Teach me, O LORD, the way of Your statutes,
And I shall keep it to the end.
Give me understanding, and I shall keep Your law.
Indeed, I shall observe it with my whole heart.
Make me walk in the path of Your commandments,
For I delight in it.
Incline my heart to Your testimonies,
And not to covetousness.
Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things,
And revive me in Your way.
Establish Your word to your servant,
Who is devoted to fearing You.
Turn away my reproach which I dread,
For Your judgements are good.
Behold, I long for Your precepts;
Revive me in Your righteousness.

Teach me . . . the way. So how does God teach me? I used to wish God would speak to me in an audible voice. I wanted Him to tell me exactly what to do next. “Now it’s time to wash a load of clothes. OK, now you need a a little rest and relaxation. Read that book you got from the library. You’ve read long enough. It’s time to start cooking supper.” Well, I don’t get those kinds of instructions. The teaching God gives is more challenging; He requires me to think and to apply what I read in His word and to follow the example of Christ as I make both large and small decisions about what to do next and how to do it. It’s the same way I teach my children, really. I give them general instructions, but I leave the decisions about how to implement those instructions more and more up to them as they become older and more responsible. I’m aiming for children who know how to take the initiative to do what is right even when I’m not stnding right behind them. Still I make them walk in the path sometimes when they stray. I try to incline their hearts to listen to me and, ultimately, to God. I turn their eyes away from worthless things. I “feed” them God’s word to “revive them in righteousness.”

Give me understanding. ‘Splain, please. Make it clear to me what I should do, and I will do it–with my whole heart.

Make me walk in the path . . . for I delight in it. Isn’t there a contradiction here? If I delighted in God’s path, wouldn’t I walk in it without having to be forced? Well, no. As Paul said, “For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. . . . O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God–through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:15b, 24-25)

Incline my heart Tip the scales in the direction of obedience to You, God. I need Your help to even want to do what’s right.

Turn away my eyes from worthless things. “I count all things loss . . . that I may know Him and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” (Phillipians 3:8, 10-11) Blogs, worthless. TV and movies, worthless. Books, worthless. Stuff, worthless. If I can’t turn my eyes away from any of them, I am in danger of idolatry. All these things and more are gifts that God gave us to enjoy, but all must assume their proper place in submission to the Lordship of Christ.

Your judgements are good. Do I really believe that God is good all the time? That He knows what He is doing when my friend’s husband dies leaving five children behind to be cared for by a single parent? That He is good and merciful when He allows evil terrorists to murder thousands on September 11 or fifty on July 7? That His judgements are good in allowing children to suffer and die in Sudan and in Zimbabwe and in tsunamis in Asia and in hospitals here in the U.S.? When I see these things and ask why, I need to be revived in righteousness. I need Him to give me understanding.