Psalm 9, John Owen and God's Wonderful Deeds || John Pesebre

I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart;
I will tell of all your wonderful deeds. (Psalm 9:1, NIV)

Question 1: How do you engage in prayer with the excellencies of God?
Answer: By starting with the Gospel.

Question 2: But how do you start with the Gospel?
Answer: By considering the "wonderful deeds" (Psalm 9:1) already DONE by Christ.

A central thought that serves as an anchor for an active faith and growing prayer life can be exemplified in the thought of the great Puritan teacher John Owen:

"For a man to gather up his experiences of God, to call them to mind, to collect them, consider, try, improve them, is an excellent thing, — a duty practiced by all the saints, commended in the Old Testament and the New. This was David’s work when he “communed with his own heart,” and called to remembrance the former loving-kindness of the Lord."*

In short, Owen is saying to make "gathering up your experiences with God" an interpretive activity of your life towards the "the former loving-kindness of the Lord" to you. Such duty springs from a person who understands the Gospel. That's how you grow your prayer life. That's how you grow your faith. That's how you grow in the knowledge of God. That's how you "hold firmly" (1Cor 15:2; Heb 4:14) to the Gospel.

It is fair to say that many people today do not engage in this type of faith-building, grace-growing reflection because their life of reflection is anchored on a disconnect of what they can do and what God has done in their lives -- so much so that whenever they start to act on their belief, they do not have the "Gospel tools" (Owen) that are rooted in the confidence of the excellencies of God. Rather, they connect to the excellencies of their will and self-determination. A disconnect happens in our faith and deeds because we are just deeds-focused.

Old saints reflect on what God has done as the springboard of what God is to do in them. Commonplace as it may look like, the word "done" is actually a very powerful word when it is attached to the work of Christ. The word "done" helps us to understand the Gospel and how to utilize it in the growth of our faith or the "do's" of our faith. Prof. Michael Horton of Westminster Theological Seminary and author of numerous Christian books confirms this when he said, "You cannot experience God without knowing who he is, what he has done, and who you are in relation to him." Horton actually offers a pattern of reflection: from God to myself. From the excellencies of the reflection of who God is and what He has done (in the redemptive narrative of all of Scripture), I then begin to reflect on my experiences with this truth. What am I in relationship to this divine being and the work He has done? You want to be used by God? You have to begin with how He made you useful.

It is important that we have certain measures to "hold firmly" (1 Corinthians 15:2) to the Gospel because as Paul said, "Otherwise, we have believed in vain" (1Cor 15:2). Owen exhorts us "to gather up ... experiences of God, to call them to mind, to collect them, consider, try, improve them." In short he is saying, always reflect and consequently make faith actions related to it. It is supposed to consume our life.

How do you go about your prayer? If you follow the ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication) as a prayer pattern do you intentionally put the theme of "done" both in adoration (His deeds seen in Scripture) and thanksgiving (His deeds as seen in your life)? If not, then probably this is the reason why your prayer life is monotonously boring and your faith not increasing in satisfying measures.

Hold firmly to the Gospel

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* Of the Mortification of Sin in Believers, IX.3.2.1. accessed at http://www.ccel.org/ccel/owen/mort.i.xii.html)