Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
You've heard the phrase, "I love you with all my heart." We know what that means. Our heart is absolutely critical to our life. I had a professor who once said: "The heart is the mission control center of our lives. It controls everything."
The Heart as Psalms
Our Verse of the Day comes from Psalm chapter 119, verse 11. It says, "I have hidden Your Word in my heart, that I might not sin against You."
It's a very well-known verse—a tremendous verse that, of course, comes from the book of Psalms. The psalms are all about how we learn more about Jesus Christ. It's so personal as we respond to Him. I love how the psalmist cries out to the Lord with so much emotion and is so real in terms of his relationship to God.
Within this particular psalm—the longest psalm of the Bible—we see this amazing verse. Essentially, in Psalm 119, verse 11, it teaches us two ways that the Word of God is our defense. This is critical for us.
Why This Matters
There's all kinds of things in our world, in our families, and in our lives that can truly be detrimental to our walk with God.
Number One: The Priority of the Heart
Let's look and see what the psalmist says. Number one: let's call it the priority of the heart. He says, right there: "I have hidden Your Word in my heart."
The word "hidden" there in Hebrew means to treasure. It doesn't just mean to memorize. We love memorizing Scripture. It's absolutely critical. Here the idea is not only hide it or memorize it, but treasure the Word of God in our hearts.
The reason we do that is because the Word of God reshapes what our heart loves. Did you know that we don't sin primarily from lack of information, but because we love something more than we love God? We don't sin because we lack things we know about the Bible. We sin because we truly don't love God more than our sin.
As we think about this passage, the Word of God combats the things that we shouldn't love. As we treasure the Word of God in our heart, we want to make the Word of God in the heart the priority.
Number Two: The Passion to Hide the Word
Secondly—and I love this—why should we have the Word of God be a priority for us?
Let's call it the passion to hide the Word in our heart. The verse says again: "I have hidden Your Word in my heart that I might not sin against You."
You know how you can tell somebody is maturing in their walk with God? It's how badly they want to keep themselves from sinning? I love this verse. It says, "that I might not sin against You"—very, very personal.
Again, because when we sin, when we do something wrong, it's a violation of our relationship with God. Again, the psalmist is very, very personal here. It's a grace-driven motivation that we should have to walk with God—not this legalistic terror or fear that we've somehow upset God because He's a terrible ogre. Not at all.
A Personal Relationship
There's this personal relationship. As we look at this, what do we learn from this particular passage?
Defeat Sin by Loving God More
Number one: let's call it defeat sin by loving God more. I love what Tim Keller says: "You defeat sin not by trying harder, but by loving God more." His Word fuels that love.
In Hebrews chapter 4, the Bible says: "The Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and it gets way down deep into our life, gets down deep into our mind, our emotions." We can trust the Word of God, and we defeat sin by loving God more.
Treasure the Word of God
Secondly, we should obviously treasure the Word of God. I'm always interested in Matthew chapter 4, verses 1 to 11. The devil comes and says, "Jesus, throw Yourself down." The devil comes and says, "Jesus, turn this rock into bread"—among other temptations.
Jesus could have said, "Shoo!" He could have said, "Get out of here." He could have said all kinds of things. Yet He quotes Scripture three times. He quotes the Old Testament three times, showing that you and I can do the same thing. Why? Because He wielded the power of the Word. Because He was the ultimate person—God Himself—who treasured the Word of God.
Christ perfectly obeyed where you and I failed, and He treasured the Word of God.
Our Challenge
May you and I do the same and hide the Word, treasure the Word of God in our heart, that we might not sin against the Lord Jesus Christ.
