In his commentary on the Psalms, Bible teacher John Phillips suggests that there are several different types of crying that children do. One kind of cry he mentions is the bad-tempered crying of a baby. Concerning this, he writes, and I quote, There is the bad temper cry when the baby is just plain mad, and when it wishes to advertise to the world that it is a true child of Adam, and has inherited, tiny as it is, a fallen human nature. That kind of cry can be amusing to watch if one is not deafened by the noise. The little fellow screws up his face, waves his little arms, goes fiery red, opens his mouth and yells. It is best ignored, he says. The sooner he learns that this kind of behavior is unacceptable and gets him nowhere, the better. Another kind of crying that John Phillips mentions is that of a sulking child who cannot get his or her way. This is the cry, he says, of whining. It's the cry of complaining, of murmuring, of grumbling. There is a Yiddish word for this that I will share with you. It's called kvetching. Some of you may be aware of this, apparently some are not based on your response. But anyway, it is the sulking... Moaning, whining cry. Third kind of cry that John Phillips mentions is the cry of a child who is in pain. Either in pain because they are hurt or they are in pain because they're frightened. But unlike the first two kinds of crying, which should go unheeded and not rewarded, Phillips says that this kind of crying calls for immediate attention. And of course, he's right. This morning, we have come in our study of Psalm 119 to a stanza where we hear the psalmist crying out in his pain to God. And like a crying child who is hurting, he anticipates that God, being the loving Father He is, is going to respond to his cries. The stanza I'm referring to is the one I just read to you. I'm going to read it again. It begins at verse 145. The psalmist says, I cried with all my heart, answer me, O Lord, I will observe your statutes. I cried to you, save me, and I shall keep your testimonies. I rise before dawn and cry for help. I wait for your word, my eyes anticipate the night watches. that I may meditate on your word. Hear my voice according to your lovingkindness. Revive me, O Lord, according to your ordinances. Those who follow after wickedness draw near. They are far from your law. You are near, O Lord, and all your commandments are truth. Of old I have known from your testimonies that you have founded them forever. Now, as you can see from these verses, the psalmist mentioned several times that he cries out to God. He tells us that in verse 145, verse 146, verse 147, and even in verse 149, when he speaks of speaking to the Lord, He says, hear my voice according to your loving kindness, though he doesn't mention the word cry. The voice that he's been addressing God with is that of a cry to him. So this too seems to be a reference to his crying out to the Lord. And like that child who cries out because he's in pain, so the psalmist, his cries stem from his pain. And he's in pain, he tells us, because of the way he's been treated and is being treated by his enemies who are persecuting him. Therefore, he is in need of being rescued, saved. from them. He says that in verse 146, he cries out to the Lord to save him, to deliver him. He says in verse 150 that those who are his enemies and are opposed to the Lord, they draw near to him, they close in on him. Now, this isn't anything new. Those of you who have been studying Psalm 119 with us for a while understand that this man has been telling us from the very beginning of this psalm, how his enemies have relentlessly persecuted him. I say this again, it would appear as best as we can tell, he's a Jewish man living in exile in Babylon during Judah's exile, their captivity. He's being persecuted by pagan Gentiles who are taunting him and mocking him for his faith. And they're also, it would appear, they're putting pressure on him to abandon his faith in the Scriptures by embracing their idolatrous religious ways. I say that because if you look at verse 37, he says, turn away my eyes from looking at vanity. Vanity is often used in the Old Testament to speak of idolatry. and revive me, says, in your ways. In verse 36 he says, incline my heart to your testimonies and not to dishonest gain. It would appear that his pagan tormentors were putting some kind of pressure on him to do something that would be dishonest and have to do with idolatry. So this isn't anything new, we know he's been persecuted, but in addition to persecution stemming from the heathen, it also appears that the psalmist has suffered greatly from some of his fellow Jews, who while now living like him in pagan Babylon, that culture of heathenism, these men had decided to abandon the word of God that they were raised on, the scriptures that they were taught, And in the process of doing this, they turned their attention to Him and they despised Him because He didn't go along with them. They despised Him for still holding on to the old truths of the Word of God and the faith that they were all raised to believe. He tells us