Psalm 40 Many Will See And Trust In God

Daily Bible Study for Tuesday August 23, 2016

By: Hanny Lynn Stearns

Fish N Loaves Ministries, Inc.

“Multiplying God’s Word Around The Globe”

Chapter Reading for Today: Please read in your Bible before proceeding. Note that most translations are considered paraphrases. The Young’s Literal Translation provides a more accurate translation since he is the one who authored a concordance. Others are helpful for seeing a different perspective, but we cannot always depend on their wording. I hope this is helpful to you. If you are studying in another version, that is fine. I am studying from the KJV, but for the purpose of this study, I will keep it with the New King James Version.

One final note: I will put the scripture in italics to differentiate from my own writing. I am adding red to the letters when it is Jesus talking – just like the Bible. Thank you.

Bible Gateway Verse of the Day

Psalm 94:18-19

If I say, “My foot slips,” Your mercy, O Lord, will hold me up. In the multitude of my anxieties within me, Your comforts delight my soul.

Psalm 100:4

Enter into His gates with thanksgiving,

and into His courts with praise.

Be thankful to Him, and bless His name.

Song: Fishers of Men   By: Newsboys

Psalm 40

Many Will See & Trust In God

The first three verses of this Psalm have long since been my life verses. They are a wonderful and precise testimony of what the Lord has done in my life. As a result of all that He has brought me out of, I am here today to proclaim to you His goodness in the land of the living when I could have perished long ago – glory to His name forever! Let’s pray…

Heavenly Father;

Thank You for all You have done for me and so many others. Lord, You indeed take the song of blues out of our souls and replace them with songs of praise to Your glorious and powerful name! Bring glory to Yourself in this study today. Reveal Your truth to us. Bring more and more people to see and fear and place their trust in You through this Bible Study. Father, I ask You to think through my mind, love through my heart and use my hands to pen the words of love straight from Your heart. May this message go out unhindered and unchecked by any outside force or my flesh. Give me the utterance to say only what You want said. Lord, as we learn we will make it our goal to please You by being doers of Your word and not hearers only. Thank You for always watching over Your word to perform it in our lives when we trust and obey You! We give You thanks and praise for what You will do in our hearts today as a result of Your word to us in Jesus name. Amen.

What I have done is take the verses of this chapter and put them into a different order, starting with “what’s happening now” and proceeding from there. It is a way to help us see chronologically what happened and what the results were to the Psalmist’s prayer, finishing with what God has done and how people respond to His wonderful goodness. I have seen Him bring me up out of a pit so deep and dark I thought I was never coming out alive. I have seen Him perform miracles in my life I never dreamed I would see. And the thing is, God does not reach a hand down out of the sky to do things for us.

He supernaturally maneuvers things in our lives for us by giving us favor, protection, wisdom, guidance and direction through His Holy Spirit inside of us. When we surrender our lives to Him and stop trying to do things our own way, He is able to move heaven and earth in our favor and cause things to happen – wonderful things, that we never could have even imagined – glory to His name forever. Let’s look at the sections of scripture in this Psalm as if it were us who were living this out. For many of you, like me, it will be real because you have lived it out. May you bask in the warm memories of all that the Lord has done for you as you meditate on these scriptures.

What’s happening now

¹² For innumerable evils have surrounded me; my iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of my head; therefore my heart fails me.

In these verses we see the Psalmist admitting that he is overcome by evil and he has so many sins on his own head that he can’t even count them. I was the same way. In fact, I had so many unconfessed sins I didn’t even realize the half of them until Holy Spirit began to bring them to light. Maybe you know what I am talking about. Before we really surrender our lives to the Lord, we can be doing a lot of things that seem quite ok to us. In reality, we are sinning bad and don’t even know it because we are walking in darkness. Even Christians can walk in darkness when they are living more to the flesh than to the spirit. When we get saved, remember that our flesh does not get born again – only our spirit does. So we still have to crucify the flesh daily.

