God My Integrity
It's been a deep week as we've looked at God's character in Psalm 18. And today, if we look at verses 19-26, David realizes that God is his integrity. He says: “The LORD has dealt with me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands he has rewarded me. For I have kept the ways of the LORD; I am not guilty of turning from my God. All his laws are before me; I have not turned away from his decrees. I have been blameless before him and have kept myself from sin. The LORD has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in his sight.” And then these great words in 25 and 26: “To the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless, to the pure you show yourself pure, but to the devious you show yourself shrewd.”
Live Blamelessly Through
David really was a man of God, especially in those early days. And you know what? It was God's anointing in his life that enabled him to live this way. He really was filled with the God's Spirit, and this helped him to live the godly life that he talks of here.
But later on, he actually backslid, and he really went down some bad roads of adultery, murder and so on. And those sins really haunted him for the rest of his life. If he had just kept this type of holiness that he talks about in these verses. He would have saved himself a lot of heartache.
What does this mean for us? Well, friends, we can be blameless. We can't be perfectly sinless because we are human beings. But we can be blameless. We can be free from intentional sin and choose integrity and choose righteousness and cleanness of hands as David says.
How do we do it? By being filled by the Spirit and living in step with the Spirit. Romans 6-8 talks a lot about how we can walk in step with the Spirit or in step with the flesh. It's up to us. We need to, with God's help, reject the sinful temptations that come our way and stand up in holiness and blamelessness. But it's by God's grace - it's by believing that God's grace is in our lives, empowering us to reject sin - that's how we can be blameless.
Embrace God's Integrity
There'll probably still be unintentional, sinful actions and thoughts in our lives. And as we grow and mature, those will get less. But the intentional sins we can be free of.
Come to Jesus today and ask him to fill you with his Spirit. And then, friends, believe that it's been done. And if you pray that with all your heart, believe that it's been done and believe that you have no more need to follow your old sinful ways, then like David, we can say God is my integrity. His Spirit keeps me away from the things that used to hold me down.
Gotta love David. His words always bring us back to God in a special way. And so I hope that you at this point in the year have found great encouragement from this week's devotions. And may God be all these things to you in the days and weeks to come.
