4. Resting In Christ Psalm 37:7

Text:  Rest in the Lord, and wait (like waiting on tables, serving!) patiently for Him: fret not thyself because of him/her who prospereth in his/her way, because of the man/woman who bringeth wicked devices to pass.” 

Psalm 37: 7.

Good morning, patiently waiting Christian!  In this increasingly apostate and hostile 21^st Century, you and I who are seeking to live our lives as fully committed, Spiritually quickened, Bible-believing Christians – are beset all around with those led of their father, the Devil, to hinder, harm, and spoil us and bring to nought our faithful Christian witness of the power of Almighty Lord God in Christ.  Fact. 

If you are NOT experiencing such constant oppositions from the world, your own flesh, and the Devil – please immediately examine yourself to see if you really are a truly committed, born again, Christian!  No Christian soldier in this great Spiritual war is excused duty!

“Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove (test) your own selves.  Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates (rejected silver, rejected by God).  But I trust that ye shall know that ye are not reprobates (failures).”     (2 Corinthians 13:5-6)

“Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil.  For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”  (Ephesians 6:11-12)

If we are not born again and, by God’s grace through God-given faith in Christ and His onetime Sacrifice at Calvary’s Cross, then the Lord Jesus teaches us that we are indeed the children of the Devil, Satan, that old vile serpent of evil, and proud sin.

“Jesus said unto them (the unbelieving of the day), If God were your father, ye would love Me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of Myself, but He (God the Father) sent Me.  Why do you not understand My speech?  Even because ye cannot hear (with their hearts) My word.  Ye are of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do...”  (John 8:42-44)

The Devil and his children are at full and total war against Christ and His children.  Thus, when we Christians get weary of the continual Spiritual battle raging against us and our Master, Jesus Christ – we must learn to Spiritually rest in Him, renew our Spiritual strength, and continue on steadfastly in the great war against Satan and sin.

“And the apostles gathered themselves together unto Jesus, and told Him all things, both what they had done, and what they had taught.  And He said unto them,  Come ye yourselves apart into a desert (quiet and private) place, and rest a while: for there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat.  And they departed into a desert place by ship privately.”  (Mark 6:30-32)

To be a ‘patiently waiting Christian’, strong in faith and steadfast in trials and temptations, one must be found continually studying/reading God’s inspired Word, and not only reading our written Bible, but meditating also upon what we are being taught by the Spirit of God therein.  It is better to quietly mediate on one verse of Holy Scripture and clearly understand what we have read, than superficially reading three chapters of Scripture, and perceiving little of what we have quickly read.

Here’s what Thomas Brooks (1608-1680) wrote on the subject of Bible mediation:

“Meditate, practice, pray: You must meditate and dwell upon what you read; otherwise your pains and mine will be lost. The more any man is in the contemplation of truth, the more deep and firm impression is made upon his heart by truth. Heavenly meditation brings out the sweetness that is in divine truths. Not those who get most but those who keep most, are richest. So not those who hear most, or read most, but those who meditate most, are most edified and enriched.

“You must also practice and live out what you read. To read much and practice nothing - is to hunt much and catch nothing.  Ah!  What cause have most to sigh, that they have heard so much, and read so much and yet done so little!

“You must also pray over what you read. Many read much, and pray little, and therefore get little by all they read. Galen writes of a fish called Uranoscopos (Starfish), that has but one eye, which looks continually up to heaven. When a Christian has one eye upon his book--the other should be looking up to heaven for a blessing upon what he reads!” (Thomas Brooks, "The Unsearchable Riches of Christ")

As a writer C.H. Spurgeon (1834 –1892) said of him, “Brooks scatters stars with both hands, with an eagle eye of faith as well as the eagle eye of imagination.”

Thus, Brooks the Seventeenth Century Puritan, and Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the Nineteenth Century Neo-Puritan – both godly men of renown in Christ Jesus – were made wise to the Spiritual benefit of mediating on the Word of God.  By doing so, they were both, in their own particular time in history, enabled of the Lord to be ‘patiently waiting Christians. They drew Spiritual strength and faith from their Bibles; meditating deeply on what they read; practicing Christ’s way to live; and in turn, waiting with expectancy the return of our Lord and Saviour – Jesus the risen Christ. 

“And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.”  (2 Timothy 2:2)

Thought:  Happy is that man who possesses a Bible! Happier still is he who reads it! Happiest of all is he who not only reads it, but obeys it, and makes it the rule of his faith and practice!”  (J.C. Ryle, 1816-1900, in Practical Religion, page 97)