You can view my blog posted earlier today that has to do with addiction. The same issue we all have to face every day is – to crucify our flesh. We have to deny ourselves. But many do not see what they do not see when they are just running to church on Sunday’s and going home and living like the devil the rest of the week. It is happening all around the world. Some folks even go to multiple masses every day and still live in a great deal of darkness. The person who wrote this Psalm was well able to identify with the words. So can I.

When I was going to church all those years I was still doing things in my life that would not please the Lord. And I did these things even as I professed to be a Christian and love the Lord. I didn’t understand much back then and am still learning today. We should always be learning. Here’s the thing. We need to be continually seeking the Lord to make sure that we are in good fellowship with Him. We must be very sensitive and tender to Holy Spirit to be sure that we haven’t missed it – and if we have, the quicker we confess and repent, the better. Then we can go from there.

When I first surrendered to the Lord in 2005, this after already being saved, I began to be shown the multitude of my sins. I did a lot of crying and asking the Lord to forgive me. I really had no idea of the ways I had sinned. Some things of course I did know, but there were other things I did not realize were sin. Praise the Lord for His tender mercy. He didn’t show me everything all at once. I am still seeing things in my life that need to be improved on. He will continue to show us more and more correction as we go if we are willing to listen and obey.

Asking for help with the enemy

¹⁴ Let them be ashamed and brought to mutual confusion who seek to destroy my life; let them be driven backward and brought to dishonor who wish me evil. ¹⁵ Let them be confounded because of their shame, who say to me, “Aha, aha!”

This is a good example of asking the Lord to be the one to deal with our enemies rather than us trying execute vengeance ourselves. The Lord told us that He will take care of them. Our job is to love them. I explained in an earlier testimony how the Lord worked out the enemy tactics in my place of employment and brought me into a broad place of His favor and protection. He is faithful. 

If we will stand back and allow Him to do His part while we faithfully do ours, we will see Him move things for us in ways we could never have imagined. We don’t need to camp on this too long. Suffice it to say that when the enemy is breathing down our backs, we need to take the authority that we have been given over them and in the natural – where people are concerned, just love them.

The request for help

¹³ Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me; O Lord, make haste to help me!

¹⁷ But I am poor and needy; yet the Lord thinks upon me. You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God. ¹¹ Do not withhold Your tender mercies from me, O Lord; let Your lovingkindness and Your truth continually preserve me.

Our Psalmist was calling on the Lord to come to his aid. He knew that his state was that of desperate need, and even spiritual poverty. He was able to recognize the qualities of God that are mentioned here to be his reason for asking. He knew God would be his Helper. I remember asking the Lord for help when things were very desperate in my life. Long before I knew anything about living in the supernatural and what my legal rights as a Christian truly are, I found out that I could call on the Lord. 

He never disappointed me. The only prayers that I have not seen answered are the ones that were not prayed properly or in line with His will. When we look at this Psalm, we should all remember how merciful, loving and kind our God really is. Jesus was and is living proof of His undying love for all mankind. Praise His name forever.

What God does not require

⁶ Sacrifice and offering You did not desire; my ears You have opened. Burnt offering and sin offering You did not require.

Let’s look at this which really explains it and ties everything together with what has been said in this very Psalm so perfectly – praise the Lord!

Hebrews 10:1-18

10 For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect. ² For then would they not have ceased to be offered? For the worshipers, once purified, would have had no more consciousness of sins. ³ But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. ⁴ For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.

⁵ Therefore, when He came into the world, He said:

“Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me.
⁶ In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure.
⁷ Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come—
In the volume of the book it is written of Me—
To do Your will, O God.’”

⁸ Previously saying, “Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them” (which are offered according to the law), ⁹ then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second. ¹⁰ By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹¹ And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹² But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, ¹³ from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. ¹⁴ For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

¹⁵ But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us; for after He had said before,

¹⁶ “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds I will write them,” ¹⁷ then He adds, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” ¹⁸ Now where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.

