Psalm 119 – To Love the Law is to Love the Messiah – Part 1

12/01/12 Video Broadcast

The amazing heart of the author of Psalm 119 and how his attitude conveys a right understanding of law & grace.

Psalm 119 - To Love the Law is to Love the Messiah - Part 1 - Study
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Psalm 119 - To Love the Law is to Love the Messiah - Part 1 - Study

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Video Transcript

This is a direct transcript of a teaching that was presented via video. Due to the fact that we often speak differently than we write, the written text may not flow and/or sound strange in some places. There may also be grammatical errors and unintended mistakes. It is encouraged that you to watch the video to complement this written transcript.

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Sometimes when I share a study I like
to go over different topics. The apostles did that when they were writing their
letters to different congregations. Topical studies are important, and we see
the apostles going through different topics as they wrote their letters to the
believers.

They would pull a scripture out of
here or there. But there was also an expectation, that we shared last week, that
the people would be going to the synagogues and hearing the Torah…hearing the
law…. every Sabbath. Acts 15:21 – that was an expectation that would be a normal
thing they would do.

They would hear the word being read
in context. They couldn’t all just easily have a copy of the scroll here to
follow along. So, we are at a great advantage here in our generations. His word
is available freely to anyone and to all. We’re very blessed to be able to have
that availability. But we still want to go over some chapters.

The chapter I want to go over today,
at least a portion of it…I’m not going to cover the whole chapter, but the
portion I want to go over today, at least part of it, is Psalm chapter 119.

What I am getting from Psalm 119 is
that we should love the law. And if we love the law, we are also going to love
the Messiah, as we are going to share as we go along here. So, I want to go over
this chapter in detail…..which many of us already know if the longest of all the
psalms.

But there are many treasures, many
nuggets… many gems that we can pull out of this psalm. I desire to define them
as I read and so I want to share them also as we go along here. We’re going to
let the psalm itself dictate what topics we cover as we go through.

There’s going to be different
topics, different things it’s going to bring up, different points….and that way,
the Spirit of Yahweh will certainly lead us to where He wants us to go, and we
will learn from Yahweh’s Spirit. So again, our topic today, our study portion is
Psalm 119….

The very first verse in Psalm 119, we
see here…

Now here we see, some of your bible
translations may have this ‘aleph’, or even some of them might actually have
this word here…ALEPH. And that’s this particular letter here which is the first
letter of the Hebrew aleph-bet. Our English way of saying that…alphabet… comes
from the Greek alpha-beta, but alpha-beta comes from Hebrew aleph and bet; and
‘bet’ is the Hebrew word for house.

We have an origin. Actually, the
order of some of some of these letters, is possibly of divine origin…ever wonder
why the ABCs are in that order? It’s not just because of the song.

There’s an order to it….it’s a little
different in Hebrew but there are some similar patterns…aleph and bet, and
then the next Hebrew letter is gimel but the one to follow after that is dalet,
which is a, b, c….a, b, g, d. There’s  some similar patterns…well, the Psalm 119
here  is what’s called an acrostic where very first letter in each verse, in
each line,  is going to be starting with the letter aleph for a series of
verses… 9 verses….which would be a total of 10 in this case, one through ten.
Just mine verses, anyway….nine.

But it’s an acrostic, so the very
first word here in the Hebrew is having to do with going straight…’ashar’. And
as we look into this, if we are ‘ashar’…if we’re ’going straight’ then we are
going to be blessed. What this psalmist saying is that we are very happy when we
are undefiled in the way, we’re very blessed.

And the word that is translated
‘undefiled’ is from the Hebrew word ‘tamim’, which is most often translated
‘without blemish’. So, happy is the one who is without blemish in the way. Who
walk in the law of Yahweh….without blemish.

….unblemished.

So, if we were to walk in the law of
Yahweh, we would be without blemish, without spot. And we would have a sound
mind…we would be sound. And as the psalmist says here we would be blessed.

So, if we are seeking the path of
happiness, if we are seeking the path of blessing, then we need to be seeking to
walk in the law of Yahweh…because that is the path of joy, happiness, and of
blessing. And his whole psalm is all about the law of Yahweh. Now, the Hebrew
word translated ‘law’ is the Hebrew word ‘torah’ And torah is a noun and it
literally means ‘teaching’ or ‘instruction’, and most all Hebrew words trace to
a three  letter root verb.

And in this case, the Hebrew word
‘torah’ would translate back to the Hebrew word ‘yarah’ which has to do with
casting something. It’s used to describe the casting of lots; it’s used to
describe the former rain, the early rain. The early rain is the giving of the
torah; the latter rain is the giving of the Spirit….both occurred at Pentecost.

