A Star, a Book, a Mission

 Matthew 2:1-3

“Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, 2 Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him. 3 When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.”

These mysterious travelers from the eastern lands knew something about the Jewish nation that, apparently, most of the Jews of that time were unaware of. Coming from a Gentile country, they may have been Persian astrologers and astronomers who had access to the Hebrew scriptures through the prophet Daniel, who rose to prominence during the days of Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon. We really don’t know exactly who these Magi, or “wise men” were, or how many they were.

But we do know that they were convinced a new King had recently been born. And they called the thing that convinced them, “his star,” a word that can also be called “his radiance.” And they also knew that this newborn King was one worthy to be “worshiped.” They had left their homes on a mission: to bring their blessing, their treasures, their submission, to an ultimate, heavenly, divine King. “King of the Jews.”

In the Old Testament, we read of other Jewish Kings, David and Solomon, who reigned over Israel in its golden age, when kings from other nations honored and paid tribute to them as monarchs who had been specially blessed by their God Yahweh, the Lord God Almighty. And the Hebrew prophets from Isaiah to Malachi had spoken and written of a coming Messiah or Christ who would even surpass the power and splendor of David and Solomon.

Did the Magi know about these prophecies, or about the prophecy of Balaam son of Beor during the time of Moses in the wilderness beyond the Jordan, that “a star will arise out of Jacob”? Perhaps. But however they learned about the newborn, divine Ruler in Judea, King Herod recognized right away that the One they were seeking was the long-awaited Christ. He consulted the priests and scribes frantically to discover exactly where that child would be born, not so he could join the wise men to worship Him, but to put the new king to death as soon as he could!

So, how did the wise men find out about the new King? God Himself obviously revealed it to them, whether by the Hebrew writings of Daniel, or by their own superstitious search of the heavens, they’d been given this special knowledge to recognize the “star” or “radiance” pointing them to the land of Judea. And King Herod made the assumption that the star had appeared at the exact time of the Christ child’s birth in Bethlehem, making his evil plans accordingly.

In Hebrews chapter 1, we read that God spoke to people long ago, “at many times and in many ways.” He revealed in some way to the Magi that His anointed King had been born and gave them a visible, radiant sign to point them to Him so they could find Him, travel to Him and worship Him. They recognized this revelation as coming from God and they responded by coming all the way to where the young Child was. Whatever this “radiance” was that God provided to them, they saw its divine importance and sought to follow where it led.

Apparently, the wise men from the east believed that the Creator had ways to communicate with His creatures—ways that made His will clear to them and required them to respond with obedience and reverent worship. Today, two thousand years later, our Creator still speaks to people. Not by way of the stars in the heavens, or horoscopes, or Ouija boards, or miraculous prophecies. Rather, He has given us a book. He’s given us His Word.

The Bible is not a book of magic. But, with God as its ultimate Author, the Bible is a revelation that clearly communicates God’s will and requires men and women and boys and girls to believe and obey Him. The message of the “star” was to seek for Jesus, the newborn King. The message of the Bible is that this Jesus came to seek for us, to make us newborn children of His heavenly Father! The gentile wise men came to the Jews looking for their new Ruler. Jesus, King of the Jews, died on the cross for sinful people, both Jews and gentiles, to include all nations in His new kingdom.

The Magi brought their precious treasures to lay before the Christ child. They sacrificed things they highly prized to honor Him and show their love and devotion. But God the Father gave us His own most precious treasure, His only begotten Son, to show us His love and to provide us salvation from the punishment our sins deserved. And Jesus Himself willingly went to that cross of death out of love for us sinners and obedience to His Father.

After He rose from the tomb and ascended to Heaven, Jesus and His Father sent the Holy Spirit to bring dead-hearted sinners like you and I to new life, once we hear the Bible’s message of salvation through Christ. And once we believe in Jesus and seek to obey Him, He tells us how he plans to carry out His plan to reach all nations with this good news of salvation. He says in Mark 16:15, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” That’s the mission every follower of Jesus Christ has been given.

