Psalms 116:1 “I Love The Lord”

Psalms 116:1-2 says, “I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.”

The Bible says, Jesus Himself said: the greatest commandment is to love the Lord thy God with all the heart, with all the mind, with all the soul, and with all your strength.

I John 4:19 says, “We love Him, because He first loved us.” The question is how can we love God more? How can we grow in our love for Christ? If we love Him because He first loved us then the possibility is there for us to have unlimited love for God. Because God has unlimited love for us.

One of the ways in which we can grow in our love for Christ is mentioned here in the first two verses of Psalms 116. Psalms 116:1-2 says, “I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.”

Answered prayer. Answered prayer is one of the ways in which we learn to love God more. It should stand without argument that God always answers our prayers so long as we do not regard iniquity in our hearts. Jesus said seek and ye shall find, ask and ye shall receive. Perhaps one of the reasons some people do not see answers to prayer is they do not pray enough. The more that you pray, the more things that you pray about the more you will see God answer your prayers. You see with prayer the secret is to have faith.

Its just as Hebrews 11:6 says, “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

Prayer takes faith and patience. You need to come to God believing that He hears you, understanding that He hears you because of the shed blood of His Son Jesus Christ. And you need to have patience in prayer. God does things in His timing. Sometimes we might have to wait years or we might have to wait an entire lifetime to finally see God answer our prayers. God’s timing is perfect. He will answer your prayers at just the right time so that it accomplishes something for the gospel.

Psalms 116:1-2 says, “I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.”

It is a wonderful thing, it is a miracle in action whenever we see an answer to our prayers. Answered prayers are opportunities to love God more. How can we love God more? We will love God more when see Him answer our prayers. Therefore we should pray more. You could say the more we pray to Jesus the more we will grow in our love for Jesus because He will answer our prayers in His time. The Lord is in the heavens. He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased.

When you pray, pray about everything. Pray for your daily needs. Pray for your health and your family. Pray about your plans for the future, your hopes and your dreams. But most importantly pray gospel prayers. Pray for the lost of the world that they will be saved. Pray for the Word of God that it will go forth into the world and touch hearts. Pray that God will put you through the fire and purify your faith. Pray that God will use you greatly for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Pray that you will become a Christian with the faith of Job and Abraham. Pray that God will pass you by and show you His glory like He did Moses. If you pray about things like these and not just about the physical things of life oh what great answers to prayer you will see. What marvelous things you will see the hand of God do. And in return what great love you will gain for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Psalms 1116:3-8 says, “The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow. Then called I upon the name of the LORD; O LORD, I beseech thee, deliver my soul. Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful. The LORD preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me. Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the LORD hath dealt bountifully with thee. For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.”

When it comes to prayer this is how it works, trouble and sorrow. Most people will not turn to God and most people will not pray to God when things are going their way and life is perfect. They will only turn to God in prayer when trouble and sorrow come their way and the sorrows of death compass them about. Sometimes even then if their hearts are hard enough they will not even pray to Jesus.

But this explains an important truth to us about life. Why do troubles and sorrows come our way in the Christian life? God is the heavens. He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased. God lets troubles and sorrows, the pains of death and hell even come into our lives so that we will learn to trust in Him more and so that we will pray to Him, so that we will grow closer to Him. Thank God for the troubles and the sorrows that come our way in life without them we would be a rich man in our circumstances and a rich man can hardly pass through the eye of a needle.

Psalms 116:5 says, “Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful.”

In this verse 3 great characteristics of Jesus are given: gracious, righteous, and merciful. How many people in this world during times of trouble and tribulation will acknowledge or believe that God is gracious, righteous, and merciful.

There are a great many things to learn about God. In fact we will never know everything there is to know about God not in this lifetime and not in eternity. You may even wonder what are the things that you will never know about God? But if a person just understands these three characteristics of God how blessed in life that person will be: God is gracious, righteous, and merciful.

Grace has to do with what God gives freely. God freely has given salvation from sins by faith in the name of Jesus Christ. Righteous means holy, without sin. God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. God is not a sinner. God is not evil. God is not a liar. God is not a murderer. God does no wrong. God is righteous and the Lord hath done whatsoever He hath pleased. Merciful has to do with God withholding judgment and punishment and giving opportunity and time for men to repent of their sins. Oh how merciful God is. This is the reason you see wicked men go on for years and years and years in their sins. Because God is merciful and is giving time and chance to repent.

Psalms 116:6 says, “The LORD preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me.”

