Sycamore

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be acceptable in your sight,
O Lord, my rock and my redeemer .  -Psalm 19:14

Today for morning worship I read through Psalm 19, which ends with the above verse.  There’s a lot going on in that psalm, so much so that my Hebrew professor in seminary made us memorize it - in the original Hebrew.  But that last verse is the one that caught my attention this morning.

Throughout the day we use an average of 16,000 words (so suggests a recent study).  How often, when you speak, do you consider what God thinks of what you’re saying?  What interested me wasn’t that the tongue is difficult to control (though it is), but the idea that many of my words leave my lips without my even considering what God might think.  If Jesus is our Lord, then we should be constantly considering His reaction to our words.

And even more significant is our thought life.  If we speak 16,000 words a day, imagine how many more thoughts we must have.  100,000?  A million?  More?  When you are thinking, as well as when you are speaking, you are called to remember that the only response that counts is God’s.  Do you remember that even your thoughts are laid bare before God?  Do you desire to please Him by the way you think, as well as the way you speak?

Yet what’s so heart-warming about this verse is that our motivation to constantly emphasize what God thinks is not the fear of punishment, or a lack of acceptance.  We desire to please Him with our words and our thoughts because He is the Lord, our rock and redeemer.  Because of what Christ has done to save us, because of the inheritance we now have in heaven, there’s really no other response than wanting your words and your thoughts to make Him smile.  As your refuge and strength, as your Savior and Lord, as your Father and King, God is an eternal audience for our worship.  And because of Christ’s death and resurrection, He is now eager to enjoy our lives of worship.