this, and we looked recently at this. He tells us in verse 139, my zeal has consumed me, means my anger has consumed me because of my adversaries, They've forgotten your words. He says in verse 141, I'm small and despised, yet I don't forget your precepts. Meaning like these men do. Verse 143, trouble and anguish have come upon me, yet your commandments are my delight. So it would appear that this man was being persecuted by both Gentiles and his Jewish kinsmen. So life has not been easy for the psalmist. And yet he is tenaciously clung to the Word of God. That's what makes him such an example to us. And in this psalm, he reveals how resolved he was to obey the Scriptures regardless of all this horrific treatment, all this persecution. And now that he's coming to the close of this lengthy psalm, yes, we are getting to the close, close. Not quite there, but as he begins to wind down, he once again returns to the danger that was threatening him. But, listen closely, his purpose in doing this is not to elaborate on his problems. That's not his purpose at all. But rather to tell us how, watch this, in light of his problems, he prayed. How he prayed and how God's Word affected his prayer life. See, just as Each paragraph in Psalm 119 has a unique theme, and I hope you've picked that up. Every stanza, every paragraph has a unique theme that's related to the place of the Bible in the life of a suffering believer. So the theme of this present stanza is devoted to teaching us how the Word of God should impact our prayer life, especially when we are hurting and we're in pain. In other words, it's as if the psalmist is praying with his Bible open before him, crying out to God as he lets the Word of God, and not his own thinking, not his own thoughts, guide him in his praying. Now this issue of prayer, and the issue of prayer and the Word of God, frankly, it's a challenging issue for those of us who are believers in Christ, because quite frankly, most of us do far less praying than we should. It is relatively easy for us to neglect the discipline of prayer to do other things, even those things that would be good, would be distinctly Christian and good, like reading and studying the Bible. We find it easier to do that than to pray, being faithful in a ministry, Sacrificially helping a fellow Christian, showing compassion to those who are hurting. Regularly coming to church each Sunday and sometimes twice on Sunday. In fact, on a personal note, I would say preaching God's Word is easier for me than engaging in a sustained, focused, concentrated time of prayer. Praying to the very God who authored the Word that I preach. The reason we find non-stop sustained talking to God so hard is because prayer takes time, and we're very busy doing other things. Who's not busy? And prayer requires ongoing concentration, and we tend to have short attention spans. And prayer is to be offered to the Lord with childlike faith as we speak to the God who we can't see, yet we are to believe that He is there, and that he hears us and that he will answer our prayers. And so for these reasons and more that I haven't mentioned, praying for any length of time is a challenge to all of us. In fact, Here's how bad the problem is. One individual I read this week put our small amount of praying into perspective. He said this. He said, surely most of us waste far too much time. Someone has calculated that the average believer, if he lives to be 75 years of age, spends 25 years asleep. 17 years at work, 6 years in traveling, 7 and a half years in dressing, 9 years in watching television, 6 years being sick, and only 4 years in prayer and Bible study. He continues, imagine four years out of 75 preparing for eternity, less than half the time spent watching television. Suppose we converted half of the travel time, mostly idle time, into praying or memorizing scripture instead of daydreaming. Suppose we invested most of the time spent getting dressed, engaging our minds in prayer. Suppose we took an hour less sleep at night and devoted the time to concentrated Bible study. Suppose we cut two-thirds of the time spent watching television and devoted that time to reading the Bible, studying the Word, and praying for family, friends, missionaries, and all those hundreds of other things we say we're too busy to pray about. Why, we could increase the time we spend in prayer and Bible study by 19 years. Instead of a paltry 4 years, we could spend 23 years in getting ready for the Bema Seat of Christ. That may be true of us, and we need to make adjustments, but neglecting prayer by wasting time wasn't how the psalmist, this man, lived. Prayer to him was a priority. In fact, I don't know if you've thought about this, but the entire Psalm 119, all 176 verses, that's one long prayer. This is a prayer. We're studying it week by week, but he prayed this to the Lord. This is his prayer to God, and so this man is highly qualified to teach us something about prayer, and he does that in this stanza. And specifically, what he teaches us about prayer is that our praying is directly tied, should be tied, to the Word of