Daily Encouragement

June 20, 2010 - Working With The Right People

Meditation on Psalm 101

Traditionally this psalm has been attributed to King David. He was a king who understood the heart of God. He ruled Israel with justice and righteousness. Therefore God blessed Him and in fact made Him the ancestor of the Messiah.

From this psalm we find that David declared His own pledge to walk uprightly before the LORD. He wanted God to walk with Him. (v. 2)

He promised God that he would set nothing wicked before his eyes. He would not associate himself with those who were not faithful, but had a perverse heart. He would destroy the slanderers, the proud, the deceitful, the liars, and the evil doers. He could not stand any wickedness.

In his early administration, he had a great leadership team recorded in the Bible. As a result, his kingdom was prosperous and revered by all neighboring countries.

So it is today in our organization, we must assemble the righteous team. We want to work with the people who are dependable and trustworthy.

I knew of one pastor who took step to chase out the unregenerate influence in the church when he first took over it. He openly pointed out the shameful way of some members who asked for donation of money. He refused to accept donation that was from unholy source. After a few years, the church grew to become one of the largest churches among Chinese. The leadership from that church eventually went out to build other churches too.

Know who you are working with. Build them up in the mercy and justice of God. Then you will always praise Him. (v. 1)

June 21, 2010 - Recording God's Faithfulness

Meditation on Psalm 105

Faithfulness is God's character and what He expects from us. God is always dependable. He never changes though His method of dealing with man may change. Thus we must obey Him with faithfulness. One of the ways to learn faithfulness is to remind ourselves His faithfulness by recording His faithfulness.

The first fifteen verses of this psalm was composed by King David when he placed the ark in the tabernacle.(1 Chronicles 16:7-22) Here in psalm 105, he or other psalmist illustrated further the faithfulness of God to His people in history.

Throughout the multiple teaching of this psalm, I find some precious gems which are so helpful to me personally. Perhaps you may feel the same:

Seeking God is so very important. "Let the hearts of those rejoice who seek the LORD! Seek the LORD and His strength; seek His face evermore!" (v. 3b-4 NKJV) Whether God will show up in your life or not is depending on how urgently you seek Him.

"He remember His covenant forever, the word which He commanded, for a thousand generations, the covenant which He made with Abraham, and confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant" (v. 8-10) God's promise never fails. What he said regarding Israel and Abraham will be fulfilled for sure. Through Abraham those who come to God by faith will also be blessed by His promise of faithfulness.

"He permitted no one to do them wrong; yes He rebuke kings for their sake, saying 'Do not touch my anointed ones, and do my prophet no harm.'" (v. 14-15) These verse tells me that nothing can harm us without God's permission. For we are also His anointed ones. (1 John 2:20, 27)

Verse nine tells us that the word of the LORD tested Joseph, the son of Jacob. Indeed, he received God's promise to him in a dream when he was young. But we can see how many trials he had gone through time and time again before He finally became the prime minister of Egypt. If you are under severe testing today, be of good cheer, God has great future for you. Keep holding on to Jesus' promises.

God is faithful. He remembers His holy promise. (v. 42a)

June 22, 2010 - The Lord Of David

Meditation on Psalm 110

King David wrote, "The LORD said to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool.'" (v. 1 NKJV) Who was his Lord? From the context of this psalm, we know that it was definitely referring to Messiah, the future King who shall rule over all nations.

The Jews in Jesus' day recognized that the Messiah is the son of David. (Matthew 22:42) Following that text, we find that Jesus asked the Jews, “why is it that David called the Messiah Lord if He is David's son?” No one was able to answer Jesus.

Praise the Lord, we have the answer. The Messiah is also the Son of God. And this Son of God is Jesus who is the Christ, the Messiah.

Revealing form this most significant psalm, the Messiah is not only the Lord and King whose people are volunteers, He is also an eternal priest according to the order of Melchizedek. (v. 4)

This is referring to the Genesis account of Abraham's encounter with the priest from Jerusalem after his great battle to rescue his nephew, Lot. (Genesis 14:18f) The book of Hebrews links this priest to Jesus. (Hebrews 7) So our Messiah is not only the King but also the Priest who made a perfect sacrifice for us forever so our sins can be forgiven and we can come into the presence of God. (v. 3-4)

The rest of this psalm is a prophecy of the Messiah King who shall destroy all His enemies and shall reign triumphantly. The book of Revelation affirms that.

In the light of such great promise, Christians should have assuring hope in Christ. We should continue to worship Him now in the beauty of holiness. (v. 3) Our Messiah Jesus is our King and our Priest. We can come before Him freely. Let us meditate upon this fact and receive His strength.