Let me say, first of all that, if
there’s  something you don’t like about Yahweh’s law…you look at it and say, “I
just don’t like that…” Then there is probably going to be something you don’t
like about Yahushua.  Because Yahushua is so inseparable from the Torah, from
the Law, that He’s actually called the Word of Yahweh.

So, if we want grace…we want truth,
then we need to follow the torah of Yahweh. We need to walk in his ways just
like Messiah walked in His ways.

Now the psalmist, the one who wrote
Psalm 119…we don’t know who it was, it may have been David, it may have been
Ezra, it may have been Asaph, we don’t know who the author is…..but  whoever it
is, their love, their love for Yahweh’s word is inspiring. This palmist has this
love affair with the law, the law of Yahweh.

And perhaps to some of you that would
seem to be a bad thing. But it’s not a bad thing, it’s a good thing, because the
psalmist so loves the torah, it would only be proof that if the Messiah was to
appear to him, at that era he lived, he would have so, so loved the Messiah,
because the Messiah is the embodiment of the Torah.

He is the embodiment;  He is the word
that became flesh. He is the Torah that became flesh and dwelt among us. He
never failed one time to keep the Torah’s precepts. If he ever did fail, even
once, if he ever failed, he could not be our Savior. He would have been
convicted by the law of the transgressor because he failed at one point.

So, he would have been in need of a
savoir himself. But He did not fail. Not even in one point. And that is why He
is able to redeem us.

There it is….Tamim…without blemish
and without spot. He was undefiled in the way. He was undefiled.  He was without
blemish (tamim). So, since he was without blemish… we also, because we want to
walk as he did, we also want to walk in the law of Yahweh.

That’s what Messiah wants out of us.
And so, the congregation is called to this task…to this.

Where we fail to walk in the law of
Yahweh, yes, we do have the sanctification through Messiah and the cleansing but
that doesn’t mean we intentionally violate the law of Yahweh. We want to
be….here we are again… undefiled. And again, that word ‘tamim’ is the most often
translated ‘without blemish’. And it has to do with an offering.

The sacrificial offerings were then
to be accepted by Yahweh. He had to bring these offerings…they couldn’t have any
blemish in them.  We are also being presented to the Father at the end of the
age, as a bride who is without blemish and without spot, holy and sanctified.
And so, since that is the case….

How did Yahushua walk? I love that
question. It’s a lovely question because I know no one can speak against it.
Just how did He walk? How did Yahushua walk? If we know how he walked, if we
know that He kept the commandments, the Torah that answers everything.

I don’t need to say anything else.
Did he keep Sabbath? There’s your answer. Did he keep the feast days? There’s
your answer.  Did He eat pork? No. Neither should we. So what do we do?  Wwyd
(some say wwjd…well the first thing he would do is use his own name).

What would Yahushua do? That’s what
we’re called to do. Just in case you think Paul would tell you otherwise…..

So, he wasn’t lying here. He says he
kept Torah. And we know he was a torah observant man.  Some say, well he was
Jewish so he had to keep the law of the Jews.  What did he tell the Corinthians
to do?

So, the book we have in our hands, my
beloved, does not destroy the law. It’s a consistent book. It does not fulfill
the law in a sense…this New Testament does not fulfill the law in a sense of
doing away with it.

It fulfills the law in a sense of
doing it, accomplishing it, accomplishing what is was that our Father had spoken
with His word. It fulfills the commandments in the same way as I shared in a
previous broadcast. If I told my  daughter,…this  morning I asked my little
daughter, Leanna, to  get me a refill on my jar of water here, and so she went
back to house and brought be back a glass of water…or a jar of water .

And so what she did was she fulfilled
my law. See here.  She fulfilled the law that I had given. She fulfilled the
commandment. So when Messiah fulfilled the commandments, does that mean he did
away with them?   No. It means he did it. So, the New Testament books do not
take away or cancel Yahweh’s law, they build on it.

They build on it and give us more
instruction, more in depth instruction of what it is that we’re supposed to
learn. What it is that the heart of Yahweh really is. And that means there may
be some new things added, but until Heaven and Earth pass away,  not even one
little yod or little mark…little dagesh or anything is going to be taken away.

Not one thing will pass away.
(Matthew 5:17) So, we do have in our hands here, we do have a consistent
book….Yahweh’s not about mixed messages and confusion. The scriptures speak one
sweet, unified, consistent word of truth.

So, yes, there are certain words
which are intended for the priests.  Sacrifices…only the priest could offer a
sacrifice.  Those are commands for the priest. So, if you tried to offer one,
there wouldn’t be a priest around to do it. There wouldn’t be a temple or an
altar to offer it on.

And the commands about stoning and
judgment, those are for the judges of the land…..righteous sentencing guidelines
for those who seek proper justice, but that’s not for the common people. Unlike
what you may have been told that when someone knocks your tooth out you can go
knock his tooth out. Yahushua said…no, no, no you don’t do that. Why? Because
that’s something …ok, he knocked your tooth out, and Yahweh forbid, he knocked
your tooth out…. Alright you go to judge, you say, Look, this guy here knocked
my tooth out.

