Bible Meditation: Psalm 119:26
Psalm 119:26—“I have declared my ways, and You answered me; Teach me Your statutes.”
There is nothing that we cannot take and place before our heavenly Father—our pains, our wants, our distresses, our anxieties, our hopes, our dreams. We should lay it all before Him. “Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you” (I Peter 5:7). One of our major problems is that we “do not have because [we] do not ask,” or “[we] ask and do not receive, because [we] ask amiss, that [we] may spend it on [our] pleasures” (James 4:2-3). But God is there, and when we ask with a sincere heart and in accordance with His will, He answers us—as David says in this verse.
Now, there are a couple of other considerations we need to be aware of here. He always knows best and we need to trust that He does. Which means He will answer in His own time, and His answer may be “no.” My earthly father didn’t always give me everything I wanted, for obvious reasons. But too many people think God is a genie Who is supposed to grant them whatever they wish whenever they want it, and they get mad when He doesn’t. Chances are their motives aren’t right in the first place.
Trust in God. Listen to the “statutes” that He teaches us. Lay it all before Him, then trust Him to do the right thing, which, as often as not, isn’t the thing we want. But God wants heaven to be our ultimate home, and He will do whatever He can to get us there.
And, some day, by His undeserved grace, if we do get there, we will be very glad that sometimes he didn’t give us what we asked for.