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“Behold, I have longed after thy precepts: quicken me in thy righteousness. Let thy mercies come also unto me, O LORD, even thy salvation, according to thy word…. Thou art my portion, O LORD: I have said that I would keep thy words.” (Psalm 119:40-41, 57)

Graveyards can be interesting places. Usually they are quiet places, and you can walk around and read the names and see the birthdays and the death dates of the people whose bodies are buried underground there. Most graveyards have stone markers that show the places where people’s bodies have been buried. Why do we say that their bodies are buried? Well, for Christians who have died, the body is the only part that is placed in a casket and buried underground or in a mausoleum (a tomb). The Bible teaches that when a Christian’s body dies, his or her soul keeps on living and goes immediately to be with the Lord – not to a graveyard or tomb.

One reason graveyards are interesting is that they are a good place to go if you need to think. The Bible says we can learn much from visiting the “house of mourning.” It is good for us to be reminded that we are on Earth only for one lifetime. Some of the birthdays and death dates of those people do not have very many years between them. Some of those markers are memorials for children, teen-agers, and middle-aged people. You might see a family member who has come to visit a grave of a loved one. Some people come and talk to the graves. Can their loved ones still hear them? Can they talk back?

A dead person’s ears do not work anymore. They cannot hear. They cannot speak. They cannot come back to life and have a conversation with living people who come to visit the graveyard. Even if a dead person could hear, and even if a dead person could speak, he would not be able to choose between silence and speaking. He would not be able to choose between not breathing and breathing. Part of being dead is being unable to do what living people can do.

The Bible uses the imagery of being dead or being alive to show what God does in our hearts when He saves us from our sin. Until Jesus Christ saves us, we are “spiritually dead.” We were born that way! Our physical bodies are alive, but we are not “alive” spiritually. Like a grave, we are stuck in our sin. We are trapped. We are unable to get out of our sinfulness on our own. We are unable to choose righteousness, because true righteousness is something that spiritually dead people cannot have. Only the spiritually alive people can be truly righteous and truly right with God.

Psalm 119:40-41 tells us about One Who is truly righteous, and He is the only One Who can make us spiritually alive. When it says “quicken,” it means “make alive.” The psalmist is praying that the LORD would bring him to life by His righteousness and because of His righteousness. He prays that the LORD’s mercies will come to him. Only the LORD can give spiritual life. He is a merciful God, and He saves people out of their sinfulness and spiritual death because of His righteousness, His mercy, and His faithful Word. Are you trusting the LORD to do what you cannot do on your own? Are you trusting Him to “quicken” you (to bring you to life) in His righteousness?

Spiritual life is a merciful gift only God can give.

My Response:
» Am I able to “quicken” myself from spiritual deadness to spiritual life?
» Is my heart trapped and weighed down by sinfulness?
» Is my sin too much to be covered by God’s mercy?

“The LORD is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation: he is my God, and I will prepare him an habitation; my father’s God, and I will exalt him.” (Exodus 15:2)

Angela pressed her face between the white boards of her grandma’s backyard fence. She waited there for a minute, listening, and then she ran across to the other side of the yard and pressed her face up against those white boards. After a little while, she ran back to the other side, and then back again.

Grandma had been watching her from the screen door and finally opened it. “Angela, honey, what in the world are you doing?”

Angela put her finger up to her lips and ran up to her grandma. “This is what,” she whispered, pointing with both hands to both sides of the back yard. “I am listening to your neighbors!”

Grandma’s face looked shocked. “Listening to my neighbors?” she whispered back. “Whatever for?”

“I’m seeing if they are Christians, Grandma.” Angela pointed to the neighbor’s yard on the right. “That’s Mr. Cherian over there – I think he is a Christian!”

Grandma nodded. “Sam Cherian and I have talked about the Lord many times. He is a wonderful brother in Christ.”

Then Angela pointed over to the lefthand neighbor’s yard. “But I’m just not so sure about Miss Wyler. She just never sings!”

Grandma looked over toward Miss Wyler’s yard and said in a very quiet voice, “Angela, why would you say that? There is nothing in the Bible that says we have to sing in order to be genuine believers in Jesus.”

“Oh, Grandma – I know that! But sometimes you can really tell the Christians from the non-Christians because they DO sing! Mr. Cherian only has one real leg, and he isn’t grouchy at all. When I watch him working in his garden, he is always humming a hymn or singing something! And he usually has a smile on his face, too. He doesn’t even sing that great and he has that funny high voice, but he is always singing. There is something different about him, and I think it’s something joyful in his heart that makes him sing.”