The only righteous way of dealing
with that is that guy gets his tooth knocked out.  So, that’s what would happen.
You know, here’s the pliers… time to give you what you did to somebody.

That’s righteous judgment. But it’s
not for you to take the law into your own hands. Same things today in our laws,
our nation we live in, I mean, someone violates the speed limit, or someone robs
from you, that’s not for you to rob from them, or to write them a ticket and
make them pay you a fine. There are people in place to do. That’s rightly
dividing the word of truth. Knowing what applies and what is not intended for
you.

Adam and Eve were given a command not
to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Is that for you? Is that for
me? No. That’s for them.  Some say, well the law is for the Jews. It’s only for
the Jews. If that’s true, then on what basis do you say that? And they say,
Well, the Old Covenant…is says right there it’s for Israel.

Alright, well what about the New
Covenant, who’s it with? I love asking that question, because the New Covenant’s
also with Israel.  Jeremiah 31:31 says so. So if you want to be a part of the
New Covenant, you need to become Israel. When you die with Messiah and you’re
raised with Him. And so, it’s no longer you who live, its Yahushua living in
you.

The bible though is not about mixed
messages, mixed standards of righteousness. Yahweh is not an Elohim of
partiality…where He’s going to send someone to the Lake of Fire cause they broke
Sabbath but let you slide. It doesn’t work that way.  So, it’s all about one
consistent message of truth.

Yahushua is the standard. The law is
the standard. They are one, they are one.  So, if we’re looking for the path of
blessing….

The entire law is a testimony in that
Yahweh is testifying as to what he desires to see out of man. The Ten
Commandments were called a testimony because they were proof that Yahweh Himself
came down and wrote with His own finger what he required of men.

The feast days are a testimony
because they speak of His plan of salvation. When we keep the Sabbath as Yahweh
intended, it is a testimony of how Yahweh created the heavens and the earth and
rested on the seventh day.  So, blessed are those who keep His testimonies.
Keeping them is the path of blessing.

Blessed are those who seek him, it
says here, with the whole heart. Yahweh’s not interested in half-hearted pursuit
of His ways, he wants the whole thing. He’s jealous if you’re holding part of it
back, He’s jealous. He wants that part. See, He made you from dust so you owe
everything to Him. He told the children of Israel, when they would disobey His
law, He said He would accept them back under one condition…

Yahweh says love me with all your
heart, love with all your soul… and if we do that, then we will seek him with
all of our heart, we will find him, if we do so.  And He told them, when he sent
them into exile..in Jeremiah 29:10 He reminded them of this….

Hallelujah  for that!

I will be
found by you, says Yahweh, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will
gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,
says Yahweh, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be
carried away captive.

You know, brothers and sisters, we
are in exile right now. We are in exile. We’re not living in the land that
Yahweh has appointed us to live in.  We’re in a strange land. We are captives in
this land. We are in this captivity. We’re in exile because of the disobedience
of our fathers.

We are Israel through Messiah
Yahushua living in us.  And so, Yahweh desires nothing less than that we would
search for Him with all our hearts.  And if we do that He will be found. And we
should not assume…I hope all of you today listening to this broadcast … old men,
young men, older women, young women, middle aged, children, all of you listening
to this broadcast, right now…today, right now is the day of salvation, and if
you seek salvation today…don’t assume that if you don’t seek salvation he will
always be available to you. The scripture says to…..

If He is calling you today, right
now, you feel a nudging in your spirit within you to follow and pursue Yahweh
and His ways…don’t assume that calling will always be present.

Consider that a gift from Elohim, an
opportunity to call upon him. So, seek wisdom now because the day may come…

There you go…your gods, your
entertainment, your pursuits, your music, your ways, your thoughts…your elohim,
the ones you serve, they won’t deliver you in the day of trouble. But, if we
seek Yahweh today we have an opportunity to not find ourselves in that position.

Now, it tells me Yahweh has a limit,
‘…call up on while near’. See, I know the proverb there is speaking about the
pursuit of wisdom and what happens to those who refuse to seek that….. If we
refuse to seek Yahweh’s ways while He is calling us, there may be a time He
doesn’t answer, and so we undergo judgment.

Calamity and terror comes upon us
because we didn’t seek wisdom. So Yahweh may allow us just to receive our dues.
I’m not sure that all death bed confessions are received by Him., especially if
a person is planning it ahead of time. Let’s wait until I die and then I’ll turn
my life to him…and all that.

I don’t want to underestimate
Yahweh’s mercy, don’t get me wrong. But at the same time, it’s not a good idea
to put Yahweh to the test…There’s one assured path of blessing, and that is that
we will call upon Him now while He is near. And then we know we’re walking in
path of blessing.

