View source for 116. Uphold me according unto Your word

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<p>'''116. Uphold me according unto Your word, that I may live: and let me not be ashamed of my hope.'''<br />
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  Lest the Psalmist should seem to have been self-confident in his rejection of the society of the ungodly, and his determination to adhere to his God; here, as on former occasions, mindful of his own weakness, he commits himself to the upholding grace of God. He does not content himself with commanding the evil-doer to depart. He pleads for his God to come to him. He wants not only the hindrances to be removed, but the vouchsafement of present supporting grace.<br /><br />
 Such is our urgent continual need! Every circumstance has its temptation. Every change of condition is specially trying—and what is he in himself? unstable as water! Indeed the highest Archangel before the throne stands only as he is upheld by the Lord, and may unite with the weakest child in the Lord's family in the acknowledgement, &quot;By the grace of God I am what I am.&quot; Much more, therefore, must I, pressed on every side with daily conflict and temptation, and conscious of my own weakness and liability to fall, &quot;come to the throne of grace,&quot; for &quot;grace to help in time of need.&quot;<br /><br />
 My plea is the word of promise—according to Your word, &quot;as your days, so shall your strength be.&quot; &quot;Fear not&quot;—is the language of my upholding God, &quot;for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God: I will strengthen you: yes, I will help you: yes, I will uphold you with the right hand of My righteousness.&quot; Blessed be the goodness that made the promise, and that guides the hand of my faith, as it were, to fasten upon it!<br />
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  But why do I need the promise? why do I plead it? but that I may live—that I may know that life, which is found and enjoyed &quot;in the favour&quot; of God? Nothing seems worth a serious thought besides; nothing else deserves the name. And therefore new life, &quot;life more abundantly&quot;—let it be the burden of every prayer—the cry of every moment. Thus upheld by the Lord's grace, and living in His presence, I hope to feel the increasing support of my Christian hope. Though I have just before expressed it in God's word—though I have &quot;made my boast in the Lord,&quot; as my hiding-place and my shield, yet conscious helplessness leads me earnestly to pray—Let me not be ashamed of my hope.<br />
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  Yes—Jesus is the sinner's hope, &quot;the hope set before&quot; His people, to which they &quot;flee for the refuge&quot; of their souls. And well may our &quot;hope&quot; in Him be called &quot;an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast.&quot; How does the distressed church plead with the hope of Israel, and put her God in remembrance of this His own name, that she might not be ashamed of her hope! And how does she—with every member of her body—eventually learn by this pleading, to say in the confidence of faith, &quot;I know whom I have believed!&quot; And is there not a solid ground for this confidence?<br /><br />
 Is not the &quot;stone that is laid in Zion for a foundation,&quot; a &quot;tried stone?&quot; Has it not been tried by thousands and millions of sinners—no, more, tried by God Himself, and found to be &quot;a sure foundation?&quot; Yet still, that I may &quot;hold fast the beginning of my confidence,&quot; and &quot;the rejoicing of my hope, firm unto the end,&quot; I must persevere in prayer—Uphold me according unto Your word.<br /><br />
  David, when left to his own weakness, was ashamed of his hope:, &quot;I said in my haste, I am cut off from before Your eyes.&quot; At another time, when upheld in a season of accumulated trial, &quot;he encouraged himself in the Lord his God.&quot; Thus I see &quot;wherein my great strength lies,&quot; and how impotent I am, when left to myself.<br /><br />
 What a mercy, that my salvation will never for a single moment be in my own keeping! what need have I to pray to be saved from myself! How delightful is the exercise of faith in going to the Strong for strength! The issue of my spiritual conflicts is certain. He who is the author, will ever be the upholder, of the &quot;hidden life&quot; in His people. It is a part of His own life, and therefore can never perish.<br /><br />
 The Tempter himself will flee, when he marks the poor, feeble, fainting soul, upheld according to the word of his God, and placed in safety beyond the reach of his malice. Not, however, that, as I once supposed, my weakness will ever be made strong; but that I shall daily grow more sensible of it, shall, stay myself more simply upon infinite everlasting strength; and &quot;most gladly shall I glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.&quot;
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