God. should be linked and connected to Scripture in such a way that it cannot be separated from it. And so, in order to teach us how prayer and the Word are united and joined together, the psalmist gives us three ways that his praying was tied to the Word. This morning, we're going to look at the first two ways that his praying was tied to the Word, with the first way being this, that his praying was tied to his obedience to God's Word, connected to his obedience. Verse 145 says, I cried with all my heart, answer me, O Lord, I will observe your statutes. Now the psalmist begins by saying that he cried with all of his heart, to the Lord to answer his prayer. This word cry or cried doesn't imply that he was shedding tears. There were times he did that. I don't think he did this all the time, but that's not the implication here. But rather, he's saying he cried out to God in the sense that he called out to Him with a fervency that was born out of anguish and desperation. And we know this because he tells us, notice, I cried out, he says, with all of my heart. Which means that he cried out to God with all of his being, all of his soul. He put all of himself into his prayer. He held back nothing. He's telling us that there was nothing leisurely about the way he prayed. This was not a well thought out, calculated petition being made to God. No, this was urgent, it was earnest, fervent, passionate, intense praying of a man who was desperate for God to answer him. See, this man was in a very dangerous situation because we have learned in this psalm that those who hated him were not only attacking his faith, they were threatening to attack him, threatening to kill him. He tells us that in verses 84 and 85 and then verse 87, that they were threatening to dig a pit for him and throw him in there and just kill him. So, he didn't have the luxury of sitting down and thinking through a well-composed prayer. In his desperation, he just cried out to God with all of his heart and all of his soul, which is exactly the way we are to pray when we find ourselves in trouble. In those types of situations, we don't have time to think through an eloquent-sounding prayer, nor do we need to. We're in trouble. It doesn't matter how well we express our prayers. The only thing that matters is that we cry out with fervency to the Lord for His help. We're to be like Peter, who when sinking in the stormy sea of Galilee, you get right to the point. Lord, save me. That's it. That's all I have to say. Save me. And like the Old Testament prophet Elijah, who during the time of Israel's darkest days of apostasy, He prayed earnestly for God's judgment on his nation, that it would not rain for three and a half years, and it didn't rain. And then three and a half years later, he prayed that it would rain, and it did rain. And James, the inspired New Testament writer, picks this up in James chapter 5, and he commends Elijah to us as an example of how we are to pray. Notice what he says, James chapter 5. The last part of verse 16 and then following, he says, the effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. Then he presents Elijah as a righteous man. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, meaning he was no different than us. And he prayed, notice this, earnestly, with all of his heart, that it would not rain. And it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. Then he prayed again. and the sky poured rain, and the earth produced its fruit." Listen, there are times when our praying should be very calm, very deliberate. We should obviously be thinking through what we're saying to the Lord, not praying, just rambling on, words without meaning and thought. But there are going to be times when You are in such a tough situation, a seemingly hopeless situation, that your prayers just have to be passionate, have to be some energy behind it, some fervency, as you cry out to God like the psalmist did, with all of your heart. But listen carefully, because there's more to fervent praying than just fervency. You can pray earnestly, pouring all of your energy into praying out to God like the psalmist did, and it would mean absolutely nothing and would not bring you God's affirmative response unless you followed the psalmist's example of obedience to the Word of God. Notice again what this man says. At the end of verse 145, after telling us that he cried out with all of his heart to the Lord, he then adds, I will observe your statutes. Now we have to be careful that we don't misunderstand what he means by this. He's not bargaining with God. He's not making a deal. He's not saying, Lord, if you only answer my prayer now and get me out of this jam, then I'll obey you all of my life. He's not bargaining with God, as so many do. He's not making promises like that. If you do this, I'll serve you forever. He's not doing that. He's simply declaring to the Lord that his heart's desire is to obey him, regardless of how his prayer is answered. Listen closely, because this is important. This man so desperately wants God to answer his prayer to rescue him from his threatening enemies is so