Prayer, Praise and Promises 10/5

Author: Warren Wiersbe
Source: Prayer, Praise and Promises
Scripture Reference: Psalm 109:14-20

Careful Cultivating

Read Psalm 109:14-20

What we love determines how we live. What delights us also directs us. David wrote about his enemies, "As he loved cursing, so let it come to him; as he did not delight in blessing, so let it be far from him."

What do you love? What do you delight in? You reap exactly what you sow. David's enemies were sowing curses, and he knew they were going to reap a harvest of misery. They were running away from the blessing of God, and David knew that in missing the blessing of God, they were going to miss the joys and purposes of life.

Let's be careful how we cultivate the appetites of our inner person. What we love we may get, and after we get it we may regret it. There may be some fun in sowing sin, but there's no joy in the reaping. Christians' tears and toil are in the sowing; our joy is in the reaping. But for those who live for the flesh and for the world, the joy is in the sowing, and the trial and the tears are in the reaping. If you take what you want from life, you pay for it.

How important it is to cultivate spiritual appetites--to have an appetite for the Word of God, for prayer, to be with His people and to delight in the worship and service of God!

* * *

Cultivate those appetites of your inner person that lead to spiritual growth. Keep them in check by feeding on God's Word and by walking with the Lord. He will use your appetites to bring blessing to your life and others.

Psalm 109:14-20 (New International Version)

14 May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered before the LORD;
may the sin of his mother never be blotted out.

15 May their sins always remain before the LORD,
that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

16 For he never thought of doing a kindness,
but hounded to death the poor
and the needy and the brokenhearted.

17 He loved to pronounce a curse—
may it [a] come on him;
he found no pleasure in blessing—
may it be [b] far from him.

18 He wore cursing as his garment;
it entered into his body like water,
into his bones like oil.

19 May it be like a cloak wrapped about him,
like a belt tied forever around him.

20 May this be the LORD's payment to my accusers,
to those who speak evil of me.
Footnotes:

1. Psalm 109:17 Or curse, / and it has
2. Psalm 109:17 Or blessing, / and it is