It is a sincere prayer for the Lord to make known His ways and instruct in His paths, expressing the privilege and duty of trusting Him at all times and under all circumstances as the God of salvation. It is offered by those who lift the soul to Him in true faith and not to vanity, waiting on Him all the day to be led in His truth, kept from shame and defeat, forgiven of sins and transgressions, and taught as meek and teachable learners. To ask in this way means seeking His will daily with earnest concern for spiritual and eternal interests, studying His Word deeply, submitting personal plans and judgment to His direction, and taking counsel of Him at every step rather than following finite human wisdom. The Lord gives unerring counsel and strength to all who come humbly and willing to be trained and disciplined for His service, while those wise in their own conceit are left to their own judgment.
Prayer and Its Context
The prayer asks God to make His ways known and to instruct in His paths because His people need divine guidance, and it is the privilege and duty of every Christian to trust Him with confidence and reliance at all times and under all circumstances. It is the prayer of those who truly believe the Word, who lift the soul to God in trust, wait on Him all the day, and look to Him as the God of their salvation to be led in truth. They ask for guidance and instruction and to be kept from shame and defeat by enemies, while shame falls on those who transgress without cause.
This prayer stands opposite to lifting the soul to vanity, seeking supremacy, accepting Satan's suggestions, and failing to honor God and openly proclaim allegiance to Him, a course that forfeits the right to blessing and keeps God from working in harmony with the person. It is to be offered sincerely, with concern for spiritual and eternal interests rather than for personal convenience, advantage, or earthly riches, joined to the request to be led in truth and taught by God as the source of salvation while waiting on Him. It is an earnest prayer for divine wisdom and instruction, prayed by waiting on God all the day, even lying awake hour after hour in pleading.
Its setting joins the request to being led in God's truth by the God of salvation, waiting all the day, trusting His tender mercies and lovingkindness, and asking Him not to remember sins and transgressions. The same context teaches that the good and upright Lord teaches sinners, guides the meek in judgment and teaches the meek His way. All His paths are mercy and truth to those who keep His covenant and testimonies, so seeking His way means asking Him to guide and teach and then following His paths.
Seeking Guidance Daily
To ask for instruction is to dig deeply into the Word rather than skim its surface, working like a miner digging for precious ore hidden in the earth in order to become Christians in every sense and bear a powerful witness in favor of truth. It is to ask for divine instruction in order to guard sacred principles and not turn aside from them, standing against the determination to break down the fortifications of truth and refusing to aid or strengthen that opposing science. Such faithfulness requires new conversion, especially for those in positions of trust.
Those who present truth must themselves be meek, teachable, and converted in heart and tongue. They are to offer the beautiful fruit of the Word courteously and pleasantly as Christ taught, presenting the right way and the paths to follow with a gracious manner. They must not do it in a fierce, harsh, forbidding, condemnatory manner that mars its influence and turns people away. The request to be shown the ways, taught the paths, and led in truth by the God of salvation belongs to waiting on Him all the day, trusting His tender mercies and lovingkindness, asking Him not to remember sins and transgressions, and learning that the good and upright Lord teaches sinners, guides the meek in judgment, teaches the meek His way, and makes all His paths mercy and truth to those who keep His covenant and testimonies.
For workers the verse means asking to be guided, taught, and led in order to discern the right way amid competing voices. It means welcoming Christ's presence and becoming learners willing to be trained and disciplined for service. It calls for setting aside personal preferences and desires, bringing plans to God and yielding one's own desires so that He will teach His way and His will may be done. The plea to be led in God's truth carries the assurance that He is the God of salvation.
The Lord will teach His will and His way to all who are willing to be taught. His workmen must take counsel of Him at every step in order to have success, being taught and led by Him continually. This brings moving harmoniously and in line with fellow workers, counseling together and laboring with united effort in trying times. It means taking up the work of coming years carefully and prayerfully in the fear of God, not rashly.
Seeking His will daily enables Him to give unerring counsel to those who come to Him sincerely, asking Him to reveal the way they should live and teach them His paths. Those who learn from Jesus grow in understanding because God is their wisdom and teaches them His way. His guidance and teaching are joined with the Holy Spirit softening the heart by grace.
People must continually seek God's instruction, wait for His direction, and submit their plans and judgment to His will rather than making their own schemes. Keeping His way requires obedience and searching Scripture for His light. In this way they do not mistake their own ideas for His guidance.
The prayer is to be kept constantly ascending for light and wisdom in decisions, keeping mind and heart in prayer and not treating the matter as of little consequence, for it means much. Each person must seek God's will for themselves and step forward with confidence only when what is spoken commends itself to sound judgment and becomes personal light. This is to be done in humility and not in self-reliance or conceit, praying continually especially when making important decisions.
If anyone becomes wise in his own conceit, God will leave him to follow his own finite judgment, and human conceit and reliance on finite judgment can lead astray. But those who walk humbly before Him will be taught of God. To them the Lord God is strength, guide, and counselor, and God desires to lead those He will make representative.
Seeking God's direction gives hope and courage amid weakness and heavy responsibility, and it is the way for those who have strayed to return. Prayed in physical weakness with tired brain and burdened heart, it seeks healing power, strength, and courage to carry heavy responsibilities. It is prayed with hunger and thirst for righteousness and longing for a daily sense of favor and promised strength, seeking courage to speak clearly the messages of reproof, warning, and encouragement so that those out of the way may be convicted and led to follow the way God leads. It is joined with praise and thanksgiving when peace, courage, and hope come and strengthen the heart.
