God Addresses People Problems

We want everyone to like us, but it doesn’t always happen. Not everyone is nice, either. Sometimes those who don’t like us whisper about us and stir others up against us. They make things up about us and rally others around them.

No one understood that better than David. He always had enemies. Much of the time, he was on the run from them. But somehow, he found mental and emotional victory in the middle of it. The four verses in Ps. 119 for today show exactly how he did that. It’s a pattern we can learn from.

Ps 119:69  The proud have forged a lie against me: but I will keep thy precepts with my whole heart.	It would take quite a resolve to commit to keeping God’s precepts with my whole heart when those around me lie about me and slander me. Precepts are codes of wisdom or principles to guide our lives. It requires a heart that stands above it all in order to let others’ responses and opinions of me just slide off. David was able to do that. This verse shows that. It’s what made him a great leader. You can’t always buckle under the load of public opinion. Here’s another David example: 1Sa 30:6  And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God. I’d like to meet him in heaven and ask him exactly how he did that. I think it will be about meditating on God’s word.
(70)  Their heart is as fat as grease; but I delight in thy law.	David is referring to the proud who forged a lie against him. Fat as grease means they are insensitive. It’s not sin to recognize and acknowledge what kinds of people oppose me. “Consider the source” might be one way to look at it. But on the contrary, decide to think on and delight in God’s law. Which law? I don’t know about David, but here’s one I could sure work on: Pro 31:26  She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.
(71)  It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.	Carrying on with the same idea of surviving the onslaught of those who opposed David—the proud who forged a lie against him, I now see his perspective. He didn’t learn God’s statutes until he was afflicted like that. Trials make us bitter or better. Natural reasoning leads to bitter. Getting God’s comfort from his word leads to better. Statutes means prescribed actions. That’s appropriate. What actions does God prescribe in a time of trial and affliction? Here’s an example David could have learned from Job 13:15:  Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him.
(72)  The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver.	After meditating on God’s word in the midst of his “people trials” and getting the right perspective to meet the challenge, David could say The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver.  Really, in times of emotional upheaval, gold and silver are worthless. The law of God’s mouth is most necessary. Law means instruction or direction. David looked to God and his word until his agitated heart could be resolved. Psa 123:2  Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their masters, and as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress; so our eyes wait upon the LORD our God, until that he have mercy upon us. David wrote that. God gives so much wisdom and insight through the testimony of David’s life.