“Deal bountifully with Your servant, that I may live and keep Your word.” Psalm 119:17.

“…with Your servant” it is the servant of God who speaks here. God’s servants are the believers in the Old Testament and the Christians of this present age described in the New Testament. Unbelievers are not servants no matter what they call themselves.

“These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves; they are clouds without water, carried about by the winds; late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots; raging waves of the sea, foaming up their own shame; wandering stars for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.” Jude 1:12-13.

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.” Matthew 7:21.

“But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do the things which I say?” Luke 6:46.

The people described above have never accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior but have created a god who is conformed to their own image of what they think God should be.

Unfortunately too many Christians are like those in the last example in Luke 6:46, they cry out “Lord, Lord,” yet they do not do what Christ tells them to do. Consider the verse below carefully.

“…if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved…” Romans 10:9. New American Standard Bible.

All Christians will confess that Jesus is their Lord and that they believe in their hearts that God raised Him from the dead.

However most of us mouth the words Jesus is Lord without realizing what it really means until years later, while some of us never understand this.

A Roman centurion came to Jesus to implore Him to heal a beloved servant. When Jesus was about to go to the centurion’s house the man said this to Him:

“The centurion answered and said, ‘Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me. And I say to this one, “Go,” and he goes; and to another, “Come,” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this,” and he does it.” Matthew 8:8-9.

How much more should the servants of the Lord Jesus Christ be constant attendants to do His bidding?

“…knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.” 1 Peter 1:18-19.

It has taken years of training in the worldly traditions of aimless conduct to bring us to where we were when we received Jesus as our Savior, oftentimes it may take years to throw off its bondage.

Yet we can still confess our sins and cry out to our Father in heaven:

“Deal bountifully [abundant mercy] with Your servant, that I may live and keep Your word.” Psalm 119:17.

It is God’s bountiful, abundant mercy that lifts us up when we fall and gives us life so that we may grow in Christ and become a more gracious servant to Him.

“Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?” Romans 2:4.

The next 2 verses shown below were discussed in Psalm 119:18-19, posted on 4-19-23 and will not be taken up here.

“Open my eyes, that I may see wondrous things from Your law. I am a stranger in the earth; do not hide Your commandments from me.” Psalm 119:18-19.

“My soul breaks [is crushed] with longing for your judgments at all times.” Psalm 119:20.

This is not the judgments that come to mind as in judging men, rather, this is a man whose soul longs to learn more of the precepts of God so that he can more perfectly serve Him.

This dovetails with our discussion of Psalm 119:17 wherein God’s abundant mercy surrounds us as we cast off the old man and grow more Christ-like day by day.

“You rebuke the proud – the cursed, who stray from Your commandments.” Psalm 119:21.

Rebuke means among other things to chastise, afflict, or punishment. In this case God rebukes “the proud – the cursed”, think of that, these people are cursed for deserting God to follow Satan.

The words, “who stray from Your commandments” indicates that the straying is a willful act, a knowledgeable act, not ignorance.

Those who stray are not passive, too often they are in our government, college professors, elementary school teachers, scientists and others all of whom deny the existence of the Creator God, destroying the faith of many.

“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress [hold down] the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest [evident] in them, for God has shown it to them.” Romans 1:18-19.

“Remove from me reproach and contempt, for I have kept Your testimonies.” Psalm 119:22.

“I have kept Your testimonies.” Too often Christians who serve the Lord wholeheartedly become the victims of the jealous or the ungodly who accuse them of saying or doing something without a shred of proof. And as if that were not enough they heap contempt upon God’s servants unceasingly.

This is why the obedient Christian cries out, “Remove from me reproach and contempt”. These vicious people are attacking God, not the Christian! And so the Christian turns this over to God.

“Princes also sit and speak against me, but Your servant meditates on Your statutes.” Psalm 119:23.

Ungodly princes and men of station or importance will speak out against well known pastors and teachers.

However, even Christians of no renown or importance in the eyes of the government can come under their evil gaze. Even now the government is trying to characterize Christianity as domestic terrorism.

But what is the Christian’s response to the reproaches of godless men?

“But Your servant meditates on Your statutes.” It is better to meditate on God’s word for answers than it is to waste your time arguing with toothless dogs.

“Your testimonies also are my delight and my counselors.” Psalm 119:24.

The delight in finding something new in the Scriptures that you have never seen before can give you a real thirst to learn more.

The more you learn, the more you will realize that our Father is a loving Father who is near, not an austere God who is terribly busy running creation.

Your testimonies are my counselors. As I look back I see so much of my life was wasted on chasing shiny objects and making immature decisions which could have been avoided if only I had paid closer attention to the Scriptures as my counselors to show me the right path.

The Bible is your owner’s manual, use it, it will save you a great deal of misery and regret.

“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Psalm 119:105.

Psalm 119:17-24 taken from godisrevealed.com posted on 4-23-23.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version, copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission, all rights reserved.