The mysterious Magi journeyed a long way to bring their gifts to the heavenly King… Are you and I willing to journey across the street or across the living room to carry out the King’s mission of love and forgiveness? Lost sinners in our own country, town, neighborhood, and even our families, must hear the good news of Jesus to be saved from their sins, and from the eternal punishment they deserve. That mission, the Book tells us, is the “star” we are all called to follow.

Themes from the Psalm of Psalms

(Loving the God of Psalm 119)

Stanza Twenty-two

TAU: Relying on God to hear my prayer, give understanding, be my helper, and seek me when I stray.

169 Let my cry come before You, O Lord; / Give me understanding according to Your word.

170 Let my supplication come before You; / Deliver me according to Your word.

171 My lips shall utter praise, / For You teach me Your statutes.

172 My tongue shall speak of Your word, / For all Your commandments are righteousness.

173 Let Your hand become my help, / For I have chosen Your precepts.

174 I long for Your salvation, O Lord, / And Your law is my delight.

175 Let my soul live, and it shall praise You; / And let Your judgments help me.

176 I have gone astray like a lost sheep; / Seek Your servant, / For I do not forget Your commandments.

In many ways, King David is a perfect picture of a faithful Old Testament saint, a man who looked forward in a secure hope for the ultimate salvation of the Lord his God. And this closing prayer of his greatest of Psalms displays that hope and David’s humble dependence on Yahweh. He depends on God to “hear” him, “give [him] understanding,” be his “help,’’ and “seek” him when he strays.

It is interesting that the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, Aleph and Tau (“tav”) combine to form the word ET. It’s a word that is not directly translatable into English, but is used in Hebrew to show which word is the direct object of a sentence. In a sense, it makes the other words in the sentence understandable. It makes the words around it make sense!

Often in the Bible, God Himself is referred to as the “First and the Last,” or the “Alpha and Omega.” Paul speaks of God being glorious because “from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.” John speaks of Christ as the Word, or in Greek, the “Logos,” who was with God, and equal to God, “in the beginning.” And that nothing was made apart from Him. Like that Hebrew word “ET,” nothing in our universe makes sense without the eternal Son of God—the Beginning and the End.

This twenty-second stanza of Psalm 119, all the verses beginning with TAU, summarizes the various themes of the entire 176-verse psalm of praise for the Word of Yahweh. The stanza is a highly personal prayer, mentioning God and his word eighteen times! There are eight requests or supplications here, as well as several expressions of praise, delight, confession and resolution. There is a spirit of humility here, calling on the Lord to teach him, deliver him, revive him, and retrieve him!

The first two verses echo one another: “Let my cry come before You, O Lord; / Give me understanding according to Your word. Let my supplication come before You; / Deliver me according to Your word.” The psalmist humbly asks that his petitions might enter the presence, and the ears, of his great God.

This humble tone emphasizes the majesty and holiness of God’s character and His person. He is perfectly holy, but you and I are sinful and polluted, having no business entering God’s presence by our own qualifications. On what possible basis could we think our cries and our supplications might be heard by this great King of the universe? Only on the basis of the spoken and written word of God Himself! Only “according to Your word,” David writes, can he cry out for understanding, or ask for deliverance. His prayer is a PLEA. Not a DEMAND. We can only hope for the Lord to hear and answer us if it PLEASES Him to do so.

How often do we brazenly and unthinkingly charge into the Lord’s presence in prayer, not even mindful of how awesome and holy He is, or how lowly, weak and sinful we are? Yes, the Bible tells us that God loves His children dearly and is eager to hear their prayers like a Father does. But even the Lord Jesus spoke to the Heavenly Father with respect and reverence, saying, “If it please You, Father, take this cup from Me,” and “Nevertheless, not My will, but Yours be done.” 

“According to Your word.” Those words also remind us that God’s willingness to grant our requests is always limited to what He has decreed and what He has promised. The Apostle James warns his readers that it is possible to “ask amiss,” that is, to pray with wrong motives. God does delight to grant His children’s valid requests, given in Jesus’ name. But praying with selfish or foolish motives, to spend what God gives on our own desires, is to ask in an unworthy manner, not in accordance to God’s will.

