My Ways

David declares, “When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to your testimonies” (Ps. 119:59). What does it mean to think on our ways? It includes many things, but I want to focus on four questions that should occupy everyone’s thoughts. If we took these seriously, it would transform us.

First, who made us? The answer, of course, is God. “Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth” (Eccl. 12:1). Do we give any thought to who He is? “He is before you, behind you, round about you, yes, within you, or else you could not keep your breath in your body for a moment, and will you not then take some time to season your heart with thoughts of God?” (Thomas Manton, Works, VII:128).

Second, why did God make us? “The LORD has made everything for its purpose” (Prov. 16:4). Specifically, He made us in His image, so that we might enjoy Him, thereby glorifying Him. “I was not made for nothing, not to sin away my life, nor to sport it away, nor to talk it away, nor to drudge it away in the servile and basest offices of this life; my end is to enjoy God, and my work and business is to serve and glorify Him” (Thomas Manton, Works, VII:129).

Third, what has happened to us? In brief, we’re completely senseless to the purpose for which God created us. “The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand” (Isa. 3:1). We amuse ourselves with the temporal rather than the eternal, the material rather than the spiritual, the trivial rather than the exceptional. Like children we amuse ourselves with toys. “The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God” (Ps. 14:2). What does He see? “They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt” (Ps. 14:3). The term corrupt means spoiled. In other words, we’re like rotten fruit—useless.

Fourth, what will happen to us? “Mark this, then, you who forget God, lest I tear you apart, and there be none to deliver!” (Ps. 50:22).

Having thought on his ways, what’s David’s response? “I turn my feet to your testimonies.” That’s repentance—a fitting response for all who examine themselves in God’s sight.

Quotable: “Everything that passes before your eyes proclaims an invisible God, an infinite and eternal power that made you and all things. Shall the heavens above, and the earth beneath, say, Remember God; and shall every creature, every pile of grass, say, Remember God; and will you be so stupid and scornful as not to cast a look upon Him?” (Thomas Manton).