Those that seek Him with the whole
heart will do no iniquity. They’ll walk in his ways.  Does that sound like too
Old Testament to you? That the standard would be you cannot do any iniquity at
all. That’s the standard. Does that sound too strict to you? Does that sound
like…that’s that old law…. trying to get me under that old law again.

My children mess up, from time to
time. Does that mean that. I come down hard on them and get rid of them because
they’re not doing everything I ask? No. The main think I look for is the
attitudes. That’s the way all fathers should be….looking for attitudes.

Are our children messing up out of
weakness, or is it just willful rebellion? ….It’s a big difference.

But to some of you it sounds too much
like, that’s Old Testament…don’t do any iniquity at all. You mess up one time.
He’ll come down and strike you down.  I think it sounds pretty New Testament to
me. Sounds real New Testament like….

What’s the scripture supposed to say?
Whoever abides in Him sins just a little bit? Whoever abides in Him will sin
every day but gets forgiven anyway? Is that what it’s supposed to say?

I mean, the clear standard of one who
seeks Him is that we would walk in His ways. It’s not to sit around and make
excuses for ourselves, like we see people say all the time, Oh, I sin every day
but that’s what grace is for. Boy, the standards too high, I can’t…you can’t
keep that law, see.

But is that what grace is for? To
give us this little certificate to willfully sin all the time and still get
forgiven? Is that what grace is for to have in our hand this ‘Get Out of Hell
Free’ card. So we stand before Him and….’I’ve got the card!’ Now I’m all for
grace, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for grace.

I’m not saying Yahweh is not merciful
if we fail to walk in His ways, but our attitude, our heart’s attitude is very
important. Our attitude is not, well….Would we accept that from our children?
You know Dad,  I mess up every day so I went ahead and did this anyway. I know
you’ll forgive me Dad, Mama…I just figure I can’t live by your law, Mom and Dad,
so I went ahead and did this wrong thing knowing that you would forgive me.

Would we accept that?  Neither does
He. So, our attitude is not..oh, I sin everyday, oh well..I’ve got grace. Our
attitude should be, ‘I have sin in my life…oh no! Yahweh, help me to abide in
Messiah more and more every day, so I will not sin. I know what Your word has
said. Your word has said….’

Our attitude should be, ‘Yahweh I
don’t want to live like a child of the devil, I want to be your child. I want to
practice righteousness’. If that’s our attitude, yes, Yahweh will forgive us
when we mess up. Just as our own children if they came to us, ‘Mom, Dad, I
failed you. I was wrong. I don’t want to fail you. I want to honor you and obey
you.

We would accept a child like that
with loving arms…full of mercy. So, when we…as we go to our Abba in heaven, we
confess our sins with a right attitude, He is faithful and just to forgive us
our sins.

In fact, part of daily prayer
Yahushua wants us to say…

That expression ‘I don’t want to be
tempted’, ‘ I want to be delivered from temptation’, ‘ I don’t want fail
You’….and so how is it brothers that we can say that we’re born again if we
still mess up sometimes? How do we say that?

Are we, at this time, born of Elohim?
We say we are. We say we’re born again, we’re saved, we say that we’re partakers
of the New Covenant, but we also know that there’s some parts of law that we
don’t quite have in heart yet. We’re not quite saved until we endure unto the
end. And the real rebirth, the true rebirth, will be when the corruptible puts
on the incorruptible.

So, when Messiah returns, that’s when
we officially have been experiencing that rebirth. We will officially have
experienced salvation and been partakers of this New Covenant where we can no
longer sin, we will be incorruptible.

Diligently! In Hebrew that’s ‘meod’….
very,  very much; greatly; diligently. Today, if you seek to keep Yahweh’s
precepts diligently, you might be called a legalist…trying to earn your
salvation.

You see, the typical everyday
attitude we see among people is…’Yeah, He’s like Grandpa. He doesn’t really care
about obedience so much, as that you just believe in His Son. He’s got this
lackadaisical attitude now about your disobedience. Now he’s calmed down, you
know he’s not as angry as he used to be when he was younger.

That’s the way people view Yahweh.
Like in the Old Testament He was this mean, fire and brimstone..they call
Jehovah God, ready to come down and strike you any minute and then He kind of
calmed down when Messiah came. He’s this big smiling grandfather in the
background and He’s just smiling at you as you stray away, ‘Oh, come back little
child…’

And that is just so far from truth.
He wants us to keep his precepts diligently. Don’t believe me? I shared a few
weeks ago a study on legalism. I’ll just touch on this real quick.