David asks Yahweh for “understanding” and for deliverance. These are two things the Lord delights to give. Solomon was given what amounted to a “blank check” when God told him in a dream, “Ask what I shall give you” (1 Kings 3). The young king asked for wisdom and understanding so that he would be a good leader for God’s people Israel. This request pleased the Lord so much that He not only gave Solomon what he asked for, but gave him wealth and victory and peace besides in great measure! He also allowed King Solomon to erect a great temple for the name of Yahweh in Jerusalem.

Verses 171 and 172 also parallel each other: “My lips shall utter praise, / For You teach me Your statutes. My tongue shall speak of Your word, / For all Your commandments are righteousness.” When the Lord graciously hears our prayers, or answers our requests, it is surely appropriate that our mouths will utter words of praise and thanksgiving. That such a wonderful, powerful King would listen to us and respond to creatures as small and unimportant as we are, is a fantastic privilege and a matter for great joy and celebration!

David is uttering praise to Yahweh…why? Because he’s been instructed in the King’s rules and His righteous commandments. King David wants above all to be a righteous king over God’s people. God’s own commands and decrees are to be on the king’s tongue continually, not just his own fallible human ideals and notions. God’s words are not merely righteous; they are righteousness ITSELF! The words from God’s mouth are the words we are called to live by ourselves, and to proclaim to all around us. Especially to those who are looking to us for truth and guidance.

The episode in David’s life that is certainly the most famous is his face-off against the giant, Goliath of Gath, the Philistine champion who challenged the armies of Israel to “choose a man that we may fight together!” When the young David volunteered before King Saul to answer that challenge, the king tried to dissuade him (1 Samuel 17): “You are not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him; you are only a youth, and he has been a warrior from his youth.” 

David’s bravehearted answer: “Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God. The Lord who rescued me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will rescue me from the hand of this Philistine.” And we all know the end of that story. Perhaps that “rescue” the hand of the Lord provided was still on David’s mind when he penned the next two verses of Psalm 119:

“Let Your hand become my help, / For I have chosen Your precepts. I long for Your salvation, O Lord, / And Your law is my delight.” Little David’s answer to the threats and boasts of big Goliath revealed the source of his confidence at that time, and throughout his entire military career: “All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands.” Truly, anybody who has “chosen [God’s] precepts” and made His law their delight can depend on the Lord’s “hand” to “become [their] help” in their time of need!

The word translated “salvation” is from the Hebrew word “yeshua”…the very name the angel Gabriel spoke to Joseph when he announced that his wife would be the mother of the Christ child. “She will bear a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins.” Being saved from enemies like the Philistines was not the ultimate “yeshua” David was longing for. He was well aware of the promises Yahweh had given his people: promises of a “Seed of the woman” who would someday “crush [the serpent’s] head” and bring an everlasting peace between God and man.

“Let my soul live, and it shall praise You; / And let Your judgments help me.” Clearly, King David was looking beyond this life when he reached the close of his Psalm of Psalms. He, along with other prophetic writers in the Old Testament, trusted that death of our physical bodies is not the end of life. He had a solid faith that our souls survive the grave and will face an ultimate, final judgment in the presence of our Creator. Even though he saw the coming Messiah of Israel with a lesser clarity than we do today, David trusted in the “tender mercies” of Yahweh that would not count his sins against him and “let [his] soul live” so that he would go on praising the Lord forever!

“And let Your judgments help me,” he writes. The perfect, truthful judgments of God cannot overlook our sin; they are righteous, fair and just pronouncements that can’t be overturned. And when Yeshua/ Jesus hung on a Roman cross 2,000 years ago, bearing the sins of all His people, God the Father judged His Son with perfect justice, unleashing the hellish punishment each of us deserved. Like the prairie farmers of old who would burn out an area of land when the brushfire was approaching, you and I can safely stand inside that burned out area beneath the cross of Jesus, where God’s fiery justice fell with holy fury. For a God of perfect justice will never punish our sins twice. Jesus paid it all!

Never forgetting the lowliness of his own past, King David brings Psalm 119 to an end with a verse of three lines, hearkening back to his life as a keeper of sheep for his father Jesse:

“I have gone astray like a lost sheep; / Seek Your servant, / For I do not forget Your commandments.”

