October 21st, 2013
Psalm 84:11 — For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.
There’s a funny word in the software business, which I work in. The word is pronounced wizzywig. It’s spelled WYSIWYG. It’s actually an acronym, standing for “What You See Is What You Get”. Well, I just invented another one. It’s WYNIWYG. Winnywig. It describes how God treats us — “What You Need Is What You Get”.
Did you ever pray for something and it didn’t happen? Why do you suppose that was? Do you think it’s because God was too busy, or because He’s not a generous God? I hope you know that’s not the answer. The verse from Psalm 84 tells us His nature — He is a sun and shield who will give grace and glory.
The second half of our verse explains a lot about this business. It provides two qualifications for God’s open-handed provision. The things provided must be good, and we must walk up rightly.
This business of “good things” is interesting for, as Sir Richard Baker (quoted by Spurgeon) said:
“But how is this true, when God oftentimes withholds riches and honors, and health of body from men, though they walk never so uprightly; we may therefore know that honors and riches and bodily strength are none of God’s good things; they are of the number of things indifferent which God bestows promiscuously upon the just and unjust, as the rain to fall and the sun to shine.” If we pray for these things, and think we are asking for “good things” we are mistaken. The good things are those things bestowed exclusively on those who walk uprightly… They are the fruits of the Spirit: “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance”.
And who are those who work uprightly? I love the way it’s expressed in Micah 6:8, “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” The upright man treats every person equally, but in mercy never demands all that might claimed. The upright woman displays complete obedience to God, active and passive. We are to be gracious and kind and to walk uprightly be not proudly, and then no good thing will He withhold.
There is one more thing to this business of “what you need is what you get”. Sometimes we definitely don’t ask for what we need. Sometimes, what we need is disciplined — and God is going to give us that too! Hebrews 12:6-7 says it: “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?”
With God, what you need is what you get. WYNIWYG.