God's steadfast love is better than life
I was reading a meditation by John Piper on Psalm 63 this morning. I started reading his book, Pierced by the Word. It is very good. As I have been battling fears lately, this definitely ministered to my soul and helped to further guide my prayers. In writing Ps. 63, David was fearing for his life and this Psalm is a response to that. Piper comments,
"Learn from David what to do in this brokenhearted, terrifying moment. He prays. The whole psalm is addressed to God. he asks for one thing - not protection, not victory, but God Himself, satisfying his soul, like water satisfies thirst in a dry and weary land. 'O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my flesh faints for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water' (vers 1). There are seasons of pain and loss and grief and darkness when nothing is worth asking for but God. Everything else seems trivial, even life.
That's why David said in verse 3, 'Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you.' David may well be killed during the night by some plotting traitor sold out to Absalom. How do you sleep? You remind yourself that the love of God in the presence oGod is better than not being stabbed to death in the night. But this rest in God's steadfast love is not easily felt. We say the words. But do we feel the reality? David did not feel it as he wanted to feel it. That is why he cried out, 'Earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you.' David desperately needed God to answer his cry to come and help him taste- not just know, but feel- that God's steadfast love is better than life.
Oh, to know God like this! Would this not be everything to us? Would this not be more than all the riches and fame and success and health, indeed all the world can offer? God Himself coming near and making our souls drink from His love until all else fades from view, and fear is swallowed up in the unshakable security of everlasting enjoyment at the right hand of God. Oh that we would come to this place in our walk with God!"