that he can continue living in order to continue obeying Scripture. In other words, this man's sole reason for wanting to be delivered from his life-threatening circumstances, it's not to escape an uncomfortable situation or even to escape the pain of death. It's so that he can go on observing the commands of the Bible. This is how committed he was to obeying the Word of God. I want to live so I can live for you. We know that this is exactly what he means because he reiterates the same truth only in a clearer, more direct way in the next verse. Look at verse 146. He says, I cried to you, save me. Now, so he's telling us what his prayer was about, the content, his request, save me. and I shall keep your testimonies." Here he's being very explicit in telling us that he cried out to God to save him, to rescue him, to deliver him from his adversaries. And he tells us his motivation for wanting God to rescue him was so that he could live and keep his commandments, meaning his word. Listen, if you want your prayers to be responded to by God in an affirmative manner, You need to pray with an obedient heart. You can't separate obedience to God from your prayers. Now, I didn't say a perfect heart, I didn't say a sinless heart, because if that were the case, then none of us could ever expect God to answer our prayers. God doesn't demand or expect sinless perfection from us. What He does demand from His children, from those who know Christ as their Savior, is a heart that desires to obey Him, A heart, watch this, that when it becomes aware of any sin, immediately confesses and repents of it. This is precisely what the writer of Psalm 66 was talking about when he said in verse 18 and then following, he said, if I regard wickedness or iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear. But certainly God has heard, he said. He has given heed to the voice of my prayer. Blessed be God who has not turned away my prayer nor his loving kindness from me. Now, this man, this psalmist, says that he is confident that God has heard his prayer and will answer him. However, In verse 18, he states that if he had regarded wickedness in his heart, then he knows the Lord would not have answered his prayer. He's telling us that was not the case in his life, but had it been, then God would not have answered his prayer. So, what we're given here then is a condition of answered prayer. There is a condition. God says he will not hear our prayers, meaning not that he doesn't hear, he hears everything, but meaning he won't hear in the sense of answering us, if we regard wickedness in our hearts. So the question is, what does it mean to regard wickedness in our hearts? Well, the primary root of this Hebrew word that is translated regard means to see, to visibly see, in the sense that something becomes visible and we see it. We see it. So, to regard wickedness in our hearts must mean that although we see some sin in our lives, something we know is wrong, something we know is sinful, something we know violates the Word of God, we do nothing about it. No confession. No repentance. We don't even struggle to deal with it. We just keep holding on to it and committing it. And if we do that, the psalmist says that God will not answer our prayers. Listen, I want you to know this isn't an isolated text of Scripture pulled out of context. No, the Bible says the same truth in a number of places, that God answers the prayers of His people. of his people who are walking in fellowship with him, and fellowship necessitates confessing any known sin." Remember what James told us about Elijah and God answering prayers? In James 5, 16, he said, the effective prayer of what? A righteous man can accomplish much, and righteous people repent of known sin. I want to illustrate this principle of prayer being linked with obedience from two very specific scriptures that address two very specific sins that God makes a point of saying that if one is not obedient in these areas and does nothing to correct these sins, then one might You might as well pray. You don't even need to pray, because your prayers will not be answered. They will not be heard and responded to by God. First scripture I'm referring to, I'd like you to see this, it's either on the screen or just look it up in your Bibles, is 1 Peter chapter 3, verse 7. You husbands, in the same way, live with your wives, in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she is a woman. Show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered." Now, the Lord is addressing, as you can see, Christian husbands. That's rather obvious. He commands a Christian husband to be understanding and to be sensitive to his wife, treating her with honor, and respect, highly valuing her. And what he means by this is that a Christian husband is to make every effort to learn as much about his wife as he possibly can, so that he can be thoughtful and kind to her, not frustrating her, but being sensitive and caring, esteeming her, treating her like the priceless treasure that she is. In other words, God is telling every Christian husband to not be self-absorbed, not be