Overflowing Praise

DEVOTION

PSALMS

OVERFLOWING PRAISE

Ps 119:169-176

169 Taw

May my cry come before you, O LORD; give me understanding according to your word. 170 May my supplication come before you; deliver me according to your promise. 171 May my lips overflow with praise, for you teach me your decrees. 172 May my tongue sing of your word, for all your commands are righteous. 173 May your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. 174 I long for your salvation, O LORD, and your law is my delight. 175 Let me live that I may praise you, and may your laws sustain me. 176 I have strayed like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I have not forgotten your commands.

NIV

Day twenty-two and the last stanza in the longest psalm. Once again as throughout this whole psalm David mentions the word, God’s promise, his decrees, his commands and his precepts along with salvation and his law. He has covered all the bases, every aspect of the character of God, especially his righteousness. Everything about the character of God is righteous. So we too seek understanding from the word of God. Mankind makes so much effort trying to understand the world we live in. They search for understanding in the name of science. They research the earth in an effort to find understanding as to how we became human, our origin, seeking for that premortal soup and single cell we emerge from. They endeavor to understand the cosmos and how it came to be, using theories rather than fact. The list is far too large to enumerate all that mankind wants to understand. How this is made or where does it come from or what is it made of? How does it work? Why is it here? Why are we here? What can we learn about this or that? But the fact is God’s word is the only source of true understanding and many people refuse it for their own supposed knowledge of the truth. The word of God is the only true source of understanding. He gives us all the truth we need for life, real life, and life eternal. But more than that, his word gives us understanding of how we came to be and why we are here and what we are to become. So we come to him with all our supplication, our entreaty of his graciousness, as the Hebrew word means. So we come to him for everything from his hand of graciousness, his character of graciousness. He is gracious to us, he gives us understanding, truth and life eternal. But more than that he gives us his promise. He delivered us from death. He delivered us from being the walking dead and living in the darkness. How horrible that was before we saw his light. We thought we were happy and we thought we had understanding, but we were living in an illusion, as are those people who live now outside the word of God. We will continue to praise the Lord to the point that our praise overflows from our lips. So often life is filled with chitter chatter of stupid things as most social media content serves as the evidence. Who has not entered into conversation that does not include the weather, a sports team, or sports figure? Who has not heard the latest gossip about who did what, when, where and why? But how many times have people spent time with praise overflowing from their lips? Maybe praise about what they did, but how much about the gracious qualities of God? How often do we hear words about aches and pains, or difficulties being faced or troubles people are having? But how often do we hear praise overflowing from their lips? Then we look introspectively and ask are we like that, or do we praise him to the point it overflows from our lips? Let the praise begin, let us fill the earth with his praise until it overflows into all creation from our lips. Let it be from our lips to the ears of God. The reason we live, that he lets us live is so we can fill the earth with his praise. So we can be witnesses of his gracious character. We have strayed from that purpose at times, but we reaffirm our desire to fill our lives, the lives of people we touch with overflowing praise of his graciousness.