Thursday,
October 28, 2021
Joyful are people of integrity, who follow the
instructions of the Lord. Joyful
are those who obey his laws and search for him with all their hearts. They do not compromise with evil, and
they walk only in his paths. You
have charged us to keep your commandments carefully. Oh, that my actions would consistently reflect
your decrees! Then I will not
be ashamed when I compare my life with your commands. As I learn your righteous regulations, I
will thank you by living as I should! I will obey your decrees. Please don’t give up on me! Psalm 119:1-8
If you’ve ever had a peek at what’s underneath
the keyboard on your laptop you have some concept of how complex and powerful
are the devices that are the shapers of lives and worldview these days. If you’ve seen a microchip, the little
silicon-based brain of the computer, you have glimpsed a model of your brain,
and a grand overlay to understanding the simplicity of faith. You have the perfect metaphor for
understanding what the Psalmist wrote about the integrated life.
Living a life of integrity in God’s world is not
just a good idea, it is commanded. God
charges (or commands) those who would be approved in Heaven with having a daily
integration of their thoughts, heart-felt desires, and actions all synced with
Scripture. Let’s see if we can open that
metaphor’s motherboard and see what the Psalmist was saying to 21st
century minds.
The integrated circuit (or chip) is the basis for
how a computer’s function serves to tie information strands together. If there is a breakdown, or mis-match, the
error messages will cover your computer’s screen view. It’s not a happy time. I say this from much frustrating experience.
In the same way that a computer with a virus is
destined to degrade and eventually return to the plastic scrap heap, a life
that is not integrated with the Creator’s design will come unglued.
The Psalmist ties together joy and
integrity. Much like the satisfaction
you feel when your computer turns-on, boots-up, and works like it was created,
so the human creature is designed by the Father to operate in the realm of God’s
law and love. Compromise with evil is to
corrode the system. Searching for God’s
ways (in God’s Word) is paying careful attention to the owner’s manual. If you don’t do that the “garbage-in/garbage-out”
paradigm will be fully realized.
The tie-together of this metaphor (and our
relationship with God) is humility.
At the close of this passage (verse
8), the Psalmist prays: Please
don’t give up on me. This is
much like depending on updates for your software. As conditions change, and spyware gets more
creative to invade the integrity of your computer equipment, so the enemy of
Heaven is always on the prowl[1] to destroy your walk with God. A daily walk with Christ is like a computer software
update, correcting that which has wandered, instructing that which has been
asleep, and recharging the spiritual batteries.
For You Today
Three times in this Psalm the writer uses a phrase that gives
us a key to living a joyfully-integrated life; he says I WILL. Power to live that life is always a matter of
God’s grace, the gift of love. But that
power never comes to those who do not choose to accept it.
You chew on that as you hit the
Rocky Road; have a blessed day!
[1] Title and Other Images: Pixabay.com Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
[1] See 1 Peter 5:8
