Introduction
Psalm 119. There has been considerable conjecture among some of you in the congregation as to how long it will take me to preach through Psalm 119. And some have wondered, will I attempt it in one sermon? And should they have brought their lunch?
I will not be working my way through every verse of this psalm. That would take us quite a while. I will, however, preach from this psalm at least twice. And we will try to take a big picture of the psalm and what the psalmist here has to say. We may do more than that. We’ll see. But it’ll be today. And then next time, I guess that’s two weeks from today, will be the next time. But we will begin today with verses one through eight.
Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart, who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways. You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently. Oh, that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes. Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments. I will praise you with an upright heart when I learn your righteous rules. I will keep your statutes. Do not utterly forsake me.
As you know, this is the longest of the Psalms. We have here 176 verses. This is longer, by the way, than Psalm 120, which begins a grouping of Psalms called the Psalms of Ascent. Psalm 119 is longer than all 15 of the next Psalms in the Psalms of Ascent, all of them put together.
We have the 176 verses just for a large overview here. We have 22 stanzas within this Psalm, and they are each of eight verses each. You’ll notice in your Bibles, if you have any older versions, it may even have the Hebrew letter, but in the newer versions, it’s just the Hebrew letter spelled out. Above verse one, you’ll see Aleph. Above verse 9, Beth. Above verse 17, Gimel. These are the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Then verse 25, Daleth, then He, Vav, and Zayin, and Heth, and Teth, and Yodh, and so on down it goes to the end. These are all 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
So we have 22 stanzas. Each verse in each stanza begins with that designated letter of the alphabet. And so in verses one through eight, each of the verses begins with Aleph. Verses 9 through 16, each of the verses begins the first word with Beth, and so on. We have some other acrostic Psalms in the Psalter as well, but this one works through the entire alphabet by itself.
Charles Spurgeon wrote a little commentary—he’s got a huge commentary on the Psalms, but he wrote a smaller book, a commentary on Psalm 119—and he titled it The Golden Alphabet. And it’s taking off from what the psalmist here has done. The psalmist here has clearly gone to a lot of work to structure this psalm in a peculiar kind of way. One, as I’ve mentioned, according to each letter of the alphabet. Each stanza of eight verses falls into two what you might call substanzas, or strophes as they’re called, of four verses each. So there’s four and four in each stanza. Each strophe or each substanza is itself divided into two couplets of two verses each with two lines each. And he’s worked hard at the symmetry of the poetry here.
The Authorship and Context of the Psalm
Today, as I say, we’ll just be looking at the big picture of this psalm. There’s no superscript given to us above this psalm. We don’t know who the author is for certain, but there are some indications in the psalm itself that the author is a king, and probably, I think, David himself. Verse 46, for example, if you’d like to look down at that, he says, “I will also speak of your testimonies before kings.” So this psalmist is someone of international stature. Verse 23: “Princes sit plotting against me.” Whether these princes are within Israel or without on the outside of Israel, either way, this seems like a king who has written. And that idea of being plotted against by other leaders, both in and outside of Israel, again, has a Davidic kind of ring to it. Verse 161: “Princes persecute me without cause.” That’s a regular theme in David’s psalms.
Plus, throughout this psalm, you will find many references to suffering generally. This is a marvelous psalm to go to just to find direction for faithfulness in suffering. Again, that’s a Davidic theme that’s common—not uniquely, but it points in that kind of direction. So David was one who suffered much. Much of his suffering was wrongfully given; he didn’t deserve it. And he protests his faithfulness. He does that here in verse 22, for example. He faces scorn and contempt for his faithfulness. Verse 78, he’s opposed with lies. That’s another Davidic theme. Again, we have the same in verses like 42 and verse 45. He’s opposed with lies, presumably for his faithfulness to God, and he expresses in those his continued trust and resolve to be faithful to God, despite the opposition for it.