You and I should not live in the past, but neither ought we ever forget where and what we were saved from. Even as redeemed people who trust in Jesus Christ, David would remind us that we are still likely to stray into paths of sin unless we are careful to follow our Good Shepherd. 

Let us always keep in mind that “there is no one who seeks after God” (Romans 3:10). It is God Himself who does the seeking. He not only gives us His commandments…He is always IN command. Isaiah admits that “we all, like sheep, have gone astray,” and are likely to stray again. And it is the Lord’s pleasure to watch over, pray for, and rescue His own children when they fail to trust Him. We can be assured that He will always seek His own and bring them safely home, because “the Lord has laid on Him (Jesus the Lamb of God) the iniquities of us all.”

As believers in Jesus our faithful Good Shepherd, we are called to follow David’s example and be resolved never to “forget [God’s] commandments.” As we remain in His fold, growing in His grace, going where He leads us, hearing and believing His word, we trust Him never to leave or forsake us.

Amen

 Themes from the Psalm of Psalms

(Loving the God of Psalm 119)

Stanza Twenty

RESH: Pleading for redemption from the God of truth…and tender mercies

153 Consider my affliction and deliver me, / For I do not forget Your law.

154 Plead my cause and redeem me; / Revive me according to Your word.

155 Salvation is far from the wicked, / For they do not seek Your statutes.

156 Great are Your tender mercies, O Lord; / Revive me according to Your judgments.

157 Many are my persecutors and my enemies, / Yet I do not turn from Your testimonies.

158 I see the treacherous, and am disgusted, / Because they do not keep Your word.

159 Consider how I love Your precepts; / Revive me, O Lord, according to Your lovingkindness.

160 The entirety of Your word is truth, / And every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever.

King David could look back on many episodes of his life when treacherous, wicked persecutors and enemies tried to pursue, oppose, or even destroy him. And surely there were times when he was tempted to take revenge on these evil people.

Take the time when David and his band of outlaws protected the fields and flocks of Nabal the Calebite, then requested that Nabal furnish them with some fresh supplies in return. Nabal, whose very name means “a fool,” ridiculed David and his men and sent them away scornfully. In a rage, David told his men to strap on their swords and they went to take revenge on Nabal’s entire household. God used Nabal’s wise wife Abigail to plead with the future king NOT to take vengeance into his own hands, and David agreed. Later, God punished Nabal, who died from fright, and Abigail became David’s wife.

In this 20th stanza of the Psalm of Psalms, we encounter another situation where King David is beset with enemies. In the 19th stanza, he spoke of those who “draw near who follow after wickedness.” But he also wrote of his God, Yahweh, drawing near: “You near, O LORD, and all Your commandments are truth.” Well, in this stanza, everyone, it seems, has arrived and is standing there with David, both his loving God… and his bitter foes who mean to judge him guilty and afflict him and persecute him.

In the previous 8 verses, he CRIED OUT to the Lord as if He were far off and needed to be awakened. He was awake through the night watches hoping for God to respond. Now, in the 8 verses that each begin with the Hebrew letter RESH, David speaks to the Lord who is nearby, standing next to him like a defense attorney, the only one in the King’s corner, the only hope David has of deliverance!

This stanza is clearly broken into two-verse couplets, both verses following a similar theme. The first couplet, verses 153 & 154, echo one another as the plea of the one being wrongfully accused by the prosecution: “Consider my affliction and deliver me, / For I do not forget Your law. / Plead my cause and redeem me; / Revive me according to Your word.”

The case of the accused believer is to be based on the law…the word…of Yahweh. Some might suggest that an admitted sinner such as David should not plead the righteous law of God as his own defense. But even though the King sees himself as a law-breaker—far from perfect in his obedience, he also sees himself as living by the merciful love and the rock-solid promises of the Lord. King David was a believer in salvation by grace ALONE. “Blessed is the man to whom sin is not imputed,” Psalm 32:2. He knew that the promise of the coming Messiah was his assurance that the guilt of his own sin would be forgiven, for those sins would be imputed to another—One who would obey God perfectly!

