Psalm 16 is a very upbeat prayer. David is expressing his excitement around his relationship with God. Can you see just how excited he is about things? “I’ve run for dear life to you”. Do you run toward God? Is He your refuge and rock? Is that the place you go for comfort and safety? God is there and waiting with open arms for us to come to Him. David continues and asks God to “be my Lord”. Lordship is really a key thing for us to understand. Too often the church is focused on Jesus as Savior, with little or no attention to this concept of lordship. But Jesus also wants to be Lord of our life – to be in the driver seat and in complete control of our lives. He wants us to put Him in His rightful place on the throne of our life. Too often we want to push Him off and do whatever we want. That is not the design and definitely not the best interest for our future. David goes on to counsel us “don’t just go shopping for a god”. There is one God and we need to make sure we are focused on Him and Him alone. It is easy to get distracted by all kinds of things that pull us this way and that – and can cause us to let other things interfere in our relationship with the living God. But David, and us as well, can find that “now I find I’m your choice”. God has chosen us and “made me your heir”. We have a fantastic future if we get our relationship right with God. He has so many blessings stored up for each of us. Heirship is a great thing to have and know.
But the verse that jumps out at me comes toward the end of the chapter: “You cancelled my ticket to hell – that’s not my destination”. We are all on a ride that leads to hell unless we have an experience with the Savior. Sin gets in the way – it stands between us and God – and causes us to be separated from Him. And that separation becomes eternal if our sin problem is not dealt with. That is why Jesus went to the cross – to give us a solution for our sin problem. His death and resurrection have won victory over sin. All that remains is our response to that unbelievable love that He showed us that day. We must accept that grace and mercy – that gift of eternal life – and make it our own. We must allow His love to conquer sin and death and put us on “the life path” so we can spend eternity with the God who created us and loved us enough to send His only Son to the cross. He is reaching out and as David says “took my hand” so he could be on the “right way”. Are you certain where your eternity will be spent? Do you know the Savior? Have you made Him Lord? There are many questions in life but none more important than this one. Don’t mess around with eternity. It is a onetime event that lasts forever. Be prepared, know your future, and do it today!