June 23, 2010 - A Call To Praise

Meditation on Psalm 113

In Hebrew tradition, Psalm 113 and 114 are to be sung before the Passover meal. Together they exhort God's people to praise Him for His care for them in historical past and the continuing present. There are three sections with three verses each.

The first three verses call His servants to praise the LORD. God's servants are those He has redeemed. We should praise him NOW and forevermore! We should praise Him universally. We should praise His name.

The second section tells us why we should praise Him. God is transcendent above all. He is glorious. He is incomparable. Yet he humbles Himself to watch over us and the things around us.

The third section emphasizes that God cares specially for the underclass and the despised ones. He lifts them up to sit with the nobles. He grants barren women with children so they can be joyful. Hallelujah!

This psalm gives us hope and joy. This psalm teaches us that we need to praise God all the time. This psalm reminds us God's character so we can learn from Him.

June 24, 2010 - Blessings From God's Word

Meditation on Psalm 119:1-16

Psalm 119 is a unique poem. It is divided into 22 sections with eight verses each. Each verse of each section begins with a word of the same Hebrew alphabet. The first word of all eight verses of the 22 sections of this psalm follows the sequence of the 22 Hebrew alphabets.

Since this psalm is the longest in the Bible, let us study only two sections of sixteen verses total each day in order for us to meditate upon them carefully.

The first group of eight verses begins with the first alphabet of Hebrews, א (Aleph).

When we walk in the law of the LORD and seek Him with the whole heart, we are blessed, the psalmist tells us. What does it mean to walk in His ways? We would do no iniquity and keep His precept and statutes diligently. The psalmist knows that this is what has commanded us to do so he asks God to direct him so he would not be ashamed but praise God for learning it. He realizes that it is not easy, thus he beg God not to forsake him. We must pray and do what the psalmist does.

The second section of eight verses begins with second alphabet, ב (Bet/Vet).

These verses tell us the blessings of God's word to help us get cleansing from sins. When we hid God's Word in our hearts, we will not sin against God. In return, the psalmist blesses God and praises Him! He wants to talk about God's judgments. He rejoices in God's testimonies as much as he rejoices in riches. He therefore determines to meditate upon God's Word and memorize them.

May we follow such course.

June 25, 2010 - The House Of God

Meditation on Psalm 122

This happy psalm by King David illustrated the joy of going to the house of God. This was one of the song of Ascents sang by the travelers to Jerusalem or by the priests as they went up the staircases in the place of worship. I believe this is a prophetic psalm composed by David under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. There are spiritual implications to all of us.

How happy we should be to stand within the gate of our church, which is our spiritual Jerusalem where the people of God gathered in whom God's presence dwells. (v. 1-2)

Our church should be like the ancient Jerusalem that was built compact together where all elected peoples of God love each other and have very close fellowship with one another. (v. 3)

There are thanksgiving to God and judgment by God in the church of God. (v. 4-5)

We are commanded to pray for the peace and prosperity of our church. (v. 6-7)

For the sake of our church and the welfare of our brothers and sisters in Christ, we need to pray for the peace of Israel and Jerusalem today. (v. 8-9)

June 26, 2010 - Dealing With Sin And Guilt

Meditation on Psalm 130

Once a while we would hear or read story about people voluntarily confessing how they had wronged others or had committed a crime many years ago. I ran into this kind of confession several times too. One American missionary to Chinese wrote a letter to a former classmate who was a Chinese to ask for his forgiveness for making some seemed to be discriminating remark long time ago during college days. All these show us that guilt is a powerful feeling in human life no matter it is great or small matter.

Psalm 130 is one of the songs of ascent. This traveler to Zion was bothered deeply by his own sin and guilt. His song which was sung by the Israelite shows us that it is a common problem we must deal with.

"Out of the depths I have cried to You, O LORD;".(v. 1 NKJV) The psalmist cried and pleaded for God's redemption and forgiveness realizing that no one can stand under God's judgment. (v. 2-3) But there is forgiveness with God so that man may be awe for His mercy. (v. 4)

He waited for God's removal of his guilt like a guard who watched for the morning. (v. 5-6)

This psalm can be applied to a person and to a nation. It can speak to the redemption of God to cover our guilt at all time even to the future. (v. 7-8)

We can rest assure of God's removal of our sins and guilt as we wait upon Jesus who had died for our sins on the cross. Trust in Him to cleanse our conscience and give us peace as we confess our sins before him. (Hebrews 10:19-23 and 1 John 1:9)