oblivious to your wife, but to be aware of her needs, aware of how she thinks, and then show her appreciation. But if this man will not do this, if he refuses to be a sensitive, caring husband who takes the time to learn As much as he can about his wife, how would he learn? Well, observe, ask questions. And to treat her then accordingly, then God will not answer his prayers, because he is sinning. And he is doing nothing to change his ways, his sinful ways, with his wife. So his prayers, Peter said, will be hindered, meaning they won't be answered. Because his unrepentant sin takes him out of fellowship with the Lord. This is such a serious sin that God highlights it in His Word. So husbands, the question is, will you do what God commands? Will you make every effort to be a student for life of your wife? So that you can learn how to honor her. Learn how to honor her by living with her in a kind and thoughtful and sensitive way. If not, listen, then don't bother praying. Don't bother praying because God won't answer your prayers since you are holding on to sin that he highlights in his word and says, stop it. Second example that scripture mentions of a specific sin that will cause God to not answer our prayers is found in Matthew chapter 6. Now I want you to know that all sin that we are aware of and won't repent of will take us out of fellowship with the Lord and our prayers will be hindered. But I'm just pointing out to you that there are two specific ones that God highlights so they must be incredibly significant. First one is husband dwell with your wives according to understanding. Second one is about forgiveness in Matthew chapter 6 starting in verse 12. Jesus said, and this is part of what we call the Lord's Prayer, it's really a pattern for disciples to pray along these lines, forgive us our debts, meaning our sins, as we have also forgiven our debtors. And then in verses 14 and 15, Jesus adds, for if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions. This is very similar to what we studied last week from Matthew chapter 18 about the king who mercifully forgave one of his servants all of his debt, but that servant wouldn't forgive someone who owed him a small amount of money. Now, the type of forgiveness that Jesus is addressing here, once again, I want you to understand it is not the judicial forgiveness of our sins that comes the moment we're saved. That happens at our conversion, it is never rescinded, and that's why Paul can say in Romans 8, 1, there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. When you come to Christ for salvation, God judicially forgives all of your sins, never to be brought up again. But the forgiveness that Jesus is talking about here, It's not that forgiveness. It is the day-to-day cleansing forgiveness that washes us from the sins that defile us. This is the forgiveness of a loving father, not as a judge. God has already forgiven His children in the sense when they came to Him as a judge, forgives a criminal. But this is the forgiveness of a loving father. This is the prayer to our Father who is in heaven. This is the forgiveness of a loving father who desires that his children enjoy their relationship, their fellowship with him. But Jesus said that if a child of God refuses, just refuses, to forgive those who sin against that person, then God the Father will withhold fellowship forgiveness from him. In other words, although this Christian may ask God to forgive them of some other sin that they've committed, if he's still holding on to this grudge, this malice, this lack of forgiveness, then God will not answer his prayer and forgive him of whatever sin he's asking to be forgiven of. He stays out of fellowship. The joy is gone in his relationship with the Lord. So, is there someone that you are refusing to forgive? Some hurt that you have held on to, you won't let go of it? In doing so, you're holding a grudge, you have malice in your heart? You keep thinking about it, you punish this person in your mind. If you refuse to forgive the person who sinned against you, then Jesus very plainly said, God the Father won't forgive you when you sin against Him. Regardless of how fervent and earnest you cry out to Him. Just a lot of hot air, that's all. So, according to the psalmist, praying and obedience to Scripture, they go hand in hand. You can't separate them. If you expect God to answer your prayers, especially those prayers born out of desperation when you're in trouble, then you need to maintain a daily walk of obedience with the Lord. And that includes confessing and repenting immediately of any sin that you become aware of. That's what the psalmist did. And by his example, he's teaching us to do the very same thing. But as this man continues writing his psalm, he tells us of another way that his praying was tied to the Word of God. First he tells us it was tied to the Word by his obedience to the Word. But in the next few verses he tells us that his praying was tied to the Word by his faith in the Word, by his faith in Scripture. Starting in verse 147 he says, I rise before dawn and I cry for help. I