Full of Life

Sep 1, 2025 • David Baldner

May your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. 174I long for your salvation, Lord, and your law gives me delight. 175Let me live that I may praise you, and may your laws sustain me. 176I have strayed like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I have not forgotten your commands. (Psalm 119:173-176)

I, like many I'm sure, went to sleep assured of a victory in the game Saturday night due to Tech's overwhelming play, a victory unlike any we've seen in a while. Even their "first game of the year mistakes" were minimized due to the intensity with which they played.

Part of my weariness was a long day filled with family in from Amarillo, exercise, dog walks, the pregame festivities, the game itself, and the weather delay. The delay pushed the game's resumption well-past my bedtime, so I crashed.

Our days can be like that - full. Full of life, events, energy and rest.

Psalm 119 is a chapter in the Bible in which you find it all. From the Lutheran Study Bible's notes:

"Ps 119 God’s Word is our beloved guide to life. It reveals God’s trustworthy promises and eternal mercy. The psalm’s length presents God’s Word like a diamond with 22 facets, each displaying a distinct light. By exhausting every letter of the alphabet, the psalmist demonstrates the breadth of the Word and his own boundless dedication to it. Luther spoke of the making of a theologian on the basis of Psalm 119.

A theologian, he held, came from three actions: prayer (oratio), reading or study (meditatio), and affliction (tentatio). Psalm 119 is an excellent expression of all three. The Gospel radiates through the psalm as the psalmist describes God’s promises, which save His people (e.g., vv 41, 58). God’s Word is loved because of its message of steadfast love (e.g., vv 76, 88, 159). God is merciful, and this mercy brings life (e.g., v 156)."

We give thanks when God's Word contains all the necessary elements for our own faith: Law and Gospel, mercy and forgiveness, wisdom, and salvation.

Pray with me: Gracious God, you know me and my life, and you know my sin. Thanks be to you, O Lord, for the wisdom found in your Word, for the forgiveness, mercy, strength and renewal found in it and for the message of salvation from your steadfast love for us. Amen.