Abandonment Restored

Introduction:

We see in the Psalm at the end, how David states, “God you will not abandon me to the grave.” We see something of God’s care for his elect people or person. In the Bible there isn’t a half-way saved person. There is not a half-way lost person. The Scripture is clear that people are either in 2 camps. One, those who are in God’s kingdom, and those who are outside of it. Those who are saved, and those who are unsaved. And the entry point being faith in Jesus. Pleasure and faithfulness in one camp and abandonment and eternal lost-ness in the other camp. In this Psalm, as we go through it today, keep in mind this fact. And especially as we consider the benefits and faithful care of those, who are restored from being abandoned.

Abandoned means, being alone, being left to our own resources, and power and ability and our own righteousness, and our own intellect and our own friendships and our own wisdom and our own natural situations. Many times, abandoned means, feeling rejected IF we are not able to measure up to our circumstances, our own family, our own community and our friends, in our own powers, and when we fail at it, we feel that we must run away, because we feel unloved, and unaccepted and unwanted. And ultimately we feel also that our failure is reflecting on our failure to please God as well.

The Reversal: But Jesus came to reverse this, and to restore it completely and to have us know that we are accepted in the providence of God in sending Jesus to make us adopted heirs of every resource of God to be applied into our life, and especially the knowledge of being loved by God, continually and without repentance or change and that this can be permanent, if we really want it.

Faithful to Preserve

Read Psalm 16:1-6, “

1  Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge.

2  I say to the LORD, “You are my Lord;

I have no good apart from you.”

3  As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones,

in whom is all my delight.

4  The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply;

their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out

or take their names on my lips.

5  The LORD is my chosen portion and my cup;

you hold my lot.

6  The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;

indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.

God is faithful to preserve you, once you become his child.

We can come to God, and take refuge in him. We can love him and tell him, that he resembles good.

King David, then looks to the kingship and explains how those who are doing right, and good, that they also bring him pleasure. Great pleasure, in who, all his delight is in. Kings and rulers, actually always delight in the people in their ruler-ship of those who are submissive to the ruling powers. The rulers delight in them. You can see it.

But, in a spiritual sense, when you become a child of God, you become pleasing to him, and you become, to him, someone whom God delights in completely.

God is faithful to preserve you, he is faithful to provide his righteousness to you, to enable you to be pleasing to him.

David has tasted God’s goodness and then states: There is no pleasure that other gods actually bring that gives a complete satisfaction - when idolatry is practiced, it’s philosophy, so the thought, is manifested in it’s ordinances and religious acts and it is a different religion.

Our actions reflect what we believe. David said that he will not partake in the actions that portray definitive allegiance to other gods. Some actions are neutral, but this is definite. David will not partake in religious acts that involve a different teaching, outside of Israel’s divine word of the prophets or law of Moses. He will not take the names of other gods, on his lips. Yahweh, alone will be the God who he is only and completely allied with and committed to.

He goes on to state that it is a volitional decision of his, that he has said that the LORD, Yahweh, is is chosen portion and his chosen cup and that God alone would be the one to hold his life. He will not be held by sins, unbelief and faulty and false doctrines that would cause libations and religious rites, and speech of other gods or deities, to be on his tongue.

David explains that in doing this, that the blessing of God has seemed to fall upon his life, to make his life, in God, pleasant, and making God his inheritance, it has also made his life beautiful, in the divine sense.

Faithful to Counsel

Psalm 16:7-8, “

7  I bless the LORD who gives me counsel;

in the night also my heart instructs me.

8  I have set the LORD always before me;

because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.

Can you imagine this please - God has reversed your situation, when you became a child of his. He has changed your heart, and you see sin more clearly. And then, he takes it as his own employment and work, to instruct you and to counsel you.

From abandonment, to direct and filial care for counseling you in the right paths, and in the right ways for your life, and counseling you in the true doctrines of himself. God is faithful to counsel you. While you sleep, to work in your life. To renew your mind, even while you are sleeping. The heart being instructed, by the eternal Spirit, the 3rd member of the Trinity. You are awakened, and he leads you, and it seems natural to you, but it is God doing it, if you are his child. You see, this is the opposite of being abandoned by him in life. We are restored, if we belong to him, from abandonment in life, and we are restored from being abandoned by him, in death as well.

Look what David here says - God, because you are with me, in life, I will not be shaken. And this also applies to David, making God his God. David set the Lord, always before him.

Faithful Care Even through Death

Psalm 16:9-11, “

Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices;

my flesh also dwells secure.

10  For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol,

or let your holy one see corruption.

11  You make known to me the path of life;

in your presence there is fullness of joy;

at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

When we have entered the life of being redeemed. When we have been born again. This is a benefit. Our abandoned state becomes an accepted state. And it also includes that God will be faithful through our own death. Death isn’t going to bring it’s intention into our life. Our death will be the doorway, to our resurrection life that already is existing in us, when we were born again. The Holy Spirit, if he is in you, will be your life after death. He is the eternal life. It has already begun. And god’s watchful eye in your life time that keeps you unshaken in life, will be the watchful eye’d care that also leads you through death. That is why the Bible says, that before being saved, we feared death, and rightly so, but after being saved, the fear of death, has in a sense just melted away, because of the faithful care of the Holy Spirit in our lives, comforting us and assuring us of our redemption and the joy of our full salvation.

David says, therefore, these truths, make his heart glad, and his whole being to rejoice. That is why saints sing, and that is why believers praise, and that is why there is a redemption from abandonment to a life of being secure in God.

Trust him today, will you?

God bless!