"But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and in His law he meditates day and night."  - Ps. 1:2 (NASB)      The writer uses and interesting term in relation to his feelings toward the Word of God: delight. The Hebrew word "chêphets" means something that is valuable, desirable, and pleasant. **   It is very interesting to me that David, the man the Bible calls a man after God's own heart, had such fond feelings for God's Word. Personally I do not believe this is a coincidence. It is hard to love the LORD and not love His Word. The Word of God, the Bible, reveals the LORD to humanity. I shows us what He is like (to a degree), what He desires, and how He works within humanity. It also shows just how much love He has toward us in the death of Jesus. Honestly, how can we not have delight in His word as David did?    Looking back at my own life, the times when the passion for serving God died down is tied directly to my time spent reading, studyi...

"Praise the LORD? Praise the LORD from the heavens;" - Psalm 148:1 (NASB)    If it difficult to read through any of the individual Psalms in the collection without seeing the term "praise," and the task is impossible in this one. When it comes to praise, the Psalmist leaves no one and nothing out: angels, hosts, sun and moon, waters, fire and hail, snow and clouds, mountains and hills, creeping things, kings, and the list goes on. It is almost as if the Psalmist is trying to tell us that it is the responsibility, the purpose of creation to praise the LORD. If that is what you gather from reading the Psalm, then we agree. However, some interesting questions start to come to our mind, such as, "How can snow praise the LORD?", or "How do the mountains praise the LORD?", since both of these are non-living items. The answer lies in the meaning of the word "praise."    We tend to think of praise as singing songs or speaking good of, b...

"Answer me quickly, O LORD, my spirit fails…" - Psalm 143:7 (NASB)    Patience! That word alone generates all kinds of emotions within us. Many of us have heard, if not said it ourselves, "Don't pray for patience, for God will send trials on you that will teach you patience." While I am not so sure about the theological implications of that kind of prayer, it is apparent in each of our lives that patience is needed. If you read the entire Psalm 143, you will find that David is a wreck. We cannot be certain exactly what he was facing, but it involved his enemies, or the enemies of God, and it brought great pain into his life. When he uses phrases like, "crushed my life" , "dwell in dark places" , "my spirit overwhelmed within me" , and "my heart is appalled" , it is apparent that he is devastated on the inside. The sum total of his current situations brought him to the ground. It is during this time he cries out, ...

"Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity!" - (Ps. 133:1, NASB)    I am not a huge social media guy, except when it comes to posting things about the LORD. With this said, over the last month I have either joined or been invited to numerous groups on a social media site. Since these are groups I have joined, most of the time I agree with the items that are shared regardless of who they are from. There will always be the occasional nuance that will cause some disagreement, but as a whole we agree. Among these groups I also find that there are those whose opinions of Biblical things are far different from mine. This does not surprise me, for we see this in our local churches. Then there will be the quote or statement that demands that some well-meaning individual come to rescue with Scripture to show the brother or sister the error of their ways. In all honesty, I have no problem with any of these, for I believe that the LORD has given ...

"My soul cleaves to the dust; Revive me according to Your word." - (Ps. 119:25, NASB)    Psalm 119 is one of the two most well-know in the collection, and retains the title of the longest. At 176 verses, it covers an entire five pages in the Bible I am looking at this moment. Besides the length of this Psalm, one of the most glaring facts that stand out is the focus on God's Word. When we use that terminology today, we are referring to the Bible, the entirety of Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. In David's time, the NT was not written, neither were many of the writings among the prophetic collections, and some others. David uses various terms in referring to God's Words: law, ways, statutes, commandments, testimonies, and precepts, and others. However, each refers to the inspired directive that comes from God. So, even though David did not have access to the collection of books we have today, we can still refer to all of these as the Word of God. At its co...

"You are the God who works wonders; You have made known Your strength among the peoples." - (Ps. 77:14, NASB)    Christians believe the Bible to be God's inspired word to mankind, and rightly so. There are a good handful of reasons that we can boldly proclaim the Bible to be the only inspired writing. Among these would be the unity of the writing through the hands of 40+ different authors in over 1,500 years of writing, the historical, geographical, and archaeological factual information, the fulfillment of prophecies, and others. However, to me at least, the most important is the "wonders," the supernatural manifestations and miracles that accompany the Bible. All the other reasons are vastly important, but miracles tend to be personal in nature as God does something mighty in an individual, family, or group of people. They also tend to get people's attention. This is one reason why Jesus told His followers "signs will accompany those who have be...