God isn’t looking for man to make sacrifices for their sins. Jesus was sent to deal with all of man’s sins – once and for all. We need to confess our sins and ask the Father in the name of Jesus to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness…

1John 1:9

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Friends, it does not get any easier than this. When we have sinned, we go to the Lord and ask for forgiveness. Jesus did all the work. We don’t have to do anything but confess, receive our forgiveness and allow the Lord to show us what we need to do in place of what we have been doing. I never appreciated Jesus as much as when I surrendered my life to His lordship. It was then, as I began to see my many sins that I started to see the amazing and ultimate sacrifice He made for me. It took me years to fully understand that when the Bible says I am forgiven, I really am forgiven. It is done – washed under the blood. God forgets it and I need to as well. Praise His name forever!

My response to God for what He did for me

⁷ Then I said, “Behold, I come;

In the scroll of the book it is written of me.

⁸ I delight to do Your will, O my God, and Your law is within my heart.”

Did you see the similarity of the scriptures – this one compared to the verses in Hebrews. It was Jesus who delighted to do the Father’s will. The law of God was in His heart and He came to fulfill the law. He did not come to do away with it. It was and is the Lord’s delight to do the Father’s will – and it should be the desire of every single Christian on the planet today. We need to come willingly to the Lord. That is where it all begins.

If we do not seek Him, He will not force Himself upon us – He is a perfect gentleman. If we delight to do His will, He will step in and act on our behalf. He will come to our aid in every need. He is so faithful! The Lord has put the law on the heart of every man. The question is, how do we respond to it? That’s where the rubber really meets the road.

Jeremiah 31:33

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

When I was wandering around in my crisis, there was something deep inside of me that longed for God. Deep inside His spirit was calling me to come. But I had to make the choice – I had to delight to do His will and go. He took it from there. Praise God!

Here’s what happened…

I waited patiently for the Lord; and He inclined to me, and heard my cry.
² He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps.
³ He has put a new song in my mouth—praise to our God; many will see it and fear, and will trust in the Lord.

These three deeply meaningful verses are the ones that touched my heart the most when I first started studying the Bible. They spoke the loudest to me because it summed up what I had been through and what God has done for me. I was in a pit so deep that no one, including myself could get me out. He heard me when I cried to Him saying, “Oh God, I’m a mess. Will You fix me?” It was that simple prayer in honest sincerity that took me from being a lukewarm Christian living in sin and according to the flesh to one who desired the deep things of God. Hallelujah!

The place I was in was so horrible I shudder to even think of it. I find it hard to believe it really happened now. It has been 13 years ago that it all started and it has been over 9 years since I arrived in Florida, waiting to see what God would do with me. I can tell you that I have not been disappointed. When He brought me here He opened the windows of heaven and the blessings have poured out beyond anything I could have imagined – praise His name forever!

What I did because of what God did for me…

⁹ I have proclaimed the good news of righteousness in the great assembly; indeed, I do not restrain my lips, O Lord, You Yourself know. ¹⁰ I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart; I have declared Your faithfulness and Your salvation; I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth from the great assembly.

When we get saved, or when we come back to the Lord after backsliding – whatever the case may be, our actions should reflect an abrupt change – for the better. For me, I couldn’t stop talking about the Lord and telling people about Him. As I have grown in my walk with Him my passion to tell the world about all that He has done for me has been my heart’s greatest desire. I live to tell the story about the Savior who came from glory as the old song says. He has done so much for me. I was a rock bottom mess. 

No one would give me the time of day, and I had nothing but the air in my lungs and a desire to leave this nasty old world. I had made such a mess of things and I could see no light at the end of a long dark tunnel. But the Lord had a much better plan. Hence I write today. I’m here to tell you that we serve an awesome, loving, merciful and gracious God. He wants all of us to get saved and set free to do His kingdom work – all of us.