“Deliver me…Redeem me…Revive me,” are David’s requests. He realizes that his cries have proved successful. His trust is in a trustworthy Advocate who is never deaf to those cries, One who always is considering our afflictions. Yahweh assured the deliverer Moses: “I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows” (Exodus 3:7). One who pleads the cause of those he loves, against the devil and his followers who preach lies and discouragement and seek to rob Christians of their hope in God’s promises.

Trusting in God to balance the scales of justice when evil folks are seeking to harm us: this is not always easy. David was encouraged by his men to take revenge on King Saul when they were hiding in the wilderness and Saul was hunting the future king to kill him. Twice it was that Saul was at David’s mercy, once in the cave relieving himself, and once asleep in his camp. Both times, David left the scales of justice in God’s hands. 1 Samuel 24:12— “Let the LORD judge between you and me, and let the LORD avenge me on you. But my hand shall not be against you.”

“Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord” (Romans 12:19). We are commanded by our Master to pray for those who harm us, and do good to those who sin against us, in the hopes of our enemies one day turning to Christ. At one time, the Apostle Paul was a bitter enemy of the church, seeking to destroy it and approving when Jesus’ followers were executed. But even the murderous Saul of Tarsus was not beyond hope—beyond the saving power of the risen Christ and the Holy Spirit of God.

The second couplet, verses 155 & 156, tell two truths about God’s salvation that are linked together: “Salvation is far from the wicked, / For they do not seek Your statutes. / Great are Your tender mercies, O Lord; / Revive me according to Your judgments.” People who neglect the established rules of God are flirting with eternal destruction. God is “angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11). Divine wrath hangs over their heads like Damocles’ mythical sword. But this is true for even the most “righteous” of sinners, unless they come to trust in the “tender mercies” of the Lord. Salvation is far from all of us, until and unless God judges us graciously and extends His merciful hand.

The Hebrew word for “revive” is simply the word for LIFE. “LIFE me according to Your judgments” David is saying, and again, God’s salvation/new life is only available to you and me because His justice fell upon the person of His only begotten Son who died in our place, bearing the guilt of our sins. We think of “wickedness” as a trait of only the most extreme sinners. But the reason Jesus became a human being was that “salvation is far from” everyone descended from Adam, who wickedly disobeyed the Creator. Yet, now that Christ has come, salvation is close and available to all who “call upon the name of the Lord” (Romans 10:13).

Verses 157 & 158 go together, describing both the number and the character of David’s opponents. Like this ancient king, you and I face “many…persecutors and…enemies.” Paul told the Ephesian believers that our struggle is not against flesh and blood people, at least, not mainly. Yes, there have been people in government, in our jobs and schools, even in our churches and families, who have ridiculed and opposed our faith in Jesus Christ. But the power and influence behind those people is a spiritual force of wickedness: Satan and his host of demons with their evil ideas and their lies.

David shares the Lord’s own attitude toward the “treacherous” ones such as Judas Iscariot who perhaps have heard God’s word from the lips of Jesus…even seen the wonders he performs, and yet they “do not keep [His] word.” It is repugnant, disgusting, to the Lord for people to treat Him and His testimonies like they mean nothing! David refused to align himself with this majority. Rather, he determined not to “turn from Your testimonies.” No matter how many lined up in opposition to the truth of Yahweh, they couldn’t turn him from taking his stand for the One who IS the Truth.

“I see the treacherous,” he tells the Lord. God has given him the eyes required to discern the false from the true. How many people around us lack that kind of insight and are led astray by the deceptive ideas of this present world! Liberal churches that deny the deity and miracles of Christ…government and corporate movements that support evolution and trans-genderism…business people and relatives who are relying on their good works to make up for their sins and get them into heaven… All such people have been blinded, Paul writes, “by the god of this age”---Satan (2 Corinthians 4:4).

David ends this powerful stanza, this plea for redemption, by extolling the Source of light that allows him to see clearly and discern rightly.

“Consider how I love Your precepts; / Revive me, O Lord, according to Your lovingkindness. / The entirety of Your word is truth, / And every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever.”

