We Respond With Wholehearted Devotion
So we've seen how God hears our cries, He loves us and forgives us, and He delivers us from death eternally. And I love what David does in this Psalm. He responds in a couple of different ways.
The Call to an Undivided Heart
Firstly, let's look at verse 11 where he writes this: “Teach me your way, Lord, that I may rely on your faithfulness; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.” An undivided heart! Or the NLT version says “grant me purity of heart”, or as another version says, “make me wholeheartedly committed to you”. All different ways of saying the same thing: giving our lives totally and completely over to God, which is what He requires of us, a life that is completely given over to Him.
And it's important for us to remember this, that God calls us not just to a life of receiving forgiveness, but to a life of obedience. To a life of holiness. He calls us to give our everything to Him.
A Life Fully Surrendered to Christ
In his book Holiness for Ordinary People, Keith Drury quotes from a letter which I thought was very profound, where the nameless writer of the letter said:
“One windy day in March I settled the issue of Christ’s control of my life and placed my total life in His hands. I decided that the Lord would sit at the steering wheel of my life. That decision meant I would no longer run the affairs of my life for my own benefit, but let God be the driver of my life.
I noticed several changes following this final wrestling match with myself and the Lord. The greatest permanent change occurred in my heart. Ever since that day, I've had a consuming passion to obey Christ. He has become the central force of my life. I have a new thirst for holiness and I want to obey Christ and Christ alone.
In a sense, I am now a slave to Jesus Christ. I submitted completely to God in everything, for all time and even for eternity. The issue was settled.
When God responded to me He filled me with a passion to obey Him. I quit asking how much I could get away with and still be a Christian and started living for Christ as my supreme passion in life.
And what I have is a new passion to be like Jesus. Holiness is not just a high priority for me, it's the central priority of my life, around which all other priorities orient.”
Now those are great words, and at the bottom of the story Keith Drury writes, “Do you have an undivided heart? Can you say that your heart is totally magnetised towards Christ? Are you fully committed to obedience? If not,” he says, “why not linger here and begin seeking to work from God that gives this gift to you?”
An Invitation to Surrender
And so if you've never given your heart totally, undividedly to Christ, why don't you linger here a moment — pause.
Ask Him to give you that passion.
Ask Him to give you that undivided heart.
Trust in His Holy Spirit to fill you and enable you to do it.
And then walk out into your day and live for Him with all you have, by faith.