Blessed for trusting God…

⁴ Blessed is that man who makes the Lord his trust, and does not respect the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.

This verse says it all. When it comes to being blessed, we who trust in God certainly are – hallelujah! You can make a list of the many blessings you experience because of your trust in the Lord.

God’s thoughts toward His children…

⁵ Many, O Lord my God, are Your wonderful works which You have done; and Your thoughts toward us cannot be recounted to You in order; if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered.

How many people really realize how much the Lord is thinking of them? I did not know this myself for a long time. The devil will go to great lengths to convince people of some really stupid stuff. He will lie and tell them God is not really thinking about them or that He is too busy. Sadly, people believe this nonsense. But if we look at what God told us in His word, we see a different story altogether…

Psalm 139:17-18

How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them!  If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with You.

How is that for a number? More thoughts than the number of the sand? Hmmm…..If anyone doubts that God is always thinking of them after reading this, then there is a more serious problem that must be dealt with. And what kind of thoughts does the Lord God think of us…

Jeremiah 29:11

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.

If you have been struggling with thoughts of doubt about the Lord thinking of you perhaps you can post these verses up around your house so that you can see it often. Say them out loud. Faith comes by hearing!

Let it sink down into your heart and soul. He really does love you and think of you (and me) all the time. Nothing is too big for the Lord – nothing.

What everyone who seeks God should do…

¹⁶ Let all those who seek You rejoice and be glad in You; let such as love Your salvation say continually, “The Lord be magnified!”

In the end, we who seek the Lord will come away rejoicing because we will never be disappointed. Let’s look at the Jeremiah verses a little further…

Jeremiah 29:12-14

Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. ¹³ And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. ¹⁴ I will be found by you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive.

All that a person has to do is seek God, through His Son Jesus Christ, and they will not be let down. God reveals Himself to those who seek Him. But He is also known as the God who hides Himself. In other words, He does not manifest His presence to those who are not looking for Him. He is there. He is everywhere all the time. But for those who seek the Lord, they will find the wonderful treasure in Him and never be disappointed at what they discover. He is so good and He does so many good things for His children. He is good all the time, yes He is!

Now that we have taken a look at the verses today, I invite you to break them down for yourself. Look at each line that we have in this study. Even remove my words and then just meditate on them and allow the Lord to speak to your heart. Allow Him to calm you and as you draw close to Him, He will draw close to you…

James 4:8

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Finally, do not bring to the Lord a blemished sacrifice. Rather, offer to God a humble and repentant heart. He will hear you when you pray to Him. Go to the Father in the name of Jesus and He will forgive you and set you on a whole new course. He wants to bless you greatly. Look at this verse…

Psalm 84:11

For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory;
No good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly.

Questions:

How did each line of these verses speak to you personally?

Which verse(es) mean the most to you?

Explain why they mean what they do.

In what ways have you expressed your gratitude to the Lord for all He has done for you?

Have you been telling others about your testimony?

If not, list the reason why and take it to the Lord.

Did you know that there are people all over the world who are in desperate need of this message of salvation and hope? 

Who can you share this with?

There are three main points to consider from today’s study…

God will respond when we seek Him sincerely

When we wait patiently for the Lord, He can change the song in our hearts from the blues to praise

A saved and rejoicing heart will tell others about what the Lord has done for them

                                          Let’s pray…

Heavenly Father,

Thank You for taking me from the blues to praise! You are so good and so merciful. Lord, show me who I can tell the good news of the gospel to. Bring people to me who will listen to my testimony and turn to You for their hope and salvation. Thank You for all You have done for me Sir. I am one grateful person. I desire and delight to do Your will and share Your love with the hurting world around me. Bring glory to Yourself in me Lord in Jesus name. Amen!

How much praising have you been doing lately?

And God Said… You fill in the blanks.

Luke 5:10b

And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men.”