flesh. Now Hear our cry O Lord, have mercy on us. When we are in trouble, when the tempter is beating down our door, when we feel weak and vulnerable, we call upon you and you hear and answer us. You do not turn away or turn a deaf ear. You are there to talk to us, to give us your voice, your answer for our need. Who else is like you O Lord, who forgives our sin? Who else would love us that much? Who would consider us worthy enough to save? Who can compare to you, to your deeds, your salvation? It seems, at least at the moment, many nations refuse to acknowledge you as God. Many nations worship other gods, even in our nation other gods are present and served. We should learn a lesson from that, and not be tempted to even look at anything as an idol, or god. Yet our youth are being deceived, even some of us, making an idol of some sports figure, an icon of athleticism, or some movie or television personality or entertainer. Then there are all the things, we can so easily get entrapped by. It becomes so easy to boast of our things, or how many places we have traveled to, or on the other hand, how good of steward we are. There are so many ways we can be sucked into the pit of self-indulgence and/or self-aggrandizement. We can even become prideful, even knowing God opposes the proud,

1 Peter 5:5

All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."  

NIV

So we, the nation of God, the citizens of the kingdom of God, will come and worship you, and we will humble ourselves before you.  Someday all the other nations will have to bow their knee before you, because you are God. All their gods will fail them, all their gods are nothing but idols of stone and metal, they cannot answer, they have no voice. They cannot forgive sin, they only serve as an image to worship, You, O Lord are far more than an image; you are the Living God. You alone can do great and marvelous deeds. All the other gods can do nothing. You alone are God. We will proclaim that you are God, you and you alone.