Who can sufficiently separate us from vicariously experiencing His eternal love. For we have the newness of the Spirit. Oh, this is His personal promise, the most faithful beyond our understanding of our Father in our personal acquaintance of His care. Because He has always existed from eternity past. He is receiving the mutual pleasure of being on brilliant display in His substitution for notorious sinners. This is Gods unfailing, eternal and unfathomable love opening our eyes to the most glorious illuminations of overwhelming beauty.

 Christ hung on the cross, was raised to life and is seated at the right hand of the Father in eternal glory. Who can dispose of Him from ruling over all things? Who can separate Him from His position of divine power and glory? Has He not judged the most violent person in this cruel world? Has He not brought down Satans kingdom for ever more? He will clearly communicate the most glorious visions of love and compassion. Shall we tarry awhile in prayer before Him who wondrously has compassion on evildoers?

 The God of all grace grants us power from on High. We dwell fondly in this eternal love displayed on the gilded cross. We are fashion to break every power and authority in the name of Christ. But yet, we who are imperfect find He dwells with the lowly. For He continues to be the most excellent example of one who was acquainted with personal sorrows and grief. He will prove nothing can separate us from His love. He will embrace us so that we will rest in His pleasure and peace.

The Psalms accurately describe the kind struggle that man acts as Gods representative on this earth by seeking transparency before God. The transparency is the emotional language of our circumstances. We are not God, who maintains a circumspect view. This is our disadvantage of being united to God in arranging the events of this world for our good and His glory. Because there is a significant threat to our faith, He provides inspired words to unify our view by accurately communicating the language of our hearts to us. The scripture is graciously given that we might think like God and experience eternity in our hearts as God has made us like Himself.

 We naturally view things in our world through the eyes of Deism. It's very difficult for us to believe that God has made everything right and reordered all things to work out for His glory and for our good. God has established His kingdom over the earth and yet from our view we witness events that seem to be out of control. This is the question Ive been genuinely trying to sufficiently answer. If sovereign God has promised to work everything out for our good then how can we recover a sense of satisfaction if there is no reasonable advantage for us to experience redemption in our practical lives? Has God only given us His promise He is in control and we should accept the sorrows of this life because it is His mysterious work? Or has He communicated a language which prevents anything purposed to ruin us? If every time we experience sorrow we must conclude that God is doing something that we do not understand isn't this saying Gods power is all mysterious, God keeps Himself at arms length so that He can prove that He is God?

 Ps 17 the Psalmist engages the enemy like he is fighting courageously in hand to hand combat. Its hard for us to believe there are appropriate times in our lives we confront an attack from the enemy. The Christian life is not about being devotional but learning from the scriptures how to professionally engage the fierce enemy in hand to hand combat. This is precisely how the Psalmist describes the Christian experience. Its becoming proficient in speaking the covenants, curses, laws, decrees and human longings as high priest in Gods redeeming plan we rise to encounter more significant opposition. If you have experience of using the Psalms and in pronouncing Gods words, you will observe this psychological battle of hunting the enemy. A single line woven in using these words going to battle in hand to hand combat.

 This is terribly important Satan rules men by a way of thinking motivated by spiritual strongholds. His uses spiritual ideas like a mortal threat to our well being. We confront an formidable enemy controlling places of authority beyond our sphere of influence. He is the Prince and power of the air. He inspires ideas in the mind in threats more prevalent than Gods language of peace. Hate is kind of like fire. As more people  plan against Gods word we feel the hot evil always directed toward the weak. The bible warns that men hearts will betray them. We prepare for the unpleasant day of multiple attacks that will destroy the weak. We define the enemies tactics by pronouncements. These prayers, go out universally and force the fight to a beach head.

 
The Psalmist describes the affirmative defense of the bible to be a instrumental rock that we stand on. We must grasp that since we live in a fallen world Gods cry for our safety establish the exclusive foundation for our unshakable confidence. Even tho we have been guilty of punishable crimes against Gods kingdom yet we are represented by a judge who comes to our defense. We have a Father who is our Judge.

Man is at enmity with God because of sin. He was in a state of being actively hostile to God and man. The covenant of creation gave man ability to be successful in applying the law by the curse. He uses redefined law to wantonly destroy God and man. This is why the apostle says all men are under the pox of excusing themselves while condemning others. All men are in bondage to this curse.

 When we manipulate the law to destroy God and others we curse ourselves. We are in this cycle of defending ourselves and cursing ourselves. We cannot escape this bondage unless God makes us righteous again. When man sinned, God had to curse him and the creation to prevent man from exterminating the human race. Gods judgement against the first sin was final. In other words if God had not come as a man and complied with the law in a passive and active obedience then man would have cursed himself. He would receive the punishment of his rebellion in eternity.

 God had to apply His righteousness to redeem us from  bondage that plagues all of mankind. We do not live in a neutral and nice world to God and the elect. We live in a cursed world filled with rebellious men who seek to curse others and themselves. This is the state of active enmity with God.

 We must live with the philosophy that men who are unjustified by God live in blindness to their own violent response to God. This is why in the OT, they were commanded to dispose of all of the leaven from their dwelling. To put differently the leaven represented the danger of miss application of the law that is a result of the curse. The leaven had to be removed so that we would not be tempted to trust in the wrong application of the law and curse ourselves.Even tho we have been delivered from the curse by cross yet we are surrounded by the considerable dangers that could make us walk with a noticeable limp. This is why Jesus warned the Pharisees would give you a permanent wound. The Psalmist illuminates us how to studiously avoid the violent assault.

