God's Sovereignty Over Our Desire
Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 5 viewsNotes
Transcript
33 Instruct me, O Yahweh, in the way of Your statutes,
That I may observe it to the end.
34 Cause me to understand, that I may observe Your law
And keep it with all my heart.
35 Cause me to walk in the path of Your commandments,
For I delight in it.
36 Cause my heart to incline to Your testimonies
And not to dishonest gain.
37 Cause my eyes to turn away from looking at worthlessness,
And revive me in Your ways.
38 Cause Your word to be established for Your slave,
As that which produces fear for You.
39 Cause my reproach which I dread to pass away,
For Your judgments are good.
40 Behold, I long for Your precepts;
Revive me in Your righteousness.
We must ask God to make us desire His way.
“Your statutes, Your law, Your commandments, Your testimony, Your word, Your judgments “
12 There is a way which seems right to a man,
But its end is the way of death.
2 A fool does not delight in discernment,
But only in revealing his own heart.
God’s word can be twisted.
1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
2 And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry.
3 And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”
4 But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.’”
5 Then the devil took Him into the holy city and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple,
6 and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written,
‘He will command His angels concerning You’;
and
‘On their hands they will bear You up,
Lest You strike Your foot against a stone.’”
7 Jesus said to him, “Again, it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
15 and consider the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you,
16 as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Scripture should be rightly studied, rightly understood, and rightly applied.
15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.
9 holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to reprove those who contradict.
We must ask God to direct our affections toward His testimonies and dishonest gain.
36 Cause my heart to incline to Your testimonies
And not to dishonest gain.
7 For the overseer must be beyond reproach as God’s steward, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not addicted to wine, not pugnacious, not fond of dishonest gain,
8 but hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, righteous, holy, self-controlled,
9 holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to reprove those who contradict.
10 For there are many rebellious men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision,
11 who must be silenced because they are upsetting whole families, teaching things they should not teach for the sake of dishonest gain.
We must ask God to cause our eyes to turn away from looking at worthlessness and to revive us in His ways.
37 Cause my eyes to turn away from looking at worthlessness,
And revive me in Your ways.
*fading riches
4 Do not weary yourself to gain wealth,
Because of your understanding, cease!
5 Do you make your eyes fly up to see it? But it is not there!
Because it certainly makes itself wings
Like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.
This does not mean that we do not work to provide for our families. In fact scripture says that we should work and strive to even be able to be generous to others.
28 He who steals must steal no longer, but rather he must labor, performing with his own hands what is good, so that he will have something to share with one who has need.
But we must not be like the man in the parable in Luke
16 And He told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man was very productive.
17 “And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?’
18 “Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.
19 ‘And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come; take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”’
20 “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you prepared?’
21 “So is the one who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
false idols
9 Those who form a graven image are all of them futile, and their desirable things are of no profit; even their own witnesses fail to see or know, so that they will be put to shame.
10 Who has formed a god or cast a graven image to no profit?
11 Behold, all his companions will be put to shame. The craftsmen themselves are mere men. Let them all assemble themselves, let them stand up, let them be in dread, let them together be put to shame.
12 The man crafts iron into a cutting tool and does his work over the coals, forming it with hammers and working it with his powerful arm. He also gets hungry and has no power; he drinks no water and becomes weary.
13 Another crafts wood, he extends a measuring line; he outlines it with a stylus. He makes it with planes and outlines it with a compass and makes it like the form of a man, like the glory of man, so that it may sit in a house.
14 In order to cut cedars for himself, he takes a cypress or an oak and raises it for himself among the trees of the forest. He plants a fir, and the rain makes it grow.
15 Then it becomes something for a man to burn, so he takes one of them and warms himself; he also kindles a fire to bake bread. He also works to produce a god and worships it; he makes it a graven image and falls down before it.
16 Half of it he burns in the fire; over this half he eats meat as he roasts a roast and is satisfied. He also warms himself and says, “Aha! I am warm; I have seen the fire.”
17 But the rest of it he makes into a god, his graven image. He falls down before it and worships; he also prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god.”
18 They do not know, nor do they understand, for He has smeared over their eyes so that they cannot see and their hearts so that they will have no insight.
19 No one causes this to return to his heart, nor is there knowledge or understanding to say, “I have burned half of it in the fire and also have baked bread over its coals. I roast meat and eat it. Then I make the rest of it into an abomination; I fall down before a block of wood!”
20 He feeds on ashes; a deceived heart has turned him aside. And he cannot deliver his soul, and he cannot say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”
*vainglory (fake weight Illustration):
The New Bible Dictionary, Third Edition I. In the Old Testament
‘Glory’ generally represents Heb. kāḇôḏ, with the root idea of ‘heaviness’ and so of ‘weight’ or ‘worthiness’. It is used of men to describe their wealth, splendour or reputation (though in the last sense kāḇôḏ is often rendered ‘honour’).
VAINGLORY, vān-glōʹri (κενοδοξία, kenodoxía): “Vainglory” is the tr of kenodoxia, “empty glory” or “pride,” nearly akin to vanity in the modern sense (
I like the old word vainglory more than the one pride. It gives us a more deep and accurate description.
Glory is weighty. There’s substance to it. A vainglory has all of the looks of true weighty glory but is is empty.
In powerlifting, your goal is too lift as much weight as you can 1 time. People often will video themselves at the gym going for a new PR (personal record). But you can buy fake weights that look real weights. You can put weight on the bar and make it look like you are lifting 500 lbs when in reality there’s very little weight there. That’s what our vainglory, our pride looks like. We have nothing truly to boast in. Scripture says to boast in the Lord.
7 For who regards you as superior? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?
We must ask God to revive us according to His ways.
37 Cause my eyes to turn away from looking at worthlessness,
And revive me in Your ways.
Quicken thou me in thy way; quicken me to redeem time, to improve opportunity, to press forward, and to do every duty with liveliness and fervency of spirit.” Beholding vanity deadens us and slackens our pace; a traveller that stands gazing upon every object that presents itself to his view will not rid ground; but, if our eyes be kept from that which would divert us, our hearts will be kept to that which will excite us.
Henry, Matthew. 1994. Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged in One Volume. Peabody: Hendrickson.
38 Cause Your word to be established for Your slave,
As that which produces fear for You.
The promises of God established.
39 Cause my reproach which I dread to pass away,
For Your judgments are good.
Being hated by the world for what we believe and do.
40 Behold, I long for Your precepts;
Revive me in Your righteousness.
