Revive Your Prayer and Worship
Psalm 119:145-152
145 I cry out with my whole heart;
Hear me, O LORD! I will keep Your statutes.
146 I cry out to You;
Save me, and I will keep Your testimonies.
147 I rise before the dawning of the morning,
And cry for help; I hope in Your word.
148 My eyes are awake through the night watches,
That I may meditate on Your word.
149 Hear my voice according to Your lovingkindness;
O LORD, revive me according to Your justice.
150 They draw near who follow after wickedness;
They are far from Your law.
151 You are near, O LORD,
And all Your commandments are truth.
152 Concerning Your testimonies,
I have known of old that You have founded them forever.
I am delighted that Dr. Shockley is teaching in the Book of Psalms in our Adult Bible Study on Sunday mornings. Psalms is the songbook of the Bible. So as we come to worship I often read and pray through a passage from Psalms that relates to our worship at the beginning of our worship service on Sunday.
It is under the category of prayer that singing finds its place in Christian worship. The psalms were sung prayers, and it is right to sing unto the Lord under the new covenant as well. Singing can also fall under the category of teaching in worship. Paul writes in Colossians 3:16 that we are to “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.” We may not always remember this, but our hymns and songs are vehicles for proclaiming God’s truth and thus can serve a teaching function as well as the function of prayer as we offer them with thankful hearts to the Lord. Prayers both spoken and sung are essential in biblically faithful worship.[i]
In this passage the psalmist is in prayer, and we are given a glimpse into how he prayed, why he prayed, when he prayed, and what his prayers were about. But most of all we learn about the important interconnection between prayer and God’s Word. If your worship and your prayer life has lost life and needs reviving spiritually, this passage will help. This stanza gives us four patterns of prayer that God can use to revive our prayer lives and our worship:[ii]
1. Pray Earnestly (Psalm 119:145-146)
The psalmist has a desperate urgency as he comes to God in prayer:
145 I cry out with my whole heart;
Hear me, O LORD! I will keep Your statutes.
146 I cry out to You;
Save me, and I will keep Your testimonies.
One of the ways to revive and breathe life into my prayer life is to recognize my desperate need for God’s help. Like we sing in the old hymn “I need Thee every hour.”
The first two verses each begin “I cry out.” The verb expresses earnestness and intensity; he prayed passionately! This earnestness is also clear in the next phrase “with my whole heart.” Spurgeon says, “Heart-cries are the essence of prayer.”
His requests are simple. In Psalm 119:145 He asks the Lord to answer him, “Hear me, O LORD!” And in Psalm 119:146 he prays, “Save me.” His first thought in difficulty was to turn to God for answers and deliverance.
Notice the purpose of his prayer. In both these requests, his earnest heart’s prayer is for help so he can obey the Word of God. He prays with desperation for the sake of dedication.
- 145b “Hear me, O LORD! I will keep your statutes”
- 146b “Save me and I will keep your testimonies”
This prayer is not motivated by a desire for ease or comfort; it’s motivated by a determination to obey God more and more. We don’t come to worship or prayer so that we will get from God what we think we want, but in order to become more what God wills for us: faithful obedience.
May God help us to see our own desperate need and to pray more earnestly, so that our prayers can be more effective and our worship more pleasing to God.
2. Pray Constantly (Psalm 119:147-148)
147 I rise before the dawning of the morning,
And cry for help; I hope in Your word.
148 My eyes are awake through the night watches,
That I may meditate on Your word.
The psalmist rises early before dawn to pray. And he lies awake at night meditate on God’s word. In other words, he prayed constantly throughout the day and night. His life was not compartmentalized to a “time with God” and then time for everything else. Every part of life, day or night, he was God-centered, God-oriented, and God-worshipping. In v. 147 he prays and in v. 148 he meditates on Scripture, which suggests there’s a 2-part 2-way communication involved in our duty to pray constantly.
The New Testament often uses the familiar phrase “watch and pray,” (Matt. 26:41; Mark 13:33; Col. 4:2; 1 Peter 4:7). Nothing will inspire your worship on Sunday more than constant prayer and meditation on God’s word the rest of the week.
3. Pray Biblically (Psalm 119:149-150)
149 Hear my voice according to Your lovingkindness; O LORD, revive me according to Your justice.
Here he specifically prays for revival. Notice this prayer for revival is based on God’s grace and God’s will. He prays, “according to Your lovingkindness“ and “according to Your justice.” In effect, he is praying, “God because you are full of love and grace, I want you to hear me. Revive me so that I might live based upon your truth, your decisions, your will.
He needed God to revive him because of the tough situation that he was facing due to his enemies. He says in verse 150:
150 They draw near who follow after wickedness;
They are far from Your law.
But even though his enemies were near, God was nearer, so he could:
4. Pray Trustingly (Psalm 119:151-152)
151 You are near, O LORD,
And all Your commandments are truth.
152 Concerning Your testimonies,
I have known of old that You have founded them forever.
The wicked may “draw near,” (Psalm 119:150), but the psalmist remembers, “You are near, O Lord.” God was there first! God is never far away from those who love His law and believe His Word is truth.
MacArthur comments: ‘When you have a thought, the Lord is near to read it; when you pray, the Lord is near to hear it; when you need His strength and power, He is near to provide it. In fact, He lives in you and is the source of your spiritual life. An awareness of His presence will keep you from being anxious or unstable.”[iii]
The psalmist had this confidence in the nearness of God because God’s Word is firmly founded forever. As the old hymns sings, “How firm a foundation ye saints of the Lord is laid for your faith in His excellent Word.” May God revive our prayers and our faith in our big God, in our glorious God, in our very gracious God.
We often think of prayer as a spiritual discipline for private worship and devotion, and so it is. But prayer is also a public devotion that is to be a part of corporate worship. When we sing hymns or pray in unison, let us do so with our hearts and minds fully engaged. Today as we worship in song, let us sing our prayers earnestly, constantly, biblically, and trustingly.
———————————————————————————–
[i] https://www.ligonier.org/learn/devotionals/prayer-worship
[ii] Philip G Layton, https://sermons.faithlife.com/sermons/111313-20-reviving-your-prayer-life-by-god’s-word
[iii] John MacArthur. Truth for today : A daily touch of God’s grace. Nashville, Tenn.: J. Countryman, p. 343.
