Three Powerful Phrases

Meditation
Psalm 86:11—Teach me Your way, Yahweh, and I will live by Your truth.  Give me an undivided mind to fear Your name.
 
King David’s prayer request is one of my favorite passages in the Bible and was my key verse for 1994.  When we break it into its natural three phrases there is so much we can apply.

“Teach me Your way, Yahweh . . .” There is no shortage of teachers in the world but the only way that I care about (devoting my life to) and want to be sure to understand is Yahweh’s way.  He is the Teacher of all teachers, unique and omniscient.  

• “His work is perfect. . .”  Deuteronomy 32:4 
• “His way is perfect. . .”  2 Samuel 22:31, Psalm 18:30 
• “The instruction of the LORD is perfect. . . Psalm 19:7 
• Romans 12:2 instructs us to conform to “the perfect will of God. . .” God’s way is perfect!  What He teaches is exactlywhat we need; the precise manner to live.  

           
 “I will live by Your truth.”  

•  “Yahweh is a compassionate and gracious God . . . rich in faithful love and truth.”  Exodus 34:6 
• “Guide me in Your truth and teach me. . .”  Psalm 25:5, 
• “All the LORD’s ways show faithful love and truth . . .”  Psa. 25:10
• “Your constant love and truth will always guard me.”  Psalm 40:11 
• “The works of His hand are truth and justice.”  Psalm 111:7 
• “The entirety of Your word is truth. . .”  Psalm 119:160 
• “Therefore love truth and peace.” Zechariah 8:19
• “But anyone who lives by the truth comes to the light. . .” John 3:21, 
• “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”  John 8:32 
• Jesus testified, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”  John 14:6
• The Holy Spirit is the “Spirit of truth”John 14:17 
• “Stand, therefore, with truth like a belt around your waist. . .” Ephesians 6:14
• “God has chosen you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and through belief in the truth.”  2 Thessalonians 2:13
• Titus 1:1 reveals that knowledge of the truth leads to godliness.  From these passages we can validate David’s focus on living by God’s truth!  God’s way and His truth are inseparable—we cannot have one without the other.  Notice that Jesus welded way, truth and life together—a clear and unmistakable pronouncement of His deity.  To follow Jesus and obey Him is to know God’s way and therefore to live by His truth.  

We will not discover God’s will (way + truth) haphazardly or half-heartedly.  Scripture is a direct key to wisdom and the more we immerse ourselves in it—committed to sound, contextual application, the more we will comprehend how to walk.

“Give me an undivided mind to fear Your name.”  Reverence for God is a strong theme throughout the Bible. It is a direct proof that we are centered in God’s way.  “The fear of the LORD is what wisdom teaches” (Proverbs 15:33).  David knew that the obstacle to following God’s way and living by His truth was a divided mind.  

How we live our life reveals who or what we really let influence us.  We want to do what is right in God’s sight and to please Him but every minute of every day our minds are seduced by other masters. We miss time in the Word consumed by work.  We set aside study for pleasure.  Slowly over time the habits we set in cement bear the handprints of worldly teachers.  The Lord who graciously wants us to understand His way and walk by His truth so that we might revere Him and be blessed is obscured by the voices of a million distracters.  What we need is to make David’s brilliant prayer our own sincere cry to Yahweh. Following the Word isthe way, the truth, and the revering life. Something to think about . . . in reveration.  
 
Inspiration
The Bible is a whole library of literature giving us the final interpretation of the truth, and to take the Bible apart from that one supreme purpose is to have a book and nothing more; and further, to take our Lord Jesus Christ away from the revelation of Him given in the Bible is to be left with One who is open to all the irreverent slanders of unbelief.—Oswald Chambers in God’s Workmanship
 
©2017 Daniel York  ARR. Reveration is the weekly devotional ministry of First Cause.  If you would like to receive these devotionals go to www.firstcause.org and click on the “Click here to receive weekly devotionals” box.  Unlimited permission to copy this devotional without altering text or profiteering is allowed subject to inclusion of this copyright notice.      
 
Ecclesiastes 12:10-The Teacher sought to find delightful sayings and to accurately write words of truth.  (Holman CSB)