“LORD Give Me Understanding”
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Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
God is said to speak to men in “a still, small voice” (1 Kings 19:12),
This may partially explain why we find it hard to hear him when he speaks. It’s much like receiving a phone call in a house with the T.V. going, the stereo blaring, and a house full of people chatting with one another. To understand the caller, it requires asking the friends to be quiet and turning down the stereo and T.V.
So it is with hearing God. It may well require removing those distractions, those areas of sin that deafen our ears to the voice of the Lord.
Transition To Body
Transition To Body
133 Keep steady my steps according to your promise, and let no iniquity get dominion over me.
134 Redeem me from man’s oppression, that I may keep your precepts.
135 Make your face shine upon your servant, and teach me your statutes.
136 My eyes shed streams of tears, because people do not keep your law.
Body
Body
Worshiper's Experience With The LORD's WORD
Worshiper's Experience With The LORD's WORD
137 Righteous are you, O Lord, and right are your rules.
138 You have appointed your testimonies in righteousness and in all faithfulness.
140 Your promise is well tried, and your servant loves it.
142 Your righteousness is righteous forever, and your law is true.
righteous- accuracy, what is correct, right thing, what is honest
right- straight, stretched; level, smooth; right
testimonies- witness; laws legal provisions
promise = word
proven (well tried) = refined
true- firmness, trustworthiness; constancy, duration; faithfulness
trustworthy and reliable are synonomous
LORD’s testimonies appointed in righteousness & faithfulness
Your promise well tried
Loves the LORD’s promise
LORD’s righteousness is righteous forever
LORD’s testimonies are righteous forever
Worshiper's Affinity Towards The LORD’s WORD
Worshiper's Affinity Towards The LORD’s WORD
139 My zeal consumes me, because my foes forget your words.
141 I am small and despised, yet I do not forget your precepts.
143 Trouble and anguish have found me out, but your commandments are my delight.
144 Your testimonies are righteous forever; give me understanding that I may live.
Consuming zealousness because foes forget the LORD’s words
Does not forget
Delight in the LORD’s commandments
Wants understanding from the LORD in order to live
Be Zealous for what is good!
Be Zealous for what is good!
13 Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?
14 But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled,
15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,
16 having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.
17 For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.
18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,
Hold Fast To The Word of Life
Hold Fast To The Word of Life
14 Do all things without grumbling or disputing,
15 that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world,
16 holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
The WORD of Life is Jesus Christ!
The WORD of Life is Jesus Christ!
39 You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me,
40 yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.
41 I do not receive glory from people.
42 But I know that you do not have the love of God within you.
43 I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.
44 How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God?
Life and have it More Abundantly
Life and have it More Abundantly
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
Transition To Close
Transition To Close
In the movie The Hurricane, based on real events, Denzel Washington plays boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, a man whose dreams of winning the title were destroyed when he was arrested and convicted for the 1966 murders of three people. Carter, serving three natural life terms, channels his frustration and despair by writing an autobiography from his cell.
Seven years after the book is published, an alienated black youth named Lesra (played by Vicellous Reon Shannon) is being taught to read by three white mentors who have taken him into their Toronto home. One of his three friends takes him to a used book sale, where he picks up Carter’s book. Lesra asks, “How do you know which book to pick?”
His friend wisely answers, “Sometimes we don’t pick the books we read. They pick us.”
Lesra finds purpose and inspiration in Carter’s story and begins writing to Hurricane. A mentoring relationship develops, and eventually Lesra’s friends take up Carter’s cause and vow to fight for his release from prison. Carter, at first skeptical of Lesra’s white friends is eventually won over by their compassionate dedication. He later tells Lesra, “Hate put me in prison. Love’s gonna bust me out.”
His twenty-year fight for justice ends in triumphant freedom, and he celebrates the victory with his “little brother”—the young man inspired by his book. Toward the end of the movie, while waiting for the judge’s ruling, Hurricane asks young Lesra, “What was the first book you ever bought?”
“Yours,” he answers.
“Do you think that was an accident?” Hurricane asks.
“No.”
At that moment, young Lesra was no doubt thinking back to the words of his mentor: “Sometimes we don’t pick the books we read. They pick us.”
The Bible is such a book. You can’t read it without getting the sense that it picked you, that the Author had you in mind as he wrote.
Close- If you trust Jesus, then trust the LORD’s Word
Close- If you trust Jesus, then trust the LORD’s Word
105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
11 I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.
5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 He was in the beginning with God.
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
22 Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart,
23 since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;
24 for “All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls,
25 but the word of the Lord remains forever.” And this word is the good news that was preached to you.
16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
24 “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.