I take it as a Davidic psalm, and at least a psalm, it seems, by a king who has been faithful and a king of considerable stature. That narrows it down pretty well, it seems to me, to David. The form of the psalm, in many respects, is that of a petition or lament psalm that we’ve seen so many of throughout our studies so far. In verses 81 and following here, the Kaph section of the psalm reflects the form or the pattern of a petition or lament psalm almost exactly. You have the individual components spread throughout this stanza. We have the direct address. We have the lament of suffering that is unjust. We have his statement of confidence. We have his statement of trust and his petition to God to help. All of that reflects a petition or lament psalm that we’ve seen so many of.
Yet throughout the psalm, as you’re probably aware, he expresses consistently his deep admiration for the law of God, the Torah. And so we might call this then, and I think we should, a Torah psalm. He loves God’s law. He’s devoted to God’s law. He delights in God’s law above all things. He values God’s law above everything else. He trusts God’s law. And so he meditates on God’s law. He gives his life to God’s law. This is a Torah psalm, or we might call it, as I have, “In Praise of Torah,” in praise of the law of God.
The Meaning of Torah
Now that brings us then to understand, before we go any further, what is the meaning of law? Or what’s the meaning of Torah? We usually think of the word “law” in terms of its commanding aspects: “Thou shalt, thou shalt not.” And that, of course, is part of God’s law. In the New Testament, the word “law” most often refers to the old covenant. So the whole covenant of God given at Mount Sinai to Moses in all of its aspects—Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy—all that was given is the Torah, God’s instruction.
In the Old Testament, we have the expression “the book of the law” or “this book of the law.” And that is a reference to certain chapters in particular, to the book of Deuteronomy, but in particular, certain chapters in the book of Deuteronomy, where God has given his law through Moses the second time to his people just before Moses’ death, as you’ll remember.
The word “law,” Torah, can refer to the entire Pentateuch, Genesis through Deuteronomy. The word itself, as it’s used in the Old Testament, the word Torah, simply means instruction. It’s law, but it has the connotations of instruction, almost that of catechetical instruction, using a catechism in teaching. It entails the commanding aspects of God’s law, what’s called apodictic law. But it also entails what are called case laws: “So if this happens under these circumstances, then you do this. And if this happens and that happens, then you do that. And if someone does this…” Case laws. It entails all of that. It includes narrative. It includes the promises that are given. The entirety of what God has given in his word in that sense is instruction. And it’s authoritative instruction because it comes from God. And so it is all referred to then as law.
Here in Psalm 119, God’s law is most often used, if not always, in its most comprehensive sense. And that is God’s revealed word written. God’s Word written. In David’s day, that would have been at least the Pentateuch. Perhaps by the time David is an old man, he might know of Samuel’s writings—1 Samuel, perhaps most of 2 Samuel, Joshua, Judges. But it refers to God’s Word as it has been written—its commands, its decrees, its promises, all of it. And all of it is understood as instruction, instruction that comes with binding authority. And so it is law. It is to be believed. It is to be obeyed. It is God’s word and therefore may be referred to as law.
So God’s revealed word then is the overarching theme of this entire psalm. And in fact, it is mentioned in almost every verse. Some would argue even the couple of times where it’s not explicit, it is implicit. But virtually every verse of this psalm mentions the law of the Lord through one terminology or another. And there is a varied terminology. Look at verse one again: “Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord.” Verse two: “Blessed are those who keep his testimonies.” Verse three: “who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways.” Verse four: “You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently.” Verse five: “in keeping your statutes.” Verse six: “your commandments.” Verse seven: “your righteous rules.” Verse eight: again, “your statutes.”
So we have eight different terms that are used. Each has various connotations. Nearly every verse has one of these kinds of terms. This is clearly then David’s theme. Psalm 119 is scripture about scripture. Any study of the doctrine of scripture, any study of the character of scripture, what it is, must entail a good look at Psalm 119, which is given to that. And the fact that the psalmist has given us the entire alphabet to work through with eight verses each might hint that even the alphabet itself isn’t enough to exhaust our examination of the character of scripture.
