May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Psalm 19:14 NLT
Psalm 19 seems disarmingly simple on the surface. It also seems to have a split personality. It starts out talking about nature, and then suddenly moves to talking about Scripture, and just as suddenly to a prayer. Some scholars propose that at least two originally separate poems have been put together for some obscure reason.
But I want to suggest that there is a common theme running through the psalm, one that is profound. That theme is the revelation, the Word, of God. It starts with nature. What can nature, which has no words, tell us about God? A great deal, actually. It can tell us of the inescapable reality, the glory, of the Creator. It can tell us of his power, his order, and his magnificence. It can tell us of his providence. But what of his nature? Is he a force or a person? What of his character? Is he good? What of his purpose in creating? Are we just random sparks flying up from his wheel?
To answer questions like those, we need speech, inspired speech. Fortunately, that is what we have in the Bible. There we learn that just as he is orderly in nature, so is he in his desires for us. (Look at the beautiful order of those couplets.) He has a plan that humans need to follow, but everything he asks of us is for our benefit. He is true, he is clean, he is love, he is the source of joy. Following his path is the way to our flourishing.
So we hear God speaking through nature and through the Scriptures. But is that all? Is God’s Word merely abstract truth? Or can we know it as a life-changing personal reality? Yes, we can! But sin can prevent that. Sin, the determination to chart our own way, to break our own trails. If we will not allow God to alter that attitude, the words that come from our lives will not be life-giving, but death-dealing. So the Psalmist begs God to purify his heart so his words will be, in the end, God’s words to a lost world. What about you? What are the words of your life revealing? Life or Death?
Called To Be Transformed 