Grandma nodded. “And what have you been noticing as you’ve watched Miss Wyler working in her garden?”

“Well, she is nice enough to me when I say ‘hello’ to her. But she just does not seem like a very happy person, inside or out. She hangs around with her cats and mutters under her breath about all the things that keep going wrong in her yard or with the weather. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her smile or heard her sing a single note.”

“I see what you mean, honey,” said Grandma. She put her arm around Angela’s shoulder and led her inside the house. “Wilma Wyler does seem to have a hard time remembering that there’s more to life than her cats and good gardening weather. I don’t know if she’s a true Christian or not. One thing I do know is that all of us struggle sometimes to remember God – don’t we? We get caught up in our worries and our work, and we forget that His goodness and greatness are bigger and better and longer-lasting than any of our problems.”

“I guess that’s true for me, too,” said Angela. “And I am a Christian! But I guess sometimes I don’t act like somebody who knows Jesus. If I’m really believing God is as good and great as His Word says He is, I have a lot of reason to be happy, even when things don’t go like I want. Kind of like Mr. Cherian singing in his garden even though his garden gets the exact same weather Miss Wyler’s garden gets. And Mr. Cherian has no cats and only one leg!”

“That’s right, honey. As long as we are right with God, we have every reason to rejoice in all that He has done and all that He is. Singing is one way Christians can show that our happiness is in God instead of in our circumstances.” She poured Angela a glass of lemonade and leaned over the table to hand it to her, smiling widely. “Maybe the next time we’re out back, we should sing a little song, just in case Mr. Cherian or Miss Wyler decide to ‘listen’ to their neighbors?”

God’s goodness and greatness are reasons enough for a Christian to “rejoice evermore.”

My Response:
» What do I think I need in order to be “happy”?
» Do I think of salvation as something worth singing about?
» Who is my Source for real and lasting joy?

“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed…. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” (James 1:5-6, 17)

With a heavy heart, Hillary stared out the window. Here it was already late October, and the leaves on the trees had not even changed color yet. But the grey sky outside matched her mood. She watched the swaying of the branches (still so full of green leaves) as a damp, cold wind blew through them. Hillary wished the leaves would just fall off. She also wished her tears would fall down, too. If only she could have a good cry, she thought maybe she would feel better.

But there wasn’t time for crying. Caroline – Hillary’s best friend and closest cousin – was all ready to move to China this week. Uncle Dave’s company was sending him and Aunt Britt and Caroline to Shanghai for two years, and Hillary was going to be left behind in plain, boring old Iowa – with only the teen-aged neighbors and the baby cousins to play with. Caroline had promised to write, but Hillary knew things would never be the same after they were gone.

“We know this is going to be especially tough for the two of you girls,” Uncle Dave had said to them. He gave Caroline and Hillary each a pretty jade ring that he and Aunt Britt had bought for them the last time they were visiting in China. “I want both of you to wear your rings every day,” he said. “When you look at them, I want you to remember that you have someone you love on the other side of the world thinking about you. Let your rings remind you to pray for each other every day.”

“These rings are made out of jade,” added Aunt Britt. “Right now you see this bright, greenish color. But when you wear jade up against your skin, it will change color a little bit, and you never know exactly how it will change for any one person. But the rings are always going to stay jade, no matter what colors they turn. I want these rings to remind you of more than each other. I want them to remind you that sometimes God brings change into our lives, partly so that He can change us, because we need to be changed. But God Himself never changes. He’s on both sides of the world. He is all-wise, and He is always there. God will never move away; He has never been afraid or lonely. Like these rings will always stay jade, God will always be the same good and great God He has always been. Even when you cannot see what changes are coming, God can, and you can put your trust in Him.”

Hillary turned away from the window and turned her jade ring around and around on her finger. She could not tell if it was starting to change colors yet or not, but she thought about what Aunt Britt had said: God will always be the same good and great God He always has been. He would be in Shanghai with Caroline, and He would stay here in Iowa with Hillary, too. She looked outside again at the still-green leaves and thanked God that even though seasons and circumstances change, she could always count on Him to be the good and great God that He has always been.

God will always be the same good and great God He always has been.

My Response:
» Am I frustrated with the changes (or the lack of change) in my life right now?
» Why does God bring change into my life?
» How can I put into practice what I know from the Bible about God’s unchanging goodness and greatness?