 
 He is informing us that all men curse themselves by trying to be righteous by their own works. God made man to be the able judge to adjudicate the law. In the garden man was able to rule the creation by applying the implanted law. He was righteous by complying with the standard of the law. But when man sinned, he was not destroyed as person. The cognitive abilities were cursed. Man is dependent upon being successful by executing the law. But the problem is that he is cursed with manipulating the law to intentionally destroy God and neighbor. Because he cannot escape the evil use of the law, he accuses the gentle saints of using God to claim righteousness. Because he is bent on cursing himself, he will attack the weak and dependent saints.

 The essential question is, If Christ went through the most extreme suffering and abuse from men in becoming a curse that we might be favoured, why are we easily tempted to accept we are not like Him because were sinners who fight against fear, guilt, sorrow and pain? If Christ is proving we are favoured, then why do we focus on this world for our acceptance? Christ sufficiently proves He is successful by our success. This is why genuine faith is denying self by pushing the curse away in the curse of the law. When we curse the curse, we properly express our dependence upon Gods righteousness.We must remove all leaven from our presence.       

 

The Psalmist responsible actions is engaging in war and winning. he says 25 To the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless 26 to the pure you show yourself pure. God must destroy all the corruption for the Psalmist to be successful in war. The Psalmist wins the war because God renews his corrupted motives that generate the superior power when he fights valiantly.Hence, humility is exercising power under control in cursing the curse - pushing the destruction under our feet by controlled power. God commands our power by His destroying grace.

 In my former years I wished that sin would be rarely successful and I would produce a second life of Christianity. I would at some point graduate from the tendencies of feeling desperate under temptation to being strong and unbending toward temptation. The more we grow to understand enemies deeply rooted in us,the more likely we understand sins influence in our routine. Instead of thinking we have become proficient in overcoming the unique power of sin, guilt and shame we see how prevalent they are in us. We grow by knowing sin (this foreign mind encased by the law) better than we know the act of sin.

 This is why the Christian experience is like a wavy line. It goes from getting close to the beneficial effects of the new man (the axioms encasement of sin) to going down facing the sin that is more than the numbers of our hairs. We shun sin ascending in our axiom worship then come down to understand the prevalence of guilt, fear and shame. The specific reason that we suffer trouble is we focus on sin as a deed instead of a heart condition. We attack sin at the branch instead of the root by the effective means of divine grace. A man who goes to the root of sin goes down to the depths of the heart (his axiom identity.) Not to expose his own sins but to obtain grace in the communication of the law, covenants, curses, statutes, promises and decrees.

Mortification is the negative function of the minds effects on the desire to choose. Not too many people talk about the complex nature of vivification. But vivification provides the gracious source of all underlying communications of the supernatural connections of the minds desire, living in calm assurance in the venerable face of this puzzling world.   

Vivification is the continuous flow of the reality of divine power, gracious affections and supernatural longings The penitent soul can lean on this deep well of divine communications to the understanding. The sacred word is ingested and implanted as the supernatural source of life and the seamless flow of Gods attributes infused in union with Christ.

 Christ has authority over all powers. We are eternally enraptured in the immediate presence of Christ going before, in front, under and over. The saints understanding is under the domination of all possible things coming together in Christ. Our spiritual longings in the effects of the soul are beyond the communication of the worlds forces.

 We were translated into the kingdom of God Who treats us like the ascended Christ. We have come into His noble house after wandering hopelessly in the streets. Christ is presently our brother. Our Father is the presiding judge of the unified world. When we were wandering in the streets, we were subject to abuse.But now we are secure in the house of God. The danger that we encounter is outside of the house.Hence, the Psalmist is incessantly talking to God within the safety of the house.

The Psalmist compares this new relationship with Adam and Eves fellowship in the garden. Adam and Eve shared their deepest desires with God. There was no possible opposition in social fellowship with God. They desired perfectly what God desired. But because we are being opposed by sin and corruption we can never maintain ideal unity with Gods desires. Even tho we draw distantly from Gods desires yet God knows that we are unable to experience the same unity that was in the garden. Because of sin we were abandoned. God had to search for us. In the present climate God attends our struggle with sinfulness and weakness. He has compassion on us.

 The unique relationship between God and man before the fall was remarkably simple. Because we did not experience pain and weakness we were capable of responding by completely understanding Gods communication. But now we vicariously experience the inability to adequately communicate on the level of the first man. Because we experience necessary evil, we are prone to erroneously attribute it to God.If our bodily strength and spiritual understanding were able to handle Gods communication like the first man then we would not be tempted to accuse God. Consequently, God understands our lifelong struggle since He made us. God looks on us now with sincere pity.

God has provided the gift of drawing close to Him by describing our terrible experience. So when the Psalmist as How long? He is exercising the gift to move God. God accurately knows it is impossible for us to genuinely please Him like Adam. The neurotic communication is coming from our side of the relationship. When we read the Psalms, we witness a man who is describing his life that is not like what we would voice to other people. We read his descriptions of depression, neurosis, and anger. Why would God allow us to describe the terrible experiences of this life? God could restore us and succeed in getting us on our feet. The reason is we all are headed in the direction of increasing our painful and uncertain struggles. We can only escape when we go to heaven.

 God has given us a gift of describing our experience to Him. The Psalmist says we struggle with corruption by wrestling thoughts and dealing with a sorrowful heart. We typically go from one unique danger to another in this corrupt world. He is tenderly drawn to us when we pour our anxious hearts out to him in candidly describing our desperate condition. God knows it is impossible for us to relate to him in the same way we were created in the garden. He is not gonna force us suffer alone. When we want to experience God drawing near to us we must speak honestly with Him.