Lilac Ministries

Bible Study Lessons

Sunday, February 17, 2008

Scripture: Psalm 37:23-40

Topic: God’s Law within Our Heart
 

But the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord; He is their strength in time of trouble. The Lord helps them and delivers them; He delivers them from the wicked and saves them, because they take refuge in Him.

The Psalms have frequent references to the blessings that will be bestowed upon those who live righteous lives. Most of us realize this cannot be taken too literally. Many a righteous person has ended up in bad circumstances. So where is the truth in these scriptures? I think it is better that we embrace such passages as “probability” more so than “guarantee.” In other words, when we lead righteous lives, our daily relationships and circumstances are more likely to be blessed and prosperous than if we lead selfish or evil lives.

Another difficulty with passages that proclaim blessings upon the righteous is that we don’t always sense the inner presence of God within our hearts. This can be true even when we feel we are “doing the right things.” If worry or depression is prominent in our daily lives, our problems become much worse. We can begin to feel guilty about NOT sensing Christ's close presence and then begin thinking that there must something fundamentally wrong with ourselves or our faith lives.

One helpful tool in such situations is to deliberately remove our focus from how we “should be feeling” or “naming and claiming the promise.” Instead, we should invest more emotional and spiritual energy in generating a faith-hope that something good is in front of us, even if we can’t see it right now. The more we focus our thoughts on the faith-hope that God will make something good of our situation (Romans 8:28), the more likely we are to find His strength and encouragement during our times of trial.

God’s Law (His presence) in our hearts is our primary source of spiritual strength. He often uses our failings to help us out of our pits of despair. Sometimes it takes a rough edge in the cliffs of our lives to get a good toehold for the climb upward.

If you are discouraged, disheartened or guilt-ridden today, I pray that you might find that toe-hold in the rough side of the cliff. Then, when you have a firm grip and footing on the Solid Rock, I pray God will nurture your budding faith-hope into a strength that is more than sufficient to sustain you on your climb upward.