Most people when they read this stop
right there…they put this little line here…Woe to you…you tithe these herbs. How
dare you do that!? No. You’ve got a little word ‘and’ here. It’s ‘and’…you got
to read that…and

Faith is a part of the law; mercy is
a part of the law; …along with justice.

Wait a minute…these you ought to have
done…what’s these? These would be pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin without
leaving the others undone! The others would be….justice mercy and faith.

So, he calls them…

….Blind
guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!

You’re getting the gnats which are
unclean  out of your salad…your not eating the gnats, but then, spiritually
speaking, you’re swallowing a whole camel, which is also unclean. So, they were
getting the gnats out by paying tithe of mint, anise, , and cumin, but they were
neglecting that camel swallowing behavior of not paying much attention to mercy
and faith and justice.

So, the finer points of Yahweh’s
law…..yes, keep them diligently. Keep them diligently. And that’s the same
attitude in the New Testament as well. Keep them diligently. And we shouldn’t
view that as being a problem. I mean look at all Yahweh did for us. Can’t we do
something for Him?

I mean, Yahushua, all He went
through….because He loved us. Our expression of love toward Him, well the least
we can do is be diligent about keeping his ways.

They’re not, and if they are
burdensome may be there’s something in our heart that needs changed. We do have
this flesh that we need to deal with.  The psalmist cries out…

The Psalmist here is not claiming
perfection. He’s saying he wishes, that just his inclination within him was
directed to keep the statutes of Elohim. And then when he looked at the
commandments he wouldn’t be ashamed of himself for not having kept them.

Some people though, they look at the
commandments, they’re not even ashamed. They think, ‘Oh well, no big deal. I can
break the law and no big deal’. But that’s the first step. We’re ashamed of what
we’ve done and then we turn from it and then we correct ourselves. So, he’s
crying out…

Almost an identical crying out
happens in the book of Romans by Paul the Apostle…

It’s almost like he’s saying, ‘Oh
that my ways were directed to keep Your statutes’. Who will deliver us from this
body of death? Yahushua will deliver us.

Do we do that? Do we serve the law of
Elohim with our minds? If we’re failing in that it’s because we need Yahushua.
We need Him, more of His indwelling, more of the Spirit of Yahweh being able to
freely minister to us and lead us in the paths of righteousness.

Some would tell you, ‘Oh well, you
people who are trying to follow law, you’re walking the old carnal way. It’s not
the way of the Spirit, see.  They might say to you, ‘Well, we have the Spirit
now, we don’t need the law. We have the Spirit tell us everything we need to
do’.

Well, you’re mistaken if you feel the
Spirit is going to lead you in a different direction than the law itself will
lead you. Because if the Spirit is within you, the scripture says (Eze 36:27)… a
prediction of the future:  Yahweh says…

And so, the observance of Yahweh’s
statutes and laws and commandments is evidence that the fruit of the Spirit is
present. If Yahweh’s Spirit is within us, it will cause to walk in His statutes
and keep His judgments and do them. We’re all called to walk according to the
Spirit and not according to the flesh.

So we want to set our minds on the
things of the Spirit rather than the things of the flesh. The things of the
flesh…our hearts are not naturally inclined to keep His statutes. We want to do
our own thing. In a natural way…we’d rather do our own thing. So we can’t live
according to this flesh that we have, we have to live according to what the
Spirit would direct us to live.

If we are refusing to subject
ourselves to the law of Elohim, saying, ‘I don’t need that,  I’ve got the Spirit
now’…what we’re saying doesn’t make any sense, because if we are spiritually
minded we will be willingly subjecting ourselves/submitting ourselves to the law
of Elohim.

So, let’s seek to be spiritually
minded and seek Messiah that we might be delivered from this body of death. The
only way we can get Yahweh’s Spirit living in us is that we would repent and we
would turn to Yahusha the Messiah. As Peter said to the crowds….

What’s the
promise? You will receive the Holy Spirit.

…is to you
and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as Yahweh our Elohim
will call.

We are in exile. We are afar off,
but Yahweh has called us. Yahweh has called us while we’re in the foreign land.
Will we seek him with all of our heart, with all of our soul, with all of our
strength? And now that we have His Spirit dwelling in us, we will abide in
Messiah and we will not need to be ashamed when we look in His law.

If we have repented of our wrongs,
and confessed our sins before Him, and committed our ways toward keeping His
statutes, and we have come to Him in humility, in confession, and dedicating our
lives toward seeking Him with all of our heart, soul, and strength…. yet somehow
we just don’t feel saved, we just don’t feel like He forgives us, we still feel
condemned.

Maybe that comes from bad parenting
when we were being raised. Our parent was very condemning, even though we were
doing the best that we could.  But Yahweh is greater than that. And those things
may have been planted in our hearts from the time we were young, but Yahweh’s
greater than that. The scripture even says in….

