"STANDING ON A LEVEL PLACE!"

PSALM 26:1-12

Have you ever walked on an uneven surface? You know, like a plowed field with furrows and clods and pot-holes? If you have you know how difficult it is to negotiate without tripping, slipping or twisting an ankle. When we were building Chladek Hall, though I abhor high places, I worked on the roof. On one occasion I stepped on some of the loose 3-tab gravel and my feet slipped right out from under me. Fortunately, Ben Prahl was there to grab me around the chest and stop my descent. Give me a nice level, low place any day! David said, "My foot stands on a level place." The word he uses implies a flat, smooth, safe place to stand. A level place is a stable, even, secure place. Speaking of standing on level places reminds me this morning of a news story I received over the Internet this week. It seems that a man named Joseph Sowell was helping renovate a closed, hurricane-damaged hotel in Pensacola Beach, Florida. The building was in bad shape and the conditions were hazardous. Whether through carelessness or mere happenstance, Joseph fell 8 stories. The place on which he had been standing was anything but level and stable. Another story in the same news release told of 3-year-old Chelsea Tafoya, a Santa Clara Pueblo, New Mexico girl, who wanted to go for a ride. Her father, Lincoln Tafoya, was taking his 4 other children to school and there was no room for her in the cab. Without her father realizing it, she climbed onto the back of the truck just as he was preparing to drive away. Clearly Chelsea was not standing on a level, safe place. It makes my skin crawl to think of one of my grandchildren in that predicament. David said, "My foot stands on a level place." In the text of the Psalm he has indicated some reasons why that was true.

• HE STOOD ON A LEVEL PLACE BECAUSE HE WALKED IN HIS INTEGRITY: VV1, 4-6, 11:
• What is integrity?
• The word as David used it means "completeness, moral innocence, simplicity, uprightness." For David that meant:
• Verse 4: "I do not sit with deceitful men, Nor will I go with pretenders."
• Verse 5: "I hate the assembly of evildoers, And I will not sit with the wicked.
• Verse 6: "I shall wash my hands in innocence."
• The dictionary would define integrity as "strict personal honesty."
• The word means to bring together, to integrate and suggests a unity of what we profess with how we live; a consistency of belief and behavior, a congruity of our words and deeds.
• When we walk in integrity it means that:
• We won't claim to be honest and yet lie and cheat.
• We won't profess to be moral and yet indulge in lust.
• We won't allow the situation or circumstance to determine our values, principles and actions.
• We won't act like we abstain from something that we actually practice.
• We won't live a secret life that is at variance from our public life.
• We won't do wrong even if we could and knew we wouldn't get caught.
• There are many fine examples of people living lives of integrity.
• The Filipino taxi driver who returned the 2 million pesos someone had left in his cab.
• The little girl in our neighborhood who returned my wife's wallet which had fallen out of our car.
• The man who chased me down in Fred Meyer to give me the ATM card I had failed to take when the transaction was finished.
• There are some definitive benefits to walking in one's integrity.
• It preserves our reputation.
• It makes our witness credible and reliable.
• It keeps us from phoniness, hypocrisy and pretense.
• It allows us to have a clear conscience before God and man.
• It causes us to stand on a level place and keeps us from slipping into sin.

David stood on a level place because he walked in his integrity; but further:

• HE STOOD ON A LEVEL PLACE BECAUSE HE WALKED IN CONFIDENCE: V1, 3:
• David espoused his trust in the Lord. The word for trust means "to put confidence or to place hope in the Lord." David said he had done so "without wavering." The KJV renders that "I have trusted also in the Lord; therefore I shall not slide." David will not slip in his confidence.
• In the lives of many people, confidence in the Lord is like:
• An elevator: up and down!
• Oregon weather: unpredictable!
• Ava Gabor: fickle!
• The cliffs and hillsides at the coast: unstable!
• Would that we could all declare the unshaken, unaltered confidence of
• Job who said, "Though He slay me, I will hope in Him." Job 13:15.
• Asa who prayed in his distress, "Lord, there is no one besides Thee to help in the battle between the powerful and those who have no strength; so help us, O Lord our God, for we trust in Thee, and in Thy name have come against this multitude. O Lord, Thou art our God; let not man prevail against Thee." 2 Chronicles 14:11.
• David who declared, "When I am afraid, I will put my trust in Thee." Psalms 56:3.
• The little girl who was trying to recite Matthew 19:14 "Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." She misquoted it a couple of times then said, "Jesus wants us all to come to him; and don't anybody try to stop us!"
• There are clearly advantages to waling in confidence in the Lord:
• It keeps us from worry, fear and anxiety.
• It guards us from doubt and uncertainty about His love.
• It protects us from the attacks of the evil one.
• It causes us to stand on a level place and keeps us from falling.

David stood on a level place because he walked in confidence in the Lord; and besides that:

• HE STOOD ON A LEVEL PLACE BECAUSE HE WALKED IN GOD'S TRUTH: V3:
• By God's truth David means God's "stability, certainty, trustworthiness, faithfulness, and credibility."
• God's truthfulness, or trustworthiness, is manifested in
• His Word which has been recorded for our instruction. Jesus said, "Your Word is truth." John 17:17.
• His dealings with us in His lovingkindnesses which never cease nor fail but are renewed every morning. Lamentations 3:22, 23.
• John wrote to the early church and said, "I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth." 3 John 1:1. To walk in God's truth means
• Believing His utterances. It is "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it for me!"
• Obeying His commands. Even when obeying God means disobeying our own desires!
• Heeding His warnings. When God says, "Thou shalt not" He doesn't mean "Go ahead and do it!"
• Claiming His promises.
• Like Joshua we will discover that "Not one of the good promises which the Lord had made to the house of Israel failed; all came to pass." Joshua 21:45.
• Like Abraham let us be fully assured that what He had promised, He is able also to perform. Romans 4:21.
• Living by His standards: steadfastly refusing to be conformed to this world. Romans 12:2.
• There is definite value to walking in God's truth:
• It keeps us from error and deception.
• It sets us free from ignorance and superstition.
• It reveals the path that leads to eternal life.
• It causes us to stand on a level place and keeps us from stunbling.

Not being on a level place, Joseph Sowell fell 8 stories into 4 feet of dirty rainwater in a swimming pool! But surprisingly he survived his fall with the help of a seventh-grader, Daniel Owens, who pulled the dazed man from the grayish-green water. Joseph was released from a hospital 6 hours after his fall with his eyes bruised and swollen. And, miraculously, Chelsea wasn't hurt in her risky truck riding incident. She tenaciously clung to the rear of her daddy's truck as the vehicle reached speeds of up to 85 mph. She hung on for dear life for nearly 12 miles as that truck sped down the highway. Tafoya credited a passing motorist, Connie Romero, with saving Chelsea's life after she flagged him down. Whew! Well, we don't always walk on level places in life, either. Sometimes we put ourselves in precarious positions. Sometimes our own poor choices put us on unstable, uneven ground. Sometimes we stumble badly; sometimes we fall. But there is one to rescue and deliver us! He comes to us when we are on slippery ground and offers his hand. He comes to us when we have fallen and picks us up. And daily offers to be our help, strength, guide and friend. He is the One who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord. You can pick where you stand; for Him or against Him; with Him or apart from Him; on swampy soil or on the stable ground. For my part, on Christ the Solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand -- where will you stand today?

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