Well, the terminology varies then. But there’s one basic consideration that overarches and undergirds everything. And it’s something we have to see at the outset. And that is the divine origin or the source of the law, the scriptures. Notice verse one: “the law of the Lord.” Verse two: it is “his testimonies.” Verse three: it is “his ways.” Or then he changes to address God, verse four, to address God himself: “your precepts.” Verse five: “your statutes.” Verse six: “your commandments.” Verse seven: “your righteous rules.” Verse eight: “your statutes.”
All of this underlines and underscores the unique character of scripture as divine revelation. This is not just any other book. This is a book that has come from God. Hence the term “law.” It comes to us authoritatively from God himself. This is foundational to the entire religion of the Old Testament. This is foundational to the entire religion of the New Testament. This is what is unique, underlying everything about us as Christians. At the bottom of everything else we have to say, we have this bold claim: God has spoken. And if God has spoken, there are enormous entailments to that that must be considered.
Well, that’s the foundational claim of Christianity, the foundational claim of the entire Bible. God spoke to Abraham, but God did not stop speaking with Abraham. God spoke to Moses. God didn’t stop speaking then either. God spoke to David. He didn’t stop speaking there either. God spoke to the prophets, and he didn’t stop then either. And we come to the book of Hebrews chapter one, and the claim is God has spoken climactically to us in his Son, given to us through his apostles. According to the Apostle John, Jesus Christ is the very word of God incarnate. He is God speaking, God making himself known.
And so because of that close association of God and his word—God speaking—hearing scripture is hearing God. Because of that, you have some parallel ideas that crop up in the psalm and really throughout all of the scriptures. For example, to pursue God, we must pursue his word. So for example, verse two, I want you to see the equivalence that’s being drawn here. Verse two: “Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart.” You cannot get away from that without saying to pursue God, you must pursue his word. There’s no mysticism here. You want to hear from God, you don’t sit back quietly and close your eyes and wait for God to communicate with your spirit in some mystical way. To pursue God, we pursue what he has said. This is how he reveals himself.
Similarly, verse 114: to trust God, you must trust his word. In 114, he says, “You are my hiding place and my shield; I hope in your word.” To trust God is to trust his word. So in this sense, we need to tweak just a little bit, if not the way we talk about Psalm 119, at least the way we think about it when we call it a Torah Psalm. It is not merely Torah-focused. It’s not merely scripture-focused. But when we say that, we must recognize that more narrowly, it is God-focused, that David here is writing in praise of Torah because of its origin. It comes to us from God himself. He has spoken and we have this enormous privilege then of hearing from him and hearing his direction for life.
And so, David’s devotion to God is a devotion to his word. David’s trust in God is a trust in his word and what he has said. David’s obedience to Torah is his obedience to God. If he fails to strive to follow Scripture, he’s being unfaithful to God. If he neglects Scripture, he’s neglecting God himself, because it is God’s Word. If he strays from Scripture, he’s straying from God.
Sometimes we find, and we find this here in Psalm 119 as well, as well as so many other of the Psalms in the Psalter, sometimes the psalmist endures persecution precisely because of his faithfulness to Torah. And yet he doubles down and he dares not do anything but be faithful to Torah because that is how you define faithfulness to God. In other words, these Torah Psalms are not in praise of a book merely, but this is in praise of the God who has spoken—the God who has given us this inestimable treasure of speaking. God is a talking God. He has spoken, and so his will for us comes to us, not in mystical encounters; it comes from his own direct expressions from his own mouth.
Now this, in short, what I’ve just surveyed, is in short the church’s historic doctrine of inspiration: that the Bible is God’s word written. That’s the simplest explanation for the doctrine of inspiration. Scriptures are God’s word written. This is the claim of David himself. For example, in 2 Samuel chapter 23, at the end of his life, he reflects back and he says, “The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and his word was on my tongue.” This is exactly what the prophets would say repeatedly: “Thus says the Lord,” or “The word of the Lord came to me saying,” or “The burden of the Lord came saying.” The claim over and again is that God has spoken through his inspired prophets.
