A Look at Psalm 119:8

Psalm 119:8 “I will obey Your decrees; do not utterly forsake me.”
 

“I will obey Your decrees!” That’s a statement full of fortitude. “I will,” is a strong statement in itself. “I will obey,” is even stronger. What would give a person such resolve? Knowing that God will not forsake us gives us a great resolve. 

We have a wonderful promise in the New Testament which says, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you” Hebrews 13:5. The Greek meaning of the word “forsake” has to do with the way the soul abandons the body at the time of death. In other words, God’s promise to us is that He will never abandon us; He will never take His life away from us.
 

A decree is a decision. David said that he would obey God’s decrees (decisions). His obedience became his assurance that God would never leave him. When we follow God in His decisions we walk with Him. God rarely asks us to go do something for Him. He primarily asks us to go with Him. The work of God is not something we do on our own. It is something we do with God. When we walk in His decisions we walk with Him. God would never abandon those who walk with Him. 
 

We live in a day where there is very little integrity. It is becoming more and more difficult to believe the promises people make: fathers are abandoning their homes, mothers are abandoning their children, pastors are abandoning their congregations. Yet in the midst of it all, we have a promise we can cling to: “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” “God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should change His mind” Numbers 23:19. Not only is God telling the truth, He also will never change His mind. What a comforting thought today!
 

Let me encourage you to take some time to pray through this, to meditate and focus in on that one thought: “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

Continued