And so, the promises that we receive
in Messiah are true. Yahshua Himself said…

What an awesome, awesome promise we
have. All it takes is repentance and faith in Messiah.

See, when we learn of Yahweh’s
righteous judgments..what are judgments?  ‘Mishpat’ is Hebrew…judgments…they are
decisions by Yahweh as to what is right and what is wrong…. declaration of who
might be saved and who would not be saved. The law tells us His judgments of
what should happen when a person sins, of what sin actually is. He also tells us
that those who are in Messiah are not under condemnation.

That’s His judgment.  His judgment is
that we will receive eternal life. And we’re called to rejoice and praise Him
for His judgments, which are always true. Praise Him with uprightness of heart
when we learn about these judgments….they’re so righteous, so impressive.

And so we call upon him to dwell with
us and not forsake us utterly. Because we recognize His judgments are right and
we want to keep His statutes. And if that is our hearts cry….

That’s righteous judgment. Yahushua
said likewise….

He will
not leave us. He will not forsake us.

That’s today and that’s forever. So,
if we wonder…. you know, sometimes Yahweh feels distant to us…if he feels
distant maybe it’s not Him that moved but maybe it’s you that moved. I mean, He
wants to draw near to us. But we can draw near to him again. It says in one
place, draw near to Him and He will draw near to you.

That’s in the book of James [4:8]. We
have these promises….and so the psalmist is crying out for Yahweh to not forsake
him. The psalmist is crying out for deliverance from the body of death …knowing
it’s not his inclination within, naturally… to love the law and to walk in it.
So, how can we cleanse our ways?

The next Hebrew letter, ‘bet’…. (I
guess it was 8 verses)…. The next Hebrew letter, ‘bet’….

Now, at this time when the psalmist
was writing these things, he didn’t know about Yahushua dying for his sins .He
didn’t know about  that – Yahushua dying….  He knew, however, that he could
cleanse his way by doing what Yahweh asked him to do. And so this expectation
that we have of Yahweh’s mercy through Messiah is an understanding that we have
now. They didn’t have the understanding.

So, we have this natural inclination,
once again, to be a foolish person. To be fools….to not heed the law of
Yahweh….to not listen. And so we have parents who are there to help drive this
foolishness from our hearts through the rod of correction. We’re admonished….

Yeah, go
ahead, rejoice in it, be happy…

…and let
your heart cheer you in the days of your youth; walk in the ways of our heart
and in the sight of your eyes; but know…

…know
this. And those of us who are not young anymore know

and we
will suffer the consequences for the decisions that we made when we were young
people.

Put it away. Get rid of it. When
you’re young you’re strong, see, you’ve got strength. You don’t have necessarily
these years after years of thought patterns that are so unbiblical to have to
deal with…to have to fight through…to have to rewire our brain.

When you’re a young person you have
an opportunity to make sure that you frame your mind around what’s right, and
good, and holy, and just, and pure, and lovely. You have that opportunity. So
use it!  …Because you won’t get it again. And when later, after years of being,
habitual habits develop… and being a sinner in the way you think and do things,
it’s a whole lot harder to keep the law of Yahweh faithfully. And the journey is
far less pleasant than if you had done the right thing to begin with. So, now’s
your opportunity.

Don’t be like those who say, ‘Oh
well, you know, I’ve been serving Yahweh all my life and I’ve never really
tasted and seen what the evil’s like. I’m going to check it out, and go live it
for awhile, and see if I like it’. Don’t do it. Don’t do it.

Just trust Yahweh’s word. You don’t
want to go there. So many times we see young people…you know, they hear these
testimonies from people who got caught up in drunkenness, or drugs, or
whatever…Oh, how glorious that Yahweh brought them back from the pit of hell,
and saved them, and cleansed them, and sanctified them.

That’s the far greater testimony. Far
greater than anything…rags to riches, or gutter to glory. So walk in that
testimony. And let that be your testimony all days of your life and many of us
will rejoice with you in that, wishing we had done that also.

So flee… run away from, as hard as
you can, and instead….

Pursue it. And do not walk away from
it because that is the path of blessing.

That’s the
expectation of young men… overcome the wicked one.

I write to
you, little children, because you have known the Father.

He writes to them what?

Don’t even love it…don’t even like
it! Hate it! Despise it! I’m not saying hate people. Hate the sin that’s in
them.

And so, what is the wise path to
choose? The path of eternal life, the path of blessing, walking in the law of
Yahweh…that is the wise path to take, young men and young women.

See, once we seek Yahweh with the
whole heart there’s a danger that at some point, we get a little lax, start to
wander away. To wander from the commandments is to wander from the flock of the
Great Shepherd. Like sheep going astray from the shepherd’s voice.

Maybe in pursuit of some delicate
weed or something over here that tastes really good. Some other delicacies of
the wicked, some other things that would be harmful to us but it maybe tastes
good, but are toxic and are poisonous. The Shepherd needs to seek and find us
then, and take us back home.

And he will, as long as we don’t flee
at the sight of Him. So many people they go astray. Yahushua comes back to get
them and they say, ‘Oh no, I don’t want you’. Ok. He’ll let you go. And off to
another flock you go.

Same for us as brothers, when we see
someone going astray, we can be as the Shepherd’s arms, the Shepherd’s voice. As
it says….

That’s our thought, brothers, here, I
hope. As people who understand and desire to walk in the law of Yahweh. That,
when we see someone wandering from that, and we know that the Christian church
over the years wandered away at some point, from the commands, and because of
that we want to turn them from the error of their way.

Seek to save their soul from
death….especially if their attitudes are, ‘I don’t care about whether I sin, or
not’. Then we will cover a multitude of sins. Now how do we ourselves keep
ourselves from wandering off the path, from wandering from His commandments?

We saw that the psalmist was crying
out, ‘Oh Yahweh, don’t let me wander from Your commandments!’  So, the minute he
might start to wander, Yahweh would, as a shepherd, bring him back into the
flock again.  But how do we keep from wandering from the commandments?  Look
where those eyes are going. Look where they’re going.

Focus on where you are going. Look
where going, son, daughter! Pay attention! Have you ever heard that from a
parent? ‘Hey, look where you’re going’! You’re driving down the road…most
accidents, maybe the majority, are caused from driver inattention. Ponder the
path of your vehicle, son….and you won’t get smashed into the semi ahead of
you.

and let all
your ways be established. Do not turn to the right or the left; remove your foot
from evil.

So, look straight ahead. Look where
you’re going. Don’t look to the left and don’t look to the right. Stay within
the lines and you won’t crash and burn. Remove your foot from evil…You know,
it’s where we look, it’s where our mind’s eye might be. Where physically our
physical eye, or our minds eye, that often determines the direction we will go.

You know, they say when you’re
driving a vehicle and a car’s got their brights on in the opposite direction,
don’t look at bright lights. Look to the right, actually toward the edge of road
so you don’t get blinded by the light. And focus on where the path of your feet
are, otherwise they know that where we look has a tendency to be where we end up
driving. You tend to drive toward what you’re looking at.

So they say don’t look at the bright
lights when they’re in the opposite direction. Look at the road. Keep the path
of your feet stay within the lines. So in our minds eye, when the enemy’s trying
to flash his angel of light, or whatever, at us…then don’t even look at it. Just
ponder the path of your feet. Ponder it. Look where you’re going. And let all
your ways be established. Don’t turn to the right or to the left.

There are a thousand sheep in your
face…in the other lane, thankfully, but there always saying, ‘Come my way; go my
direction’. And we’re travelling through this room, we’re saying, ‘Excuse me,
I’m going the other way….that way back there. There’s a cliff at end of that
road’. And we’re calling to the people as they go by, ‘Hey, wait, wait, wait,
wait…you’re going the wrong way. That’s a cliff. Here’s the path of light in
front of us’.

Some might make a U turn. Yahweh does
allow U turns, thankfully.  But we’ve got to keep our eyes on the pathway ahead.
And the only time we look at the evil is to say, ‘Hey evil, come back here and
turn the right way’. So, we set our affections, we set our minds on Heavenly
things.  Colassians 3:1 As followers of Messiah…

…Those are the ways of death. That’s
all in the past.  Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. So
let’s pray that we will not wander, so that if we ever do, he will send the
shepherd after us.

And if the shepherd comes, don’t run
away from Him. Let him take you up in His arms and carry you in His bosom back
to the home that you belong, in His flock.

This is
one way of seeking Him with the whole heart….

Having Yahweh’s word placed in our
hearts is key. You see this…he understands that when the word is in his heart,
when it’s placed in his heart, then that will give him the power to be an
over-comer. See, having Yahweh’s law in our hearts is not a New Testament only
concept.

The whole goal, this New Testament
goal of the law being in our hearts is that we may do it. That’s the goal.
That’s the purpose of the law being in our heart. The word, the law of Yahweh
was put into hearts of the children of Israel way back then. It’s not a New
Testament…it’s not a brand new concept, at all.

In fact, Paul quotes this verse in
Romans, saying that…

or, ‘Who
will descend into the abyss?’”(that is, to bring Messiah up from the dead).

Don’t say that. What does it say?

So, if we confess with our mouth the
Master Yahushua and believe in our hearts that Elohim has raised from the dead
we will be saved. Why? Because, Messiah the living word will come down and dwell
in our hearts so when the  Father looks at us, He doesn’t see our sins. He sees
the living Torah dwelling in us so that we might appear unto Him, blameless,
holy, fully sanctified, fully cleansed.

The goal of Yahweh is to get His
righteous word from point ‘a’ to point ‘b’…from His mouth to our hearts that we
might do it. That’s His goal. That’s the New Covenant. And if the word is
dwelling there through Messiah Yahushua being the word that became flesh and
dwelt among us living there, that’s what the New Covenant’s all about… to get
that word which we had chosen to go astray from… to get the word back to us once
again.

Who’s that
Covenant with? You can’t say out of one side of your mouth, ‘Well that old
covenant’s for the Jews, therefore it’s not for me. Then out of the other side
of your mouth say, ‘Well, that new covenant, I’m with that, too. That’s with me…

the old
covenant….

Halleluyah! He will forgive their
sins and they will be remembered no more…and so if the law is in our hearts
because of the Messiah’s indwelling, we can be assured that our observance of
the law will reflect on the outer layer. Therefore the clearest evidence that we
have Messiah in our life, and in our hearts, is that we are keeping the law of
Elohim. If His law is in our hearts, it says.

See, we are a people prone to
forgetting. We are a people who are prone to forgetting what His word has said
but we, a forgetful people, have the Spirit of Elohim dwelling in us.

And the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom
the Father sent in Messiah’s name teaches us all things, and brings to our
remembrance  so we don’t forget, all things that Yahshua taught us. Well, if
Yahushua is the Word… He teaches, by example, of how to keep the word. If He is
the word that was with Elohim from the beginning according to John 1 , He’s the
word in Genesis, Deuteronomy, Leviticus….He’s the word there, too. And so, the
Spirit of Yahweh will write this Torah in our hearts, if we’re willing to let
it. Through our own biases, through our own traditions maybe, we don’t want to
let Yahweh’s Spirit teach us all things. We need to let Yahweh’s Spirit flow
into us unhindered. And as we do so it’ll be a daily, progressive walk. Yahushua
said….

You know brothers, Yahushua leads us
this way. He doesn’t give us everything at once. As men who lead our families….
we got to lead our wives, our children that way, too. Maybe there’s some things
we would want them to be doing they can’t bear it right now. We need to be like
the Gentle Shepherd. And that’s a conviction that I learned hard way…just so you
know.

And so, the work of Spirit is to
guide us into all truth. If someone is walking in truth that’s the clearest
evidence they have the Spirit….because they’ve been guided to that place. And
the Spirit will tell us the things to come. So, the work of Spirit is to guide
us, direct us, teach us….He will teach us the Torah because, by the Spirit, the
Law of Yahweh is being written in our hearts so that we might not sin against
Yahweh.

The goal of Yahweh is not to just
keep cleansing us over and over and over again. His goal is that we would walk
out our salvation in Messiah…the pattern that Yahweh has set forth for us. And
that pattern of what sin is and what sin isn’t has always been the same. The
standard…

That’s what it is. Don’t’ let anyone
tell you otherwise. Yahweh’s word is not a mixed message. Yahweh’s law…it’s all
about love. It’s all about love. And so when we read a commandment to honor
Sabbath..to remember it, to keep it holy, …it’s an expression of love to our
Heavenly Father.

If our earthly father gave us a gift,
and it had been handed down from generation to generation for we don’t know how
long, would it be loving to our fathers if we took the gift and threw it on the
ground and we stepped all over it, and disregarded it? …Certainly not. Our
Father in Heaven has given us the gift of the Sabbath. It says the Sabbath was
made for man. This is not a day we just want to trample on and treat it as
common. We’re called to remember it and keep it holy.

That’s an expression of love toward
our Heavenly Father for giving us this gift that He has given, that has been
handed down from generation to generation since the beginning of creation. It’s
one example of how we love the Father. Some people don’t see these commands as
being a way of love because they’ve not been taught that.

But, through progressive revelation
of what Yahweh expects of us, I would hope that we would be willing to open our
minds up…our thought patterns up… to scrutiny. To letting the word of Yahweh
come in and cleanse the parts of our hearts that are not yet yielded to His
will, either through ignorance or just through rebellion.

Our focus now that we have been saved
from death is that we would begin to walk as Messiah walked…walking in that true
way of love….walking in the way of life that was taught in the Torah, in the Law
of Yahweh. Anything that is other than that is simply not love, at all.

And it’s obvious to me that the man
who wrote this psalm loved the law. He loved it with all of His heart. And so,
if he had met Yahushua, he would have loved Messiah. If we, brothers, sisters,
if we love the law that’s bonified proof that we truly do love the Messiah.

And so, as we turn toward this way of
love, this pattern that Yahushua has set forth for us, this walking in the image
of Elohim that He did, let’s also seek to walk in the image of Elohim. And as we
do, turn toward that way of love because Yahweh is love.

Brothers and Sisters, May Yahweh
bless you and may Yahweh truly, and I know He will, have mercy on us all.