Now we have that word “inspired” in 2nd Timothy chapter 3 verse 16: “All Scripture is breathed out by God.” An important doctrine for us. It lies at the bottom of everything else we believe. There’s one thing that’s significant about that doctrine, though, and that is our word “inspiration.” The Christian church from the beginning has always believed this doctrine that when scripture speaks, God speaks. It received its fullest exposition in Benjamin Warfield in the last century, famous for that. His Christian doctrines were given to us in this big—you’ve heard me call it before—this revelation dump in Jesus. He’s come and he’s given us God’s word fully. And then it was left to the church to unpack that and understand it in its fullness. And major Christian doctrines throughout the centuries have had moments of real exposition where they’ve given, not necessarily anything new, but a fuller exposition of those doctrines.
With the doctrine of the inspiration and the inerrancy of scripture, it was Benjamin Warfield who did that. And at the bottom of his argument was: what scripture says, God says. That’s 2 Peter chapter 1. When scriptures were given to us, they did not come by one’s own disclosure, but holy men of God spoke as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. And our word “inspiration,” etymologically at least, doesn’t quite say that. This is what Warfield argued. The word that’s used in 2 Timothy 3 verse 16 is the “outspiration.” It’s not that this book was written and God breathed into it something of a divine quality, but that the scriptures are themselves the very breath of God, his own words spoken.
So that, on the one hand, we can say the Bible is a 100% human book, written by men. And on the other hand, we can say the Bible is 100% a divine book, because what those men wrote is what God spoke—his word through his inspired prophets. And so when we come to the New Testament, for example, very often we find this language, it’s so fascinating. The implications are enormous. They’ll quote something from Moses, and the New Testament writer will say, “and God said,” and yet it’s what Moses wrote. Or, “the Holy Spirit spoke by the mouth of David saying…” And you find this equation being worked out in the New Testament. What scripture says, God says. What God says, scripture says. And this is what we have in Psalm 119 over and over again. This is the law of the Lord. This is his testimonies, his statutes, his ways, his rules, and so on.
And so the Christian church has loved to point out that there are the marks, as we would expect, there are the marks of inspiration throughout the scriptures. Biblical writers—this is one curious observation that I’ve long thought just fascinating—the biblical writers, for example, presume to tell us what God thinks, or God thought, or the reason God did this was because he thought or because he… and they presume to speak for God from his innermost thoughts. Who in the world can do that? Samuel can write offhand, “the thing that David did displeased the Lord.” How does he know that? It is because these men spoke from God himself.
We have other marks of inspiration that give promises and warnings ahead of time, and they all are demonstrated with precise accuracy. As Isaiah tells us, he tells us the end from the beginning. Pretty easy to tell the beginning from the end. God tells the end from the beginning. He tells us ahead of time what will happen and then it works out. The study of fulfilled prophecy already is a fascinating study in its own.
There’s a marvelous unity to Scripture, as we would expect if God is the supreme author of Scripture. There’s a marvelous unity to Scripture. We have this multiplicity of complex, interrelated themes, all joining in chorus to sing the same song, all uniting on the same person of Jesus. You’ve got this multiplicity of authors spanning 15 centuries, and all of them coming together to write on the same theme in all kinds of interrelated, complex themes, and all converging to the same tune. And this then is the uniqueness of scripture. The Bible stands out as above any other book in the world in this respect. Verse one: it is the law of the Lord. It is his testimonies. This is his ways, his precepts. Verse eight: his statutes. Verse six: his commandments. Verse seven: his righteous rules. And so every time we open this book, every time, we ought to be struck: this is a unique book. Here we have the privilege of hearing from God himself.
Now that has massive implications. We’ll spend the rest of our time with that this morning and then next time as well. If the scriptures are God’s word written, then what are some entailments of that? Well, the psalmist here unpacks several of them for us.
First: Authority
Number one, most obviously, and I’ve already mentioned it, is authority. If this is God’s word, then it comes with supreme authority. If scripture is God’s word, we are obliged to believe it. We’re obliged to obey it. We’re obliged to conform our life to it in every respect. If God gives a warning, we’re obliged to be warned and take it seriously. If God makes a promise, we’re obliged to believe it and to trust in that promise. If God issues a command, we are obliged to obey that command and adjust our lives, our thinking, our talking, and everything accordingly. This is his laws, his precepts, his statutes. And all throughout this psalm, we find God’s word must be kept. It must be obeyed. In fact, in verse three here, to fail to keep God’s ways is the very essence of wrongdoing. So when God speaks, when Scripture speaks, God speaks. And that is to say, we find it in Scripture. There’s no other consideration, no other higher court of appeal. When God says it, it’s final. Supreme authority.