Love, truth and righteousness. They all come together perfectly in the written and living Word of God. David’s plea in the courtroom of Yahweh, when faced with a multitude of treacherous accusers, is a request for the Judge to “consider” the psalmist’s LOVE of God’s precepts. David has heard them taught. He has read, memorized, perhaps even written down the instructions and revelations of God. They are his food and drink, they are his waking thoughts and they fill his mind in the watches of the night. They have come to characterize his daily walk. They are his means of defense against Satan.

But even these qualities in David are not what qualify him for LIFE. It is God’s “lovingkindness,” His unfailing love and covenant mercy, the psalmist depends on for renewal, revival, redemption. Salvation is of the Lord, not the result of even our finest and best acts of obedience. Our love for God and His precepts only become realities “because [God] first loved us” (1 John 4:19). Chosen from the foundation of the world, believers were beloved of God before creation even began. 

Both His truth and His righteous judgments are eternal, meaning that they have always been in the Father’s mind even before time began. We little creatures mean so much to this great God…and who can tell WHY that is? Our sins against this God of love are worthy of eternal torments—punishment beyond measure. And His perfect justice will be carried out to the letter of His law. His warnings and His curses are just as binding as His promises…

And yet, also before time began, the eternal Son of God was determined to pay the price for the sins of those the Father set His love upon. Mercy for a multitude of rebellious creatures entered into the plans of God in the form of a Roman cross and an empty tomb, with a triumphant Savior rising again, having paid the total price of our redemption.

Are you and I living by “the entirety of [God’s] word [which] is truth”? Have we been judged NOT GUILTY in the courtroom of heaven, because we have trusted in Jesus, the Way, the Truth, and the Life? If so, that righteous judgment can never be overturned by any higher court. For, “every one of [God’s] righteous judgments endures FOREVER!

Amen

Psalm 119 - QOPH

 

Themes from the Psalm of Psalms

(Loving the God of Psalm 119)

Stanza 19

 

QOPH: Crying out for God’s salvation, waking to dwell on His eternal truth

 

145  I cry out with my whole heart; / Hear me, O Lord! I will keep Your statutes.

146  I cry out to You; / Save me, and I will keep Your testimonies.

147  I rise before the dawning of the morning, / And cry for help; / I hope in Your word.

148  My eyes are awake through the night watches, / That I may meditate on Your word.

149  Hear my voice according to Your lovingkindness; / O Lord, revive me according to Your justice.

150  They draw near who follow after wickedness; / They are far from Your law.

151  You are near, O Lord, / And all Your commandments are truth.

152  Concerning Your testimonies, / I have known of old that You have founded them forever.

 

The emotional honesty of those God used to compose the Scriptures is always striking to me. If we truly know the Lord, part of that knowledge will be that we cannot hide even our inmost thoughts and desires from Him, nor does He want us to!

David, who most likely is the author of this Psalm of Psalms, expressed his delight and his praise in the perfect righteousness of God, as well as the perfect God of righteousness, in the previous stanza. He testified that, even when trouble and anguish overtook him, he took comfort and found delight in the commandments of Yahweh. Yet, in this next stanza, number 19, he finds himself in a situation where, as he’s done before, he is desperate for the Lord’s intervention–His salvation.

The Hebrew letter QOPH is the consonant “K” that begins each verse of stanza 19. It is the first sound in the Jewish word for “cry” and that is the exact mood of these eight verses. It is a cry from the heart of a righteous person for the salvation of God. The “trouble and anguish” David mentioned in stanza 18 are obviously still plaguing his mind, actually robbing the king of sleep! He asked the Lord, “Give me understanding, and I will live.” But in these lines, he seems desperate for his God to hear his voice. Yahweh, it seems to him, is far away and must be awakened in order to bring the psalmist help.

“I cry out with my whole heart; / Hear me, O Lord! I will keep Your statutes.” Many people come to doubt or deny the existence of God because they have met with anguish and tragedy in their lives. “If there were really a God,” they say, “he would not allow terrible things to happen in His world!” But these people forget that God created mankind for a purpose: to glorify their Creator and enjoy Him forever. Because we have rebelled against the Lord and against his righteous laws, our loving God has allowed pain and tragedy to show mankind what life would be like without God’s blessing!

