Samuel D. High
sdhigh@aristotle.net
-----Original Message-----
From: "Smith, Lynn " <lsmith20@Central.UH.EDU>
Sent: Sun, 20 Jul 2008 09:35:57 -0500
To: "Smith, Lynn " <lsmith20@Central.UH.EDU>
Subject: Morning Manna July 21-BP: Ps. 119:97-104; RBTTY: Acts 23:1-15; Ps. 29-30
July 21 “Sweet Rumination”
“O how I love Your Law! It is my meditation all the day. . .How sweet are Your words unto my taste! Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth.”
Psalm 119:97 103
The more we know Him and the deeper we love Him the sweeter is Word becomes to us.
Righteous rumination.
That’s really what the psalmist is talking about in today’s Manna when he says “It (God’s Word) is my meditation all the day.” The Hebrew word “siyach” is used here for “meditation” and also means “reflection, devotion, prayer, contemplation, communication, discourse, etc.” And, since Ps. 119 is a personal testimony, it’s clear he’s talking about private, not public, worship where he gets alone with the God of Abraham and experiences an intimate “communion-union” with Him.
Isn’t this a wonderful picture, dear Pilgrim?
Assuredly it is. And, reality that same intimacy is available to us if we’ll simply make it a priority in our lives (Mt. 6:33). We should not be surprised that Jesus was/is a “morning Person”—quite often “rising up a great while before day and going out to a solitary place to pray” (Mk. 1:35).
Why did He do this?
Simply because there were less things/people to distract Him. And, as He knelt there in the darkness. . .while all the world slept. . .and the moon and stars He’d created shone overhead. . .He could commune with His Father and bask in the love He has for all of His creation.
Until we fall in love with Christ, we will not fall in love with His Word. We’ll always be too busy to pause and pray, having a “fast food drive-in” mentality as we go hurry-scurry here and there. And, then we wonder why we’re so frazzled, fretting and fuming much of the time.
“Be still and know,” Pilgrim (Ps. 46:10).
Cease-and-desist from your frantic and frustrated ways. Find a place each day where you can get alone with the Heavenly Father and let Him love on you (and vice versa) as He whispers to you His Word. Soon, you’ll find it a delicious part of your life—yea, a time you look forward to each day as you rendezvous with the One Who loved you enough to die in your place on the Cross and then rose again to assure you that you’d never have to face life alone again. Hallelujah!!
The psalmist didn’t view his “quiet time” as a perfunctory square to be filled; instead, he saw it as a “pleasure to be enjoyed.” The “fringe benefits” of this time helped him to “be wiser than his enemies” (v.98) and have “more understanding than all his teachers” (v.99a). Likewise, his “hiding God’s Word in his heart” (Ps. 119:11) kept “his feet from every evil way” (v.101) by recognizing the devil’s snares before he fell into them. May His Word to the same for us and be “sweeter than honey” to us today.
Thanks,
Mr. Lynn M. Smith
Department Business Administrator
Department of Economics
204C McElhinney Hall
(713) 743-3802 (office)
(713) 743-3798 (fax)
LSmith20@central.uh.edu (email)
http://www.class.uh.edu/econ/ (department website)
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