Second: The Truthfulness of Scripture
Next, and closely associated with that, in fact entailed in it, is the idea of the truthfulness of scripture. Once we say scripture is God’s word written, we have said the church’s historic doctrine of inerrancy. Now we say it in the negative way: inerrant, no errors. It’s simply, to say it positively, it is God’s word and therefore it is truth. It is truthful and trustworthy. God does not lie. God isn’t ignorant. He’s not unaware of certain details. He doesn’t come along later and say, “Well, I didn’t know that was going to happen,” or “I didn’t realize that hadn’t been discovered yet and I’ll have to adjust my word.” That’s never going to happen. And we can bank on it then when God speaks, it is true. Verse 142, for example: “your law is true.” Verse 151: “all your commandments are true.” Verse 160: “The sum of your word is truth.” And then if you’d like just to jot down, I won’t take time to go there, verse 29, verse 104, verse 128 affirm for us that everything that’s contrary to the scriptures is wrong. It’s false. You read the scriptures, you hear another contradictory idea, you know exactly already that’s wrong, because it’s not what God has said. Truthfulness. God speaks, we can know it is true.
Now that’s important on another level, if I can park here for just a moment. Our generation was told that there’s no such thing as truth, at least not a truth with a capital T. Big narrative, metanarrative truth, nothing that is true for everyone. You may have your truth, but I may have mine, and they may not be the same. And there’s true with a small “t” maybe, but this idea of true with an uppercase “T”—why, that’s just arrogant. Who do you think you are to think you know enough to say that you know the truth? And in fact, it appears arrogant to our postmodernist, relativistic society for us to say we have the truth. It appears arrogant or too limited in our knowledge. How can you say that you know the truth?
In fact, we’ve even had debates in our generation on the very meaning of truth. Truth has been defined in terms of pragmatics: “Does it work?” Or is it cohesive: “Does it cohere together?” We’ve shied away from the idea of correspondence to reality: that this is what it is, this is what God has said, this is true, and anything else is false. We’re told that we don’t have enough understanding, we don’t know the whole of reality. How can we say that we have capital T truth? And there’s something about all of that argument that is just right enough to be confusing, because we don’t want to be arrogant. We don’t want to claim that we’re know-it-alls. And the fact is, we are biased. We do get things wrong all the time.
And there are a couple of things wrong with that whole narrative that’s been pushed on us in this last generation. And the first one is probably the most obvious. And that is, it’s a self-defeating claim when they tell us that all truth is relative, or that there’s no such thing as universal truth. That’s a universal truth claim. It’s a self-defeating claim.
When our daughter was little, like any other toddler when they’re learning to speak, she had a fascinating vocabulary. One of them we always remember is her word for elephant. Her little mouth couldn’t say elephant. She would say “entel, entel.” So she always said entel. And one day, I thought, “I think you can say it better.” So I said, “Gina, it’s elephant, not entel.” And she said, “My can’t say elephant.” Self-defeating claim.
When someone says, “There’s no such thing as truth,” you need to ask, “Is that true?” If they say, “There’s no such thing as universal truth,” you need to ask, “Is that universally true?” Or “All truth is relative.” Is that absolutely true or is that just relatively true? You need to expose it.
But more important than all of that—that’s picking at it and it gets at the logical fallacies of it all—but more important than that, that whole narrative that there’s no such thing as truth dismisses the very idea of God. It dismisses that there is someone who knows the whole of reality perfectly, with perfect clarity, and can speak truthfully accordingly. And so if God has spoken, we can know. And we may not be able to know comprehensively, but we can know with certainty, and we can know with truth, because God has spoken. And that’s David’s claim here throughout. If God speaks, we can know what truth is, and we have it because God has spoken.