David’s wholehearted cry is not simply a cry of pain and anguish; it is a call to the LORD his God. It is also coupled with a pledge to “keep Your statutes.” God hears our cry when we are desperate for Him, but is doubly eager to hear us when we are eager to OBEY His word. David isn’t trying to bargain with the Lord here saying, “If you’ll get me out of this mess, I’ll pay you back with my obedience.” Rather, he’s admitting that many of his troubles can be traced back to his own wrong choices. He’s confessing that he is fallible and not always careful to keep the rules God has firmly established.

Verse 146 almost mirrors the same thoughts as the previous verse: “I cry out to You; / Save me, and I will keep Your testimonies.” The heart cry of the king is repeated, and notice that his plea is for the Lord not only to HEAR him, but to SAVE him. And his promised response to God’s salvation is to keep—that is, to hold to, to treasure—His testimonies. We’ve mentioned before that our proper view of Scripture is to see ALL of it, every single word, as the Lord’s revelation of Himself to us. Only through the words of God given in the Bible can men and women be saved, freed from sin and death and hell.

So, what is to be our attitude when we “cry out” to the Lord? First, we must cry out humbly, not in an arrogant, demanding way that assumes we are worthy of His help and He is obligated to come to our aid. We should acknowledge that WE are part of our problem, and are willing to be instructed and changed. Second, we must cry out trustingly, understanding that true salvation is enjoyed only by those who cling faithfully to “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God,” as Jesus quoted to Satan when tempted in the wilderness. When God saves a person, He goes on to sanctify him through the truth of His word.

“I rise before the dawning of the morning, / And cry for help; / I hope in Your word.” The trouble and anguish the psalmist deals with is such a trial in his heart and mind, that he is unable to remain asleep. It is “help” he requires, not only for God to “hear” him and “save” him, but also to “help” him. Again, David writes a verse that parallels and mirrors the same thought in the following: “My eyes are awake through the night watches, / That I may meditate on Your word.” Let’s see the connection here between hoping in God’s word…and meditating on His word. When someone is in desperate need, we think of him or her as “beyond hope.” But the promises of God in His word are a never-ending source of hope.

One such hope-filled passage is Isaiah 41, a chapter filled with God’s reassurance to Israel that they would be delivered from the idolatrous nations that would take them captive. “Fear not,” the Lord tells them, “for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.” “For I, the LORD your God, will hold your right hand, Saying to you, ‘Fear not, I will help you.’ “‘Fear not, you worm Jacob, You men of Israel! I will help you,’ says the LORD And your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.” Like a family’s faithful protector, God strengthens and helps His own, those who “hope in” and “meditate on” His word.

“Hear my voice according to Your lovingkindness; / O Lord, revive me according to Your justice,” David continues. The word translated “lovingkindness” is the Hebrew word “chesed,” which is also rendered “covenant love” or “mercy” or “unfailing love.” This word speaks of the loyalty of Israel’s divine Ruler, the One who called them out of paganism and made them a special nation. 

God referred to Israel as “My firstborn son” to Pharaoh when He demanded him to “Let My people go!” He then brought them out of the misery of their Egyptian slavery, judging their enemies with His perfect justice when He did so. When God called Moses from the burning bush He assured him, “I have HEARD their cries because of their taskmasters.” God overruled the plans of Pharaoh and the Egyptians and delivered the children of Israel from bondage. And David is assured in his heart that the same loyal love of God is still his (and ours!) to trust in when we are facing injustice from the wicked.

“They draw near who follow after wickedness; / They are far from Your law,” reads verse 150. We see in this verse a clever contrast of DISTANCE, both distance from danger and distance from God’s law. The wicked of this world, as well as the wicked in the spiritual world, are never content just to move away from God’s commands themselves; they are always trying to attack the ones who seek to please the Lord. They approach those who follow Christ, not to encourage or learn from them, but to oppose and do battle against them. Christ’s disciples are not just learners; they are also called to be soldiers, prepared to stand up against the forces of wickedness in the heavenly places, in the power of the Lord.

