Sermon Central
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Lamedh - Psalm 119:89-96 Series
Contributed by Bobby Stults on Feb 1, 2012 (message contributor)
Summary: Where are we in our faith in God’s word… and how it can sustain us in all our life’s journey? The psalmist cast his lot with God and God’s word and knew that God would sustain and keep him! Let us cast our lot with God’s Word and know that God is going to
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Lamedh
February 1, 2012
Oak Park Baptist Church – Wednesday Bible Study Series
Psalm 119:89-96 (ESV) – 12 of 22
Lamedh – 12th letter of the Hebrew Alphabet
89Forever, O LORD, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens.
The word used here by the psalmist for “Forever” is the Hebrew masculine noun Oh-lawm which means unending or perpetual or everlasting… in short the psalmist is saying that there is NO end to God’s Word… it is EVERLASTING…it is UNENDING…
But he goes further with that perspective… he says “…Your word is FIRMLY FIXED…” now here when he uses those 2 terms it is actually ONE term in the Hebrew. It is the Hebrew naw-tsab which means stationary, fixed or established with a sense of permanence… not any sense of movement!
“Your word is ESTABLISHED…FIXED… it’s un-moving & unchanging…” Basically the psalmist was saying that God’s Word was infallible and inerrant… unchanging and permanent!
Fundamentally the psalmist understood that in this life there are many things that will fail, fall and disappoint him… but he knew in his heart and he fully trusted that God’s word was NOT one of THOSE things! Rather he proclaims here that God’s word was fully trustworthy and permanently fixed within the heavens and so…it was trustworthy for ALL of eternity!
Where do YOU stand on God’s word? Is it merely something that you run to in the difficult times? Is it merely some book of stories that you can rely on to get advice from time to time… OR do you consider Scripture as the very word of God as the Psalmist does! Is it only something for the difficult times or some book of stories OR is it the Word of God in which we can all place our trust to live and find salvation through its message.
90Your faithfulness endures to all generations; you have established the earth, and it stands fast.
This verse is one of 2 or 3 verses in the entire chapter that does not give a reference to the Word of God… instead the psalmist switches gears and instead of proclaiming the WORD of God, he proclaims his faith and trust in the FAITHFULNESS of God! As we look at this verse we can see that he essentially says the same thing about God’s faithfulness that he had proclaimed in v.89 about God’s Word!
“Your faithfulness ENDURES…” The Hebrew word used here means the same as at the end of this verse where the psalmist says that God’s faithfulness STANDS… in other words it is established and will remain! God’s faithfulness is something we do NOT have to worry about… it is ALWAYS going to be there for us!
The psalmist also comforts those who are reading by ensuring that this faithfulness that is upon them… is a faithfulness that will endure the test of time… it is a faithfulness that ALL generations will be able to experience. God’s faithfulness is for those in the present, but likewise it is meant for those to come as well… it is everlasting to everlasting, knowing NO boundaries!
And because it is established by God for ALL generations it is going to stand firm through the course of time… it endures and stands fast and is established among the people.
How often do we find ourselves questioning the integrity of God and His faithfulness? I know I do… I am ashamed to admit it but there are times I don’t trust Him, but the reason for that is that I don’t have faith in Him… I simply cannot SEE what He is doing and because of my lack of spiritual sight, I cannot trust Him! But this tells us that God’s faithfulness will ENDURE for all generations… it will never fail us… it will always be there for us! So with this being known… why would we ever doubt him?
Here the psalmist also speaks to the sovereignty of God in the creation process as well. He states the God has established or fixed the earth and it stands. We have been given dominion over all the earth as per God’s instruction, but we have not been given the ability to determine Earth’s fate. God has set it in motion and it is only God whom can destroy it.
We may be able to make it a terrible place… sin does that! Sin leads to self centeredness and self centeredness leads to selfishness and selfishness leads to NOT caring about others or other things…
There are those in our world who are only concerned about making money and the do things that are harmful to this planet, and they should be taken to task for their selfishness, but there is NO way humanity can destroy what God has created… we dirty it and mangle it and it is NOT what God desires, but we can never destroy it!