And so we come to a world that’s just so confused today, doesn’t know what truth is, doesn’t know if there is such a thing as truth. Something like five-fourths of what you hear on the newscasts is false. And in a world like that, we can appear arrogant: “You think you have the truth.” Matter of fact, we do. That doesn’t say anything about us. It’s not because we’re smarter, better, more informed. It’s because God has spoken. You have the same truth. The only difference between you and me, the only difference between us and them, is that we recognize God’s truth for what it is. If God has spoken, it is not arrogant to believe it. If God has spoken, it’s the very height of arrogance to refuse it. If God has spoken, it is the very height of arrogance to stand over it as a judge, as though you know better. This is his law. This is his testimonies, his ways, and it’s altogether true, and everything that contradicts it is simply wrong.
Well, it’s the same with regard to ethics and morals and values. We’ve been told, again, that there’s no absolute standard. What’s wrong for you might not be wrong for me. What your community or your culture thinks is wrong might not be wrong here. What you think is right may not be necessary over there. How arrogant it would be for you to impose your thinking on someone else’s. And again, there are problems with that. They can never live with it. They always end up with certain morals and standards and values that are inexorable. But most importantly, it dismisses again the very idea of external revelation—that God has spoken. That God has spoken and given us moral direction. And if he has, if God has spoken, then we can know right from wrong, good from bad, what’s good, what’s bad, what’s better, what’s worth our time, what’s not. All of that we can know with certainty if God has spoken.
And so again, the psalmist here, verse one: those who walk in the law of the Lord, well, their way is blameless. Verses two and three: those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart and walk in his ways. These are the ones who do no wrong. Verse seven: his rules are the very standard of what is right and righteous.
In fact, God’s word is not only true, and it is not only true and binding with regard to ethics and morals and values, but we can say a step further, and that is God’s word is eternal. It is always everywhere relevant. Verse 89: “Forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens.” It never needs to be adjusted. Culture is not going to get to the well-informed place where God’s word somehow now has been outdated. Verse 152: “Long have I known from your testimonies that you have founded them forever.” Verse 160: “The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever.” There’ll never be a time when God’s word is outdated, when it doesn’t apply, when it’s not binding.
Many of you know the seminary, one of the seminaries where I attended, one of my alma maters—Pastor Boyd’s alma mater as well—went in the direction of postmodern relativism in recent decades. I sat down with one of the professors one time at lunch, challenging him on all of this. I’m trying to pin him down, and it’s all, “Well, I think,” and “This is my worldview. It’s not necessarily theirs.” I finally asked him, “Is homosexuality wrong?” I didn’t ask, “What do you think?” or “Do you think that homosexuality…?” Is homosexuality, homosexual practice, wrong? Oh, they’re so slippery, drives me nuts. “Well, I think it is.” “Is there ever a place where it’s not wrong?” “Well, I don’t think there is.” You see how slippery they get? “In my worldview, it’s always wrong.” “Will there ever be a time, any circumstance, when it is right?” “Well, I don’t think so.” Trying to get away from this universal norm of scripture, always relevant, always binding, whatever your worldview happens to be. Verse 160: “Every one of your righteous rules endures forever.” Look back at verse 52: “When I think of your rules from of old, I take comfort, O Lord.” Long proven, always relevant.
Third: Trustworthy
Now if all of this is true, then we have to say more. If scripture is God speaking, if it is God’s word written, it is authoritative, it is true, it is eternal. We can go another step and say it is trustworthy. It is trustworthy. If scripture is God’s word written, then we have a book that we can approach with absolute confidence. We can read the scriptures with the absolute assurance that if we believe what it says, our trust will prove to be well-founded. We can approach the scriptures with the confidence that if we adjust our lives to what it teaches and what it commands, we can be fully assured that we’ll not have regrets for it in the end. It’s trustworthy. This is after all God, the creator, speaking. Verse six: “Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments.” I’ll expand on this next time.
