Psalm 119:1

119:1  Blessed are those whose way is blameless,
who walk in the law of the Lord! (ESV)

Are any of us truly undefiled? Through Christ, we now are. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1) I enjoy studying theology, and I am a major bibliophile. But that single thought right there still amazes me. To think that he died for me.

So, do we walk in the law of the Lord? We ought to, for we are spiritually minded…

If we are truly spiritual, if we are truly born again of the spirit, then we not only ought to walk in the law of the LORD, but we must.

Psalm 119:2

2 Blessed are those who keep his testimonies,
who seek him with their whole heart, (ESV)

Again, who keeps His testimonies? Who seeks Him with the whole heart? Does our soul, like the psalmist’s, pant for God as the deer pants for the water brooks?

I am fast realizing that part of the real value of Psalm 119 is not merely in the wondrous truths it speaks about God’s Word, but in the way this particular psalm shows us how God’s testimonies are indeedsharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit…

Psalm 119:3

3 who also do no wrong,
but walk in his ways! (ESV)

Do we “do no wrong”? Do we avoid sin at all costs? Not that we have “already attained” or are “yet perfected,” but are we even making the effort? How many Christians do you know that still pursue their sins? Relish in them? Do you confront them? Am I one of them? If so, for the sake of my soul, point me back to His ways!

Psalm 119:4

4 You have commanded your precepts
to be kept diligently. (ESV)

How convicting! Can we ever say “well, we don’t have so submit to Christ’s authority – having faith is enough.” Having faith is enough to be saved, but is it truly saving faith? Or are we just professing faith, without actually placing trust in the Lord?

Psalm 119:5

5 Oh that my ways may be steadfast
in keeping your statutes! (ESV)

We know that David was a “man after God’s own heart.” But what made him that? Why did God call him that? Paul tells us in Acts 13: “I have found in David the son of Jesse a man after my heart, who will do all my will.” David was a man after God’s own heart how? Because he did God’s will! At the same time, however, even David had not “already attained,” by his own admission here… He aches that he does not keep God’s statutes. And based on what we know of David, we know that he was sinful. But again, he yearned to change his ways.

Psalm 119:6

6 Then I shall not be put to shame,
having my eyes fixed on all your commandments. (ESV)

In his classic book Knowing God, J. I. Packer says, “Christians will tell you, if you ask them, that the Word of God has both convinced them of sin and assured them of forgiveness.” Around last October, I decided that I would read through the entire Bible, since I’d never done it before (I was saved only a few short years ago). And what have I found, and what do I continue to find? Packer was right. The Bible does convict of sin. (Of course, I think he may have gotten the idea from scripture…) And when we look into all of God’s commandments, all of scripture, we are indeed ashamed of our sin. What then? We continue, along with the psalmist, to…

Psalm 119:7

7 I will praise you with an upright heart,
when I learn your righteous rules. (ESV)

God’s judgments are indeed righteous, and everything He does is perfect and holy. How can we react any other way than to praise Him? How can diligent study and application of His Word lead to anything other than praise for Him?

But, some may say, we don’t have an upright heart… Which is true, we don’t, until we learn of His righteous judgments. The scriptures make us, like Timothy, wise for salvation. And then we gain the righteousness of Christ.

Psalm 119:8

8 I will keep your statutes;
do not utterly forsake me! (ESV)

When we keep His statutes, we know that he does not forsake us utterly. We know that He is faithful. As John writes,

Amen.

Today’s quote of the day from Shannon…
“Yikes! I missed a whole week of my pregnancy!”

By this, of course, she does not mean that she skipped a week, and now has to make it up, or that the baby’s due date has shifted from February 17th to the 24th.

No, she simply means this – she thought it was week 12 for the past two weeks. It’s my fault, of course, for not blogging through week 13… Week 12 was the last week I wrote anything on the pregnancy. So, I need to start rehearsing, “Yes, dear, I’m sorry I made you forget week 13. It won’t happen again.”

So, how’s the pregnancy progressing? Well, even at 3 1/2 months, she is still having a little bit of problems with nausea, so prayers for that would be appreciated. At this point, she seems to have developed a slight lactose intolerance – milk and dairy products are causing her to feel sick. I did some research on the internet and it seems that this is not entirely unheard of, but seems to usually be temporary. Which is good, because I believe Shannon’s absolute favorite dish is a cereal bowl.

The only other news is that we go back to the doctor on the 23rd, which is this coming Wednesday. We won’t have an ultrasound or anything fun like that, so probably no pictures, but we’ll see. Until next time…

I’m currently taking part in a men’s theology class offered by my church. We’re studying through Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, and we meet monthly to discuss it, along with other issues of theology. The purpose, of course, is to provide a basis for sound teaching in the church, as scripture commands us throughout, especially in 2 Timothy 2:2: “And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”

The assignment for this month is to read, study, and meditate on Psalm 119, that great psalm on the Word… I thought it might be interesting to bring all of you along on that journey. So for the next 22 days, I will be blogging through Psalm 119, 8 verses per day.

An Acrostic? What’s That?

Psalm 119 is not only the longest psalm in the Bible, it’s the longest chapter of any book of the Bible, intimidating even Charles Spurgeon: “Its dimensions and its depth alike overcame me. It spread itself out before me like a vast, rolling prairie, to which I could see no bound, and this alone created a feeling of dismay.”

It has 176 verses, and it divided into 22 sections, each one corresponding to a letter of the Hebrew alphabet – aleph, beth, gimel, etc. In the original Hebrew, each line of each section actually starts with the letter, corresponding to that section making this what Bible scholars refer to as an “acrostic” psalm. You can see what that looks like here. Notice that the first letter of each group of 8 verses is the same. But don’t forget – Hebrew reads from right-to-left, so you have to look at what is (to us) the “last” letter in each row.

So, What’s It All About?
Psalm 119 is about the Bible. It’s about God’s word. Or, as Matthew Henry wrote,

The general scope and design of it is to magnify the law, and make it honourable; to set forth the excellency and usefulness of divine revelation, and to recommend it to us, not only for the entertainment, but for the government, of ourselves, by the psalmist’s own example, who speaks by experience of the benefit of it, and of the good impressions made upon him by it, for which he praises God, and earnestly prays, from first to last, for the continuance of God’s grace with him, to direct and quicken him in the way of his duty.

Now how can I put it any better than that?

Words

As we go through the psalm, we will see His word referred to in a number of different ways:

The names used to describe God’s Word are: law, testimonies, ways, precepts, statutes, commandments, ordinances, word(s), promise, judgments, faithfulness, appointment, justice and commands. (The Believer’s Bible Commentary, William MacDonald)

This in itself is insightful. Some of these are obvious references to the Bible: law, testimonies, precepts, statutes, commandments, ordinances, word(s), commands. Others are not so obvious.

“Promise,” for example, is not a word that you would normally stop and say, “oh, the biblical writer is referring to scripture.” Indeed, “promise” does not appear in the NKJV (the translation I use), but it does appear in v. 41 (among others) of the NIV:

May your unfailing love come to me, O LORD, your salvation according to your promise;

In the NKJV, this is rendered as:

Let Your mercies come also to me, O LORD— Your salvation according to Your word.

Isn’t that really what the Bible is all about, anyway? The promise (word, faithfulness, testimony) of salvation? Isn’t that the whole purpose, to make us, like Timothy, complete and wise for salvation through faith?

We’ll keep these words in mind as we make our way through the psalm, and see specifically how each of them refers to God’s word, and what they have to say about it in context. By extension, we’ll learn what the psalm says to us about how to view the Bible and what role it plays in our walk with Christ. Stay tuned…