Daily Devotionals
Daily Devotional: Psalms 17:1-5
Ps 17:1-5
Hear a just cause, O Lord; attend to my cry! Give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit! From your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right! You have tried my heart, you have visited me by night, you have tested me, and you will find nothing; I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress. With regard to the works of man, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent. My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped.
2 Tim 1:3
I thank God whom I serve, as did my ancestors, with a clear conscience, as I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day.
David lived with a clear conscience. Job lived with a clear conscience. Paul lived with a clear conscience. Did they ever do anything wrong? Yes! For sure they all sinned! When each of these said they had a clear conscience, it was not because they were being self-righteous nor were they feeling superior to others. They lived their lives each day with a commitment to do the will of God to the best of their ability and according to their understanding of what was right.
David, Job, Abraham, Ruth, Deborah, Paul, and all of the other examples of faith were people like you and me. They were not some kind of super people with some kind of miraculous endowment to do right. They were people who had made a commitment to God to do his will and to live for him. We can be like them in our lives today if we are as determined and as committed as they were.
Their conscience was their own. They were not held to the standard of what other people might think or say. They were not held to the standard of the local teacher or Rabbi. They understood what Paul wrote to the Romans when he said that each of us will stand or fall before God and stand we will because we belong to the Lord. He is able to make us stand.
Judge yourself before God and let your brothers and sisters do the same. Jesus said to get all of the wood out of your own eye before you try to take the splinter out of the eye of another person. When we sin, we must repent. He will forgive.
O Lord God, thank you for your love, your mercy, and your grace that allows me to know that I can be with you in eternity. Thank you for your patience as you mold me into your likeness and get me ready to live with Jesus forever. Use me to help others to want to serve you. Use me also to help those who have physical needs. Thank you for all you have given me to enjoy in life. Thank you for allowing me to be born in the time and place that has been my lot. Be with the leaders of our nation and give them wisdom. I pray in the name of Jesus my King.
Robert