“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” (1 John 2:1)

Johanna was not happy. She and her sister Donna had gotten in an argument, and Dad had walked into the living room to find them standing on either end of the couch, yelling at one another. Both Johanna and Donna had been sent to their rooms to think about what they had been fighting over, and why they thought it was “so worth fighting for.”

But Johanna already knew it wasn’t worth the kind of meanness she had let loose on Donna. It had just started out as a tiny disagreement – about whose doll would get to wear a favorite outfit for that day. But this was not the first time Donna’s attitude had gotten on Johanna’s nerves, so Johanna had decided to tell Donna what she really thought of her – and her doll. She never intended to end up on one side of the couch, throwing pillows at Donna and yelling mean things at her. But that’s what had happened.

She already regretted it, even before Dad finally came in to punish her. If only it could be easier to remember that she loved Donna – right during that very moment when Donna was getting on her nerves! But those annoying moments seemed like the hardest times to remember love. Johanna could only think about herself when she started to get angry like that.

She picked up her Bible and looked at the verse she had just studied that morning. “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not.” Well, I already blew that today, thought Johanna.

But she kept on reading. “And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” Wow! she thought, shaking her head. She had looked “advocate” up in the dictionary just that morning, and she had learned that an advocate is someone who stands up in court to explain someone’s case and defend that person. An advocate is a spokesperson, someone who speaks in behalf of someone else. It is someone who is strong and guiltless who represents someone who is weak and guilty.

Johanna thought about that idea long and hard. It was amazing to think that Someone strong and perfect like Jesus was representing someone weak and sinful like her. Now she understood why the first part of the verse came before the second part. The thought of Jesus “fighting for” her was something to be thankful for – and something worth fighting for! Slowly it dawned on Johanna: Because of what Jesus Christ had done and was still doing for her, she needed to fight against sin. Her real battles should not be with Donna or anyone else, but with her own sinful nature. Johanna knew that to please her Advocate, she needed to fight harder against the temptation to sin in the first place.

Jesus Christ stands before God as our righteous Defender.

My Response:
» Am I constantly sinning and just relying on Jesus’ righteousness to cover for me?
» Do I think my own selfish desires are worth fighting for?
» Am I willing to focus my time and energy on fighting against my own sin?

“The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward.” (2 Peter 3:9a)

Have you ever heard the phrase “You have my word”? or “You have my word on it”? That means that the person speaking is making a promise based on his or her own track record. If a very honest person tells you he will take care of something for you, saying, “you have my word on it,” then that means you can trust him. He is telling the truth. If a very careful person tells you she will be on time for a meeting, saying, “You have my word, I’ll be there,” then she wants you to know you can trust her to be at the meeting on time.

The kind of people whose word you can trust – they are the ones you can count on. They are faithful. They are dependable. Usually, they will not let you down.

Why do we add usually to that sentence? Well, even the most faithful human beings are still only human. They make mistakes. They forget. They get stopped by circumstances that are out of their control. And they sin. If you leave your backpack with an honest person, he still might not be able to stop a robber from stealing it. If you are counting on a reliable friend to be exactly on time for a Saturday morning meeting, she may not be able to come at all. What if her alarm doesn’t go off and she accidentally oversleeps? Or what if her family decides at the last minute to go out of town for the weekend? Even the most faithful people might let you down sometimes. Humans can only be trustworthy to a certain point.

But the Lord is not like us. If He promises something in His Word, we definitely have His Word on it! And nothing can stop God from doing what He plans to do. No traffic jam or robber or change of human plans can mess up God’s plans. God never forgets. He never sins. He never changes His mind about whether He cares about His people enough to keep His Word to them.

Is there a promise that you think God has made you but not kept? He may not keep that promise exactly the way you want Him to, and He may not carry that promise out exactly when you wanted Him to. But He is not slack (lazy) concerning His promises. He may be taking a long time, but He will always finish what He says He will do. Often, He waits because He wants to show us mercy. (Some of God’s promises are about punishing stubborn sinners, and He is giving them a longer time to repent and turn to Him.)

When the Lord gives His Word, we can always count on Him. He will never let us down.

The Lord is always faithful to keep His Word.

My Response:
» Am I the kind of person who people think of as “faithful” and “trustworthy”?
» Do I think rightly about the Lord’s faithfulness and trust Him to keep His Word?
» How can I show others that I am trusting and obeying a faithful God?