wait for your words, my eyes anticipate the night watches that I may meditate on your word." So having told us that he cries out to the Lord to deliver him, now the psalmist tells us when he does this and what time he does this. He says that he gets up early in the morning before the sun rises so that he can cry out to God for his help. But that's not all. Throughout the night and the night watches, he does the same thing. He cries out to God. In other words, he's telling us he prays day and night. What I want you to notice, though, is that his morning and evening prayers were driven by his faith in God's Word. Notice what he does in the morning when he prays. He says he waits for God's words, meaning that he's waiting for God to fulfill his Word, to bring it to pass. And in the evening when he prays, he says that he meditates on the Word. So he can't separate his prayers from the Word. And what this man is telling us is that he's praying to God to help him because He believes what the Word of God says. He waits for the Word. He waits for God to bring about what He says. What? That God will help him. Now, as I've mentioned to you many times, God doesn't promise to always deliver us physically from some terrible circumstances. Sometimes He leaves us in those circumstances. Other times, He does take us out. That's up to Him. but you have his word for it that he will always help you in your desperate circumstances by giving you his grace and his strength. This is the meaning of Paul's very famous statement, and I think all of us know this, most of us know this, Philippians 4.13, I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Now I've got to tell you, this is one of the most misapplied verses in the Bible. How often Christians take this as a promise that's related to accomplishing something incredible in the world of sports. Something they're really not capable of, but this verse is telling them they think that they can do this. It's not at all what Paul is talking about. He's talking about God strengthening us to endure any circumstance that we might find ourselves in, so that we will be content in Him and we will rest in Him. We won't be worried, we won't be fearful, we won't be anxious over our situation. Why do I say we know this is what Paul means? Because of the context. We know this is what Paul means by this promise because of what he's just said in the previous verses in Philippians 4. Notice verses 10 through 12, just before verse 13, he said, But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity. Not that I speak from want, for I've learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means. I also know how to live in prosperity in any and every circumstance. I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need." Now, the Philippians, you should understand what this is about. The Philippians were very, very poor. They were really a people in poverty. These are the Macedonians from 2 Corinthians that Paul writes about, that they were dirt poor. Philippi was in that region known as Macedon. So these Philippians were very, very poor and yet they sent Paul a love gift, thoughtful and sensitive to the apostle. And he was very grateful for this. They had wanted to do this, but they lost contact with him. But when they found out where he was, they sent him a love gift. He was in prison. They sent a gift to him. And he was very grateful for this. In fact, we could say that his letter to the Philippians, in many ways, it was a thank you note to them. But Paul wants them to understand that he has learned to be content, no matter what his circumstances were. He is grateful for their gift, But he's learned to be content, whether he had a lot of money or he was humbled by not having much money or any money. In fact, he says that he learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, of having abundance and suffering need. He has learned that secret. And what is that secret? It's found in verse 13. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Folks, that's the secret. Paul learned that he could count on Jesus to give him strength and help in every and any circumstance. The psalmist of Psalm 119, he didn't know Philippians 4.13, but he certainly knew the principle that God promises to help his people and that God will minister to them in all of their difficulties, He will strengthen them, He will draw near to them, He will comfort them, and sometimes, as I've said, sometimes He will physically rescue them. And He knows this. He doesn't know Philippians 4.13, but He knows this truth because in the Old Testament, God promised in many places to help the Jewish people, His covenant people. And the psalmist is simply affirming his trust in this promise to strengthen and help and not abandon him as he prays early in the morning and at night for God to fulfill His Word. Folks, that's exactly what needs to be behind our prayers. This faith in God's Word. Faith in God to do exactly what He tells us in His Word He will do. See, our praying needs to be based on Scripture. not our own self-will, not our own personal desires. God calls