It is a sincere prayer for the Lord to make known His ways and instruct in His paths, expressing the privilege and duty of trusting Him at all times and under all circumstances as the God of salvation.
It is offered by those who lift the soul to Him in true faith and not to vanity, waiting on Him all the day to be led in His truth, kept from shame and defeat, forgiven of sins and transgressions, and taught as meek and teachable learners.
To ask in this way means seeking His will daily with earnest concern for spiritual and eternal interests, studying His Word deeply, submitting personal plans and judgment to His direction, and taking counsel of Him at every step rather than following finite human wisdom.
The Lord gives unerring counsel and strength to all who come humbly and willing to be trained and disciplined for His service, while those wise in their own conceit are left to their own judgment.
Prayer and Its Context
The prayer asks God to make His ways known and to instruct in His paths because His people need divine guidance, and it is the privilege and duty of every Christian to trust Him with confidence and reliance at all times and under all circumstances. It is the prayer of those who truly believe the Word, who lift the soul to God in trust, wait on Him all the day, and look to Him as the God of their salvation to be led in truth. They ask for guidance and instruction and to be kept from shame and defeat by enemies, while shame falls on those who transgress without cause.
This prayer stands opposite to lifting the soul to vanity, seeking supremacy, accepting Satan's suggestions, and failing to honor God and openly proclaim allegiance to Him, a course that forfeits the right to blessing and keeps God from working in harmony with the person. It is to be offered sincerely, with concern for spiritual and eternal interests rather than for personal convenience, advantage, or earthly riches, joined to the request to be led in truth and taught by God as the source of salvation while waiting on Him. It is an earnest prayer for divine wisdom and instruction, prayed by waiting on God all the day, even lying awake hour after hour in pleading.
Its setting joins the request to being led in God's truth by the God of salvation, waiting all the day, trusting His tender mercies and lovingkindness, and asking Him not to remember sins and transgressions. The same context teaches that the good and upright Lord teaches sinners, guides the meek in judgment and teaches the meek His way. All His paths are mercy and truth to those who keep His covenant and testimonies, so seeking His way means asking Him to guide and teach and then following His paths.
Seeking Guidance Daily
To ask for instruction is to dig deeply into the Word rather than skim its surface, working like a miner digging for precious ore hidden in the earth in order to become Christians in every sense and bear a powerful witness in favor of truth. It is to ask for divine instruction in order to guard sacred principles and not turn aside from them, standing against the determination to break down the fortifications of truth and refusing to aid or strengthen that opposing science. Such faithfulness requires new conversion, especially for those in positions of trust.
Those who present truth must themselves be meek, teachable, and converted in heart and tongue. They are to offer the beautiful fruit of the Word courteously and pleasantly as Christ taught, presenting the right way and the paths to follow with a gracious manner. They must not do it in a fierce, harsh, forbidding, condemnatory manner that mars its influence and turns people away. The request to be shown the ways, taught the paths, and led in truth by the God of salvation belongs to waiting on Him all the day, trusting His tender mercies and lovingkindness, asking Him not to remember sins and transgressions, and learning that the good and upright Lord teaches sinners, guides the meek in judgment, teaches the meek His way, and makes all His paths mercy and truth to those who keep His covenant and testimonies.
For workers the verse means asking to be guided, taught, and led in order to discern the right way amid competing voices. It means welcoming Christ's presence and becoming learners willing to be trained and disciplined for service. It calls for setting aside personal preferences and desires, bringing plans to God and yielding one's own desires so that He will teach His way and His will may be done. The plea to be led in God's truth carries the assurance that He is the God of salvation.
The Lord will teach His will and His way to all who are willing to be taught. His workmen must take counsel of Him at every step in order to have success, being taught and led by Him continually. This brings moving harmoniously and in line with fellow workers, counseling together and laboring with united effort in trying times. It means taking up the work of coming years carefully and prayerfully in the fear of God, not rashly.
Seeking His will daily enables Him to give unerring counsel to those who come to Him sincerely, asking Him to reveal the way they should live and teach them His paths. Those who learn from Jesus grow in understanding because God is their wisdom and teaches them His way. His guidance and teaching are joined with the Holy Spirit softening the heart by grace.
People must continually seek God's instruction, wait for His direction, and submit their plans and judgment to His will rather than making their own schemes. Keeping His way requires obedience and searching Scripture for His light. In this way they do not mistake their own ideas for His guidance.
The prayer is to be kept constantly ascending for light and wisdom in decisions, keeping mind and heart in prayer and not treating the matter as of little consequence, for it means much. Each person must seek God's will for themselves and step forward with confidence only when what is spoken commends itself to sound judgment and becomes personal light. This is to be done in humility and not in self-reliance or conceit, praying continually especially when making important decisions.
If anyone becomes wise in his own conceit, God will leave him to follow his own finite judgment, and human conceit and reliance on finite judgment can lead astray. But those who walk humbly before Him will be taught of God. To them the Lord God is strength, guide, and counselor, and God desires to lead those He will make representative.
Seeking God's direction gives hope and courage amid weakness and heavy responsibility, and it is the way for those who have strayed to return. Prayed in physical weakness with tired brain and burdened heart, it seeks healing power, strength, and courage to carry heavy responsibilities. It is prayed with hunger and thirst for righteousness and longing for a daily sense of favor and promised strength, seeking courage to speak clearly the messages of reproof, warning, and encouragement so that those out of the way may be convicted and led to follow the way God leads. It is joined with praise and thanksgiving when peace, courage, and hope come and strengthen the heart.