But, we can praise Him that the evil ones aren’t the only ones who are drawing near, who are “on the move” in this spiritual battle. “You are near, O Lord, / And all Your commandments are truth” is the hope of David, and all those who trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Hebrew doesn’t literally say that the Lord IS near. It actually reads, “You near, O LORD.” God, David testifies, is on the move, He is coming, He is approaching, bringing all the help David needs to put his enemies to flight. When the demons saw Jesus coming close to them, their response was to cry out in terror! With Him on our side, our faith can be a shield to “quench all the fiery darts of the evil one.”

Let’s take a minute to examine the second line of that verse: “And all Your commandments are truth.” Jesus prayed that the Father would “sanctify them by Thy truth; Thy word is truth” in His high-priestly prayer (John 17). Truth is the “belt” in the Christian soldier’s armor, girding our loins so that our limbs are ready for the fight. Jesus, our Master and Commander, has no intention of leaving us vulnerable for the “roaring lion”---Satan—to pick us off like little lost lambs! His truth, His word, truth that lasts forever, include His Ten Commandments, teaching us what pleases Him and receives His favor and blessing. It is also our “sword,” Paul tells us in Ephesians 6, the weapon with which we fight back and conquer the lies and deceptions of the enemy that seeks to drag lost sinners to hell with him!

Verse 152 concludes this 19th stanza: “Concerning Your testimonies, / I have known of old that You have founded them forever.” David was not a perfect man, nor a perfect king. Again and again we read in his psalms that he had to repent and confess his sins, finding grace from the Lord to revive him and cleanse him. He depended on the Lord to “search me and know my heart.” And his trust was based on a knowledge that Yahweh his God was the true, eternal God, who ordained all that came to pass even from the beginning. 

Who else can we fully trust, but the One God who founded the heavens and the earth? “In the beginning,” John wrote in his gospel, “was the Word.” Jesus Himself was, and is, the fullest expression of the Word of God—His testimonies that will never fail us. And this eternal God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, will never fail to hear his children when they cry out to Him!  

Amen.

 

Psalm 119 - MEM

 Themes from the Psalm of Psalms

(Loving the God of Psalm 119)

Stanza 13

MEM: Loving God’s law means growing in wisdom, avoiding evil & hating false ways

97. Oh, how I love Your law! / It is my meditation all the day.

98. You, through Your commandments, make me wiser than my enemies, / For they are ever with me.

99. I have more understanding than all my teachers, /  For Your testimonies are my meditation.

100. I understand more than the ancients, / Because I keep Your precepts.

101. I have restrained my feet from every evil way, / That I may keep Your word.

102. I have not departed from Your judgments, / For You Yourself have taught me.

103. How sweet are Your words to my taste, / Sweeter than honey to my mouth!

104. Through Your precepts I get understanding, / Therefore I hate every false way.

It’s been a wonderful journey thus far in our study of David’s Psalm of psalms. His Spirit-inspired poetry is filled with marvelous lessons for the Christian–those who have trusted in King David’s greatest Son, the Lord Jesus. The psalmist’s experiences with God and His word are often a forecasting image of the life and experience of our Lord when He walked the earth. Like David, Jesus was oppressed and afflicted by enemies, slandered and forsaken, even by those closest to Him. 

In our last study of this Psalm, stanza twelve, we saw the writer turning a corner from focusing on his enemies to being mindful of the word, works, and faithfulness of his God Yahweh. He stopped dwelling on his own weakness and helplessness, and remembered who he belonged to: a trustworthy God whose “faithfulness endures to all generations” (v. 90). With this God-ward confidence, the wicked who waited to destroy David could be easily dismissed (v. 95). Like Jesus before his accusers, King David could freely confess his faith in the future judgment of His heavenly Father (1 Timothy 6:13; Matthew 26:64).

This brings us to the thirteenth stanza of Psalm 119, each verse beginning with the M of the Hebrew alphabet, the letter MEM. This letter comes from the symbol for “water,” and it represents to the Jewish tradition the idea of God’s ocean of wisdom and knowledge. Interestingly, there are two forms of this letter: an “open” form and a “closed” form. To the Jewish teachers, God has opened up much of His wisdom for His creatures to hear and understand, but much of His knowledge is still hidden from our finite