us to believe Him, and this should manifest itself in how we pray. We are to believe the Word of God. In Hebrews chapter 11, verse 1 and then verse 6, we read these very important words, is the assurance of things hoped for, it's the conviction of things not seen. And then the writer says in verse 6, and without faith it's impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Faith, the writer tells us, is believing that what God says is true, It's true. What God has said, it's true. And it is anticipating the fulfillment of His Word. Even though you don't see it now, it's believing that what God says is true. And without faith, He says, it's impossible to please Him. You must believe that God exists and that He rewards people by answering their prayers, by doing what He said He would do. That's why the writer to the Hebrews goes on to mention some of the great Old Testament saints who did believe God and they lived their lives by faith in His promises, even though they didn't see the fulfillment in the exact full sense of fulfillment, they went on believing. For example, you have Joseph who tells his family Bury me, bury my bones, not in Egypt, but when you go back to Canaan, bury my bones there. Why would he say that? It happened many years later that they did this, because Joseph believed that God had given the land of Canaan to the Jewish people as theirs. He was simply believing God, even though he didn't live to see the fulfillment of it, he believed that. And the writer's purpose in Hebrews 11, in enlisting these Old Testament saints, is to urge the Hebrews, and by application to urge us, to follow their example of trusting God in very difficult circumstances. That's why we read, coming out of Hebrews chapter 11, the point of this, verse 1 of chapter 12, Here it is, here's why he said this, what are we supposed to do in light of these great Old Testament believers who trusted God? Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, I don't think this means that they're watching us from heaven, it simply means that they are testifying to us from the pages of Scripture. This great cloud of witnesses, witnesses in the sense of not watching us, but testifying, witnessing to us, Let us lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us." This marathon of a race is called the Christian life, and it is to be lived, the writer is telling us, by faith. We run by faith. He'll go on to say, keeping your eyes on Jesus. You run by faith. So I ask you, are your prayers driven by your faith in God's Word? When you ask God for His help, is your request tied to His Word? Are you believing that what God has promised, He'll actually do? I mean, there's a revolutionary thought that God will actually do what He said. That's what He wants from us. Listen, every true believer, Every true Christian has faith. They've been given faith as a gift. At your salvation, you were given the gift of faith. Otherwise, you wouldn't be saved. So, we all have the capacity to trust the Lord. Sometimes though, our faith gets weak. We have doubts. Sometimes we feel like the man who said to Jesus, I believe, help thou my unbelief. So, how can you strengthen your faith? How do you strengthen weak faith? Well, you do what the psalmist says he did. He meditated on the Word of God. Look at verse 148. My eyes anticipate the night watches. That's when he also prays. But he says that I may meditate on your Word. See, it was his meditation on Scripture that helped him, note this, to internalize the Word, to personalize these great truths, to make them so much more real to him. So what does it mean to meditate on God's Word? We read this throughout the Bible, to meditate on the Word. Here's a good explanation of biblical meditation from Dr. James Montgomery Boyce, who said this, he said, Biblical meditation is more than merely reading the Bible and perhaps praying afterwards. It's more than even memorizing certain portions of it. It is internalizing the Bible's teaching to such an extent that the truth discovered in the Bible become part of how we think, so that we think differently and then also function differently as a result. See, when you meditate on Scripture, not only do you think differently, but Bible truths come alive to you. Bible truths become so much more real to you, they become part of your fiber. It was Spurgeon who said that he wanted his blood to be bibling. He made that word up, there's no word bibling, don't try to look it up, just bibling. As a result, what happens is your faith is strengthened in the Word of God. It becomes a part of you. It dwells in you richly. But it wasn't only meditation that strengthened the faith of the psalmist. In verse 149, he tells us of something else that helped him trust the Lord, even in the midst of his terrible situation. He says in verse 149, Hear my voice according to your lovingkindness. Revive me, O Lord, according to your ordinances. Now, the psalmist appeals to God to hear his cries for help, but notice what he bases this on. He bases this on God's lovingkindness. That is to say, he has faith that God will answer him because