S63P8 – The qualities of God’s word: purifying

Psa. 119:9-10

How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word. With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments!

If you had asked me before my salvation what kind of life I wanted to live, I likely would have told you that I just want to live a good life.  I wanted to be a good friend, a good son, a good employee and simply a good person.  In trying to figure out how to be all of these things, the world’s resources for instruction were endless.  What I found were not concrete definitions of what it means to be a good person living a good life.  I instead discovered dozens of differing opinions on how to reach that goal.  By the world’s standards, there is no one way or one set of rules that states how an objectively good and pure life is lived.  This is because the only objective and true standard of goodness and purity comes from God.

When we think of living in a pure way, we might think this applies only to the issue of sexual sin.  However, pure living touches on every aspect of life.  God desires not only sexual purity from his children but also purity with regard to our motives, our thoughts, our words and our treatment of others.  The pure way is one that conforms to the commandments of God, and those commandments give instruction regarding our behavior in all areas of life.  He instructs us to guard the way that we have followed because adherence to his statutes requires a certain degree of discipline and vigilance.  If we discipline ourselves to follow the word of God, the instructions that He has given us for living this life, then we are able to make this way pure.

Some might see God’s commandments as confining.  They view the boundaries He has set as limitations, and they think that a full life can be lived only by experiencing what lies beyond those boundaries.  If we are familiar with the word of God, we know that nothing good lies outside the freedom that He gives us within his commandments.  In fact, the life that is purified as it is conformed to the word of God is the most free life we can live here.  It is what lies outside of his boundaries that binds us and keeps us confined.  Father, make us a people who hunger for purity in our lives and fight for it to be manifest as we live according to your word.