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The Journey

I Delight in the Way

Scripture: Psalm 119:9-16

Prayer is very important to me. It is probably the number one reason that I pursued ministry in the first place. When I see people misrepresent prayer, it pains me. It is like someone telling a story about someone very close to you, but telling the story in a way that is untrue and slanders your friend. Prayer is not a magical spell where we can congure up the power of God. Prayer is a deep relationship with the one who loves you. It is speaking and listening.

The Psalmists are people that know this the most. They have conversations with God in any situaton. They get angry wth God, they complain, praise, exhault God because a life prayer is a live of conversation of relationship. In our human relationships we have arguments, laugh, cry, express concerns, and gain advice. Prayer is no different. When we live in communion with God, in relationship with the one who created us we can be honest with Him just as we are with our closest friends.

The Psalmist today speaks about how to encourage the youth to keep a pure or right path. It is to encourage them to pursue a relationship with God. The psalmist speaks of treasuring and meditating on the law and comands of God. This means more than just studying them. To meditate on the
scripture is to relate, engage, and converse with God about what He has said to those in the past and how that relates in our present age. It is not a general statment but how does the comand of God relate to you personally.

Meditation is important in a life with God. It is clearing our minds of all else to focus in on the one thing. In Christian meditation this one thing is God. It is contemplating scripture and walking along with it. When we meditate on scripture we go beyond memorizing it, or understanding it through study. Memorization and study do have their place, do not get me wrong, it is important to understand all we can and to be able to recall scripture at all times, but we should also know the Word of God intimately. The commands cease being laws but become endearing whispers from the lover of our souls.

The psalmist says that God will teach him His ways personally. The there can be an relationship deeper than knowledge. This reminds me of God walking with Adam and Eve in the coolness of the evening in the Garden of Eden. It reminds me of the countless lessons and conversations the gospel writers depict in their narratives of Jesus. The angels said that Jesus was to be called God with us. This is the truth. Jesus came to show us how to walk with God, and to provide the way to enter into the relationship.

Today I encourage you to interact with this psalm. Spend a few moments to consider each of the lines or verses. Imagine what it would look like if you were to engage life with God in that way? Would aspects of your current lifestyle change, ask yourself why or how?

I encourage you to engage with others as well when you enter into a life of prayer. We are communal people. We come together to encourage each other. We are on a journey with God personally, but we are not alone. Places like this allow us all to interact even if we are great distances away from each other. Interact here and I also encourage you to find a group where you can meet personally as well.

About jwquaker

I’m sure everyone wants to know who I am…well if you are viewing this page you do. I’m Jared Warner and I am a pastor or minister recorded in the Evangelical Friends Church Mid America Yearly Meeting. To give a short introduction to the EFC-MA, it is a group of evangelical minded Friends in the Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and Colorado. We are also a part of the larger group called Evangelical Friends International, which as the name implies is an international group of Evangelical Friends. For many outside of the Friends or Quaker traditions you may ask what a recorded minister is: the short answer is that I have demistrated gifts of ministry that our Yearly Meeting has recorded in their minutes. To translate this into other terms I am an ordained pastor, but as Friends we believe that God ordaines and mankind can only record what God has already done. More about myself: I have a degree in crop science from Fort Hays State University, and a masters degree in Christian ministry from Friends University. Both of these universities are in Kansas. I lived most of my life in Kansas on a farm in the north central area, some may say the north west. I currently live and minister in the Kansas City, MO area and am a pastor in a programed Friends Meeting called Willow Creek Friends Church.

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