Psalms 8:1; add 31:1-4
My Shepherd met me searching for Him in His green pastures. My thoughts kept returning to a thought that arose during Sunday’s devotional from Psalm 32:1-2:
Psalms 32:1 ¶ Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
Psalms 32:2 Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.
The praise of David for God’s gracious forgiveness is referenced by the Spirit through Paul in Romans 4:6-8:
Romans 4:6 Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,
Romans 4:7 Saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.
Romans 4:8 Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.
The passage in Psalm 32 adds important insight into the character of the faith through which God’s grace moves.
Faith is an action of our spirit. See the connection between our spirit and the action of believing: “We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak” (2 Corinthians 4:13—italics added to highlight the connection between our spirit and faith). We must guard our faith from seducing spirits (1 John 4:1). The Holy Spirit gains access to our soul through our faith: “In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise” (Ephesians 1:13; see also Galatians 3:2-5, 14; 5:22 where we see faith listed in the fruit of the Spirit).
Faith is a spiritual gift given to us by the Spirit of God: “To another faith by the same Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:9a; see Romans 12:3). Faith is a spiritual activity. Believing is a “work” of the spirit, not of the flesh (John 6:28; Galatians 5:19; see Romans 8:8; Titus 3:5).
The Spirit, through David, provides a critical distinction in the character of the faith that opens the door of the heart to the Heart of GOD: It is guileless (Psalm 32:2, “in whose spirit there is no guile”). The word guile translates רְמִיָּה (rah-chah-meem). It is translated as deceit in Micah 6:12: “a tongue of deceit, “lips of deceit” (Psalm 120:2), and “workers of treachery” in Psalm 52:4. In Proverbs 10:4, it is translated “slack hand,” slothful soul” in Proverbs 19:15, and slackness in Jeremiah 48:10, where the prophet rebukes those who “Do the work of the Lord with slackness.”
Along the still waters, I meditated on the critical distinction between the flesh-faith of mere “professors” and the authentic “spirit of faith” of the genuine believer. Some rest their salvation on a false faith, a fleshly faith. Their spirit is treacherous, false, and deceitful. That deceitfulness can arise from indifference, a lazy, careless attitude toward the command of GOD to all men everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30).
When the spirit in a man is full of guile, deceit, treachery, whether that produces indifference or a crafty, manipulative spirit that vainly imagines they can make a fool of God with feigned faith. But Jesus warned: “I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:3; see Luke 13:27).
Paul identified seventeen “works of the flesh” (Galatians 5:19-21). “Faith” is not one of them. Each of these “works of the flesh” arises from the impurity of the flesh (Romans 7:18, 23). This “law of sin” that resides in our “members” (the flesh) pollutes the spirit that is attached to them, creating a perverse spirit of guile. The spirit of a man that responds to the gospel with a serious concern for his soul, a “godly sorrow” that works “repentance unto salvation” (2 Corinthians 7:10), will believe sincerely.
Paul differentiates unfeigned faith from any other sort when he testified of the faith he saw in Timothy: “When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also” (2 Timothy 1:5).
There is unfeigned (guiless) faith. This means there is another sort of faith that is not genuine, a feigned faith, exercised by a spirit full of guile. Our spirit must respond to the Holy Spirit, creating conviction in our minds and hearts about our sin. Repentance arising from this godly sorrow opens the door of our hearts to God’s Spirit, Who will enter in and seal us to God by the Holy Spirit of promise (Ephesians 1:13-14).
In the valley shadowed by His Cross, I knelt rejoicing in the gospel, glad Jesus drew me to Him (John 12:32), quickened the faith He measured out to me at conception (Romans 12:3; Psalm 139:16), gave me repentance (2 Timothy 2:25), to acknowledge the truth to salvation.
At the table, He anointed my head with His oil and filled my cup with His grace. Goodness and mercy followed as we went into the harvest.
Praying for revival! 🙏
Going live later this afternoon.
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