of God's love for him. That's exactly why you and I can trust the Lord. Even when we can't feel Him, even when we're in terrible circumstances, we know from His Word that He loves us. Once again, it was Spurgeon who said, when we cannot see the hand of God, we can trust the heart of God. I love that. Because there are many times we can't see the hand of God, and we wonder, where are you, Lord? Well, He's right there, continuing to love us. We can do this, trust the heart of God, because God's heart is a heart of love. the death of Christ being the greatest proof of His love for you. And now that you belong to Him, He's a father to you, and as a father, He will care for you. This is really, although it doesn't use the exact words of a father, this is really the thought of the verses I'm about to read to you, starting in Romans chapter 8, starting in verse 31. Paul says, what then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who's against us? God is for you if you're his child. He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us all, how will he not also with him freely give us all things? Let me just paraphrase that to say what Paul is really saying is when you were enemies of God, Yet He sent Christ and delivered Him for you. Now that you're His child, why do you think He's going to treat you in a bad way? He's going to also freely give us all things. Verse 33, who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies. Who's the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is he who died. Yes, rather he who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword, Just as it is written, for your sake we are being put to death all day long. We were considered a sheep to be slaughtered, but in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him, notice, who loved us. Nothing that happens to you will be able to separate you from God's love. Paul is saying that he continues to love you regardless of your circumstances. And because he loves you, he will continue to give grace to you to endure. And that's why the psalmist finishes verse 149 with this statement. He says, Revive me, O Lord, according to your ordinances. He asks God, who he knows loves him, to revive him. Meaning what? To energize him, to give him strength, to invigorate him. How? By the word of God. as he goes through his present ordeal. He knows God will because he knows God loves him. And he knows that the word that God has promised will be fulfilled. He believes that. And so he prays accordingly. So I ask you this morning, how is your prayer life? Do you need to make it more of a priority? Notice this man got up early to pray. Do you get up early to pray? You should. Prayer should be much more of a priority to all of us. So, when you do pray, pray as the psalmist prayed. With obedience marking your life. Prayer and obedience, they go together. Repenting of anything you know to be sin in your life. Don't wait to repent. Do it immediately, and then pray with faith, believing the very promises of God, taking Him at His word. And if you don't know Jesus Christ, the only prayer that you need to be concerned about is what we call the prayer of salvation. Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, Paul said, will be saved. But it isn't a prayer of words that saves you. I think we have to clarify that. So many people think they're saved because they prayed a prayer. A prayer doesn't save you, but the faith behind those words, that's what's important. For by grace are you saved. Not through a prayer. For by grace are you saved through faith. So the question is, will you place your faith, your trust, your confidence, your reliance upon Jesus Christ for your salvation? That's the only thing you need to consider. As we close the service, I mention to you again, if you'd like to pray with someone or talk to someone, there will be several elders up here at the front. Let's pray together. Father, we pray that your word has made a profound impression upon us, that obedience will mark our lives. I pray, Lord, for every husband here that he will take to heart, Your command to dwell with our wives according to understanding, to show respect and honor to her, not to be so caught up in ourselves that we lose sight of her and take her for granted. I pray, Lord, that every one of us will make sure that we have forgiven those who have sinned against us, that we hold no grudges, we're not punishing them in our minds, but that we forgive even as we've been forgiven. And I pray, Lord, that any sin that you have brought to any believer's mind here today will be repented of and addressed immediately, so that they can enjoy their relationship with you, their fellowship with you. And I pray, Lord, for any here without Christ, that they will clearly understand how desperate their situation is, lost, alienated, headed for hell without Christ. I pray that you'll open their hearts to the gospel and that they'll call upon you to be saved with faith trusting Christ as the sole basis for going to heaven. All of this Lord we pray with confidence because we pray this in Christ's name. Amen.