Doing Good Things || Psalm 119:64 || Weekend Wind-Down #18

Welcome to the eighteenth week of “Weekend Wind-Down.” This series is where we take the verse of the day, look at the face value interpretation, check the background and context of the verse, do a deeper dive on the focus scripture, and figure out what we can walk away with. 

Today’s verse is Psalm 119:64, which says this: 

64 – O Lord, your unfailing love fills the earth; teach me your decrees.

Face Value

God’s love gets shown, felt, and experienced throughout the world. Help me to learn how to love as you do. 

Background

Psalms are poetry that expresses praise, worship, and confession to God. Psalm 119 is part of a collection of psalms mainly written by King David. This collection is all about anthems of praise and thanksgiving for God and his Word. 

Deep Dive

We need a connection train of scripture that stems through our focus verse. Psalm 33:5 says:

5 – He loves whatever is just and good; the unfailing love of the Lord fills the earth. 

That verse connects to Psalm 11:7, which says: 

7 – For the righteous Lord loves justice. The virtuous will see his face. 

That verse connections to Psalm 7:9-11, which says: 

9 – End the evil of those who are wicked, and defend the righteous. For you look deep within the mind and heart, O righteous God. 

10 – God is my shield, saving those whose hearts are true and right. 

11 – God is an honest judge. He is angry with the wicked every day.

“Deep within the mind and heart” – God looks in everything. This belief should either comfort or terrify you. Because God even knows our motives, we have no place to hide, no way to pretend we can get away with sin. This belief should also comfort us. We don’t need to impress God or put up a front from him. We can trust God to help us work through our weaknesses to serve him as he intends. 

Take-Home Point

God’s love gets shown through his righteousness and justice in the world. There’s a lot I want to unpack here, starting with a couple of vocab words that repeat in the four Psalms verses that we talked about. 

• Unfailing Love – Heb. checked “the-sed,” meaning goodness and kindness. Specifically, it talks about showing the world plenty of God’s goodness and kindness.
• Righteous – Heb. tsaddiq “tsad-deek'” meaning just and righteous. Specifically, God’s righteousness and God’s justification.
• Virtuous – Heb. yashar “yaw-shar’,” meaning straight and correct. Specifically, the straightforwardness of God.

God’s love through his goodness, kindness, righteousness, justice, and straightforwardness. These principles are what our words and actions should come from. 

God knows our thoughts. He knows our intentions and true feelings that we may not share externally. He knows our intrusive thoughts and jealous actions. This belief shouldn’t terrify us. It may be terrifying, but it shouldn’t terrify us. It should be a wake-up call at the end of the day. It may scare us to recognize that we’re not living a life God would be happy with. We’re not doing good, being kind, doing the right things, letting justice prevail, and being honest. It can scare us to recognize this. Yet, God doesn’t give us a spirit of fear. We don’t have to live in fear. God gives us a spirit of love, power, and a sound mind. (2 Timothy 1:7). God doesn’t do things for evil, but for good. This belief can mean that God’s love is a good thing and his justice and righteousness is a good thing. 

This thought may sound like many things to learn about and do for God, so what are some things we could do? Do things that are kind, appropriate, and morally right. What that means to you might be different than it means to me, but we both must submit to God. Intentionally listening to others is kind. Holding the door open for someone who has their hands full is appropriate. Things along that line would work. Do things that align with God’s moral law. What’s that? Based on my research, it’s what Jesus shares as his two favorite commands: Love God and love neighbor. Spend time with God through worship, studying, and prayer. Get into the community with fellow believers for a meal, study, or fellowship. 

We want to love like God loves; let us see His love in the world and study God’s word to understand how we can do it. 

Thank you for joining me for this Weekend Wind-Down as we explored how God’s love gets shown through righteousness and justice based on the Psalms. Stay tuned for the next reflection. Let me close out with prayer. 

Loving God, thank you for the gift of your grace. Thank you for the love that comes no matter what we do and who we are. Help us see your love in the world, especially when times are dark. Help us to understand how your love works with us and teach us how to share your love with others. It’s in your name; we pray. Amen.