Prayer of the satisfied heart
I say to the Lord, my God:
“You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.” (Psalm 16:2)
In Psalm 16, David is taking refuge in God. Taking refuge includes David’s prayer for God to keep him. In other words, the prayer “preserve me” in (Psalm 16:1) is itself a taking refuge in God.
But David doesn’t simply ask God to keep him. He also speaks and declares truth about who God really his. He stated the importance of God in the equation of his life. (Psalm 16:2).
The last phrase of verse 2 is packed with deep theological truth and precious fuel for worship. So, what does King David really mean when he says, “I have no good apart from you”?
That: God is the source of all goodness.
Have you ever heard this:
"Every good that is good comes from the God who is Good".
God is the maker and sustainer of all creations. Genesis 1 backs this truth, he creates and then appraises his work: “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31).
“What exactly makes all of the good things good?”
Then he concludes that the good things are not independently good. They are not good by themselves rather, there must be some ultimate good out there that makes all the other things good. Sadly, atheists from around the world fail to reason or see the truth in this light........
In other words, Anselm Canterbury reasoned there must be a Supreme good that is the source of all other goodness. And just like that, he was following in the footsteps of David in Psalm 16. David confesses that there is a Supreme Good that makes all other goods good. And our Abba Father is this Supreme Good. Or, as David prays elsewhere - God is my “exceeding joy”. As we should also know, David knew his refuge is the foundational joy on which all other joys/happiness are built.
God’s goodness is unique.💖
All other created goods are finite, temporal, and ever changing. But God is infinite, eternal, and unchanging. The Apostle James acknowledges this fact:
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:17).
Fam, created goods cast shadows. As good & wonderful as they are, they are not & can never be infinite goods. They are limited, and they fade eventually..... But the I am that I am has no shadow, and he does not change. His goodness is without boundary or limit. His is an absolute and essential goodness.
God’s perfections aren’t just qualities that he happens to have. They are essential to him. They are our human descriptions of his being,
We call a man righteous because he meets the standard of righteousness. We call a man wise because he conforms to the pattern of wisdom. But fam,
- God himself is that Standard.
- He is the Pattern.
- He is not merely righteous; he is Righteousness itself.
- He is not merely wise; he is Wisdom itself.
- He is not merely strong; he is Strength itself.
- And he is not merely good; he is Goodness itself.
He is the Righteous, the Wise, the Strong, and the Good.
This is what it means for God to be God, for God to be Yaweh. This is why Jesus can say, “No one is good except God alone” (Mark 10:18). He is the fountain of all goodness, the origin of all pleasure and joy. He is infinite, eternal, unchanging, inexhaustible, self-sufficient and all-sufficient, without limit or diminishment.
The enjoyment of God is our proper happiness, and is the only happiness with which our souls can be truly satisfied. To go to heaven and fully enjoy the glory of God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here: better than fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, best friends or children, or the company of any or all other earthly friends.
- These are but shadows; but God is the Substance.
- These are but scattered beams; but God is the Sun.
- These are but streams; but God is the Fountain.
- These are but drops; but God is the Ocean.
OH DEAR!
What a wonderful God we serve😊
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