Here is how we live without regret: go to God’s word and adjust your life accordingly. And so what we find then, for example, back in verses one and two, when we adjust life to conform to scripture, we’re blessed. Verse one: “Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord.” Verse two: “Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart.” Verse six, we find that we will not be put to shame having our eyes fixed on God’s commandments. And so we can approach this book with absolute confidence. We’ll never err if we follow what it says.
Now, at this point, we’re pushed into a kind of dilemma. Verse 1, for example: “Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord.” Who can say that? Can you say that? “My way is blameless. I walk in the law of the Lord. Therefore, I am blessed.” Can you say that? Verse two: “Blessed are those who keep his testimonies.” Have you kept them enough? “Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart.” Have you done that? You want to be blessed? Well, that’s how: keep God’s word, pursue it with your whole heart. Or verse 3: “who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways.” Who in the world has done that? And so it forces us into a kind of dilemma here. What’s this all about? What do we do now?
If that’s the way of blessedness—and we were told that at the very outset in Psalm 1, the blessed man is the one who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers. He is one who delights in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night, all the time. That’s the way of blessedness. How have you done on that?
Well, the Bible does this, and it does it intentionally. It drives us into this dilemma, and this is one way that the scriptures and wisdom literature as a whole point us to the gospel. Psalm 1, for example, again, the blessed man is the one who doesn’t walk in the way of sinners, stand in the way of sinners, or sit in the seat of the scornful. He’s the one who delights in the law of the Lord. We have the same thing here in Psalm 119. Verse one again: “Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart, who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways.”
And standing on our side of history, at least, we ought to be able to look back and see in this, well, ultimately, ultimately, the answer is clear. God didn’t stop speaking with Abraham. He didn’t stop speaking with Moses. He didn’t stop speaking with David. He didn’t stop speaking with the prophets. He has spoken to us climactically in his Son—the very word of God incarnate. And Jesus Christ, he is himself the blessed man par excellence.
Verse one, we ought to be able to look back and read, from our standpoint in redemptive history, shouldn’t we be able to do this? Look back at verse one and read it in light of Jesus and say, “Jesus’ way was blameless. He walked in the law of the Lord.” Verse two: “He kept God’s testimonies. He sought him with his whole heart.” Verse three: “He did no wrong.” And he did it all as a stand-in for his people, a representative—and not just a representative, a substitute for his people. “I’ll go and I’ll do for them what they can’t do for themselves.”
And then he goes to the cross, answering for our sins and bringing satisfaction to God, providing for us everything that God required of us in terms of perfect obedience, in terms of suffering a penalty we deserve for our sin. Jesus does for us all that he requires of us and gains our acceptance before God. But it doesn’t stop there. He not only gains our acceptance before God, he promises to transform us from the inside out. That’s the new covenant promise: “I’ll write my law on their hearts. I’ll change them from the inside out.”
And so we find we’re accepted before God because of Jesus and only because of Jesus. And then we find this real transformation has happened. It starts on the inside and our appetites change. We have this new appreciation for God’s word written that we didn’t have before. And we find ourselves going back to it, and we want to learn it again. We want to learn more, and we want to go deeper. We want to spend more time. We start seeking out other people who like to do the same. And when we all meet together, we want to hear from God’s word. What has God to say?
We find ourselves through it all being changed and conformed to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ himself. We find ourselves going back and praying verse five, for example: “Oh, that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes!” And we find that as we go back to scripture, it has this strange, life-giving power. It develops a thirst in us. We’ll pray, as we’ll see in verse 18: “Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.”
We find that God begins to accomplish in us just what he commands of us in his word through the Lord Jesus, who has done it in our place, has gained our acceptance before God, and has begun the great work of transformation in our hearts. It is truly an amazing thing to consider: God has spoken. And it’s an amazing thing to experience. As we read his word, we find its life-giving power. This was it at the beginning: through the word of truth, he begot us, he brought us into life. And we see it from then on forward as well, that God transforms us through the very word that commands us to live for him.
Amen. Let’s pray.
Our Father, what a wonderful gift this is, the gift of your word. Give us increasingly a heart to seek it out, to learn it, to know it, to be changed by it, to conform our lives to it. May we do this for our good and for your glory. We ask through Jesus Christ. Amen.