The word simple means foolish.

I Corinthians 3:18-19 says, “Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.”

I Corinthians 1:18-28 says, “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:”

Psalms 116:6 says, “The LORD preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me.”

The word simple means foolish.

Psalms 116:9 says, “I will walk before the LORD in the land of the living.”

Now we come to a verse which surmises how life should be lived. What does it mean to walk before the Lord in this life? It means that every day, everywhere you go, everything that you do, every decision that you make, even in everything that you say, you think about God, you think about the presence of God that He is right there watching you, you seek the will of God and not your own will, you walk before the Lord.

It should be no surprise that prayer was talked about before this verse. A big part of walking with the Lord is praying to Him. Any one who doesn’t pray is not going to stay in fellowship with God. The reading of, the meditating on, and the study of the word of God is important. But prayer is just as important. You need both to have and to maintain a fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Psalms 116:10, “I believed, therefore have I spoken: I was greatly afflicted.”

Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. If you have faith in Jesus then it is going to result in you telling other people about Jesus and what He has done for you in dying for your sins on the cross. I believed, therefore have I spoken.

Psalms 116:11, “I said in my haste, All men are liars.” Lets see if you can find one person who has never told a lie in their entire lifetime. Well I can find one. Guess what His name is? Jesus Christ.

Psalms 116:12-14 says, “What shall I render unto the LORD for all his benefits toward me? I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the LORD. I will pay my vows unto the LORD now in the presence of all his people.”

The Word benefit has the idea of something good that is given unto you. It benefits you. Of all the things that God has given the greatest is the gift of salvation, the gift of eternal life, the forgiveness of your sins. In these verses it is called the cup of salvation.

This is a very interesting phrase because when I think of a cup and salvation I think of the words of Jesus when He prayed in the garden of Gethsemane just before his arrest and crucifixion.

Matthew 26:39-44 says, “And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt. And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done. And he came and found them asleep again: for their eyes were heavy. And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words.”

Jesus mentioned a cup three times in his prayer. What was the cup that Jesus drank? Why it was the cup of sin because Jesus became sin for us. It was the cup of the wrath of God because Jesus took upon himself the judgment for our sins. What a cup from which Jesus drank. It was so terrible that to even think about it in prayer, near the hour, drew great drops of blood from His forehead.

Consider the contrast between the cup of salvation from which we drink the cup from which Jesus drank. The cup of salvation is a cup of grace and righteousness of eternal life and peace. The cup of sin and judgment is a cup of death and unimaginable suffering. If you had the cup of Jesus before you you would not be able to drink it. You would not even be able to take one sip.

How thankful we should be for what Jesus has done for us. Jesus has done what we could never do. Jesus fulfilled the law. Jesus never sinned but lived a righteous life and Jesus took the penalty for our sins when He hung on the tree, when He died on the cross.

I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the LORD.

Psalms 116:15, “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of His saints.” This is a very great verse. It is a verse filled with comfort. We could ask the question if God has given us eternal life then why does He let us die?

The word precious means valuable, honourable, costly. God has a purpose in everything that He does. God uses death, those last few fading and painful moments of life. God uses death as an opportunity for His children to learn one last lesson in trusting in Him. And God uses the death of His children for the spread of the gospel.

Just as God has a plan and a purpose for your life He has a plan and a purpose for your death and the circumstances surrounding it. The circumstances, the events, the details, how you will suffer as you die and how it will touch the hearts of those around you, all these things God has taken into account.

If you are a Christian the day you die will be a great day. It will be the day that you leave this world for the next. It will be the day that you sin no more. It will be the day that you go to heaven to suffer no more. And it will be the day that you see Jesus face to face.

You never know whose lives will be touched by your death. But God does and you can find great comfort in the fact that He wants to use your death for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Psalms 116:15, “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of His saints.”

Some people dream and desire to accomplish great things with their life. But what about with their death. Well as Christians we know that our lives and our deaths have the potential to accomplish great things for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

When you come near the end of life and the fear and the darkness of death threatens to swallow you up remember this verse in Psalms and remember that God is still in control. He has a plan. He is doing His work and Jesus will be there for you to guide you through the doorway of death and into His arms.

“Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of His saints.”

If you do not know Jesus as your Savior then today is the day of salvation. You can drink from the cup of salvation and receive eternal life. You can face the shadow of death and in knowing Jesus you will find that God has a plan and a purpose both for your life and your death. Please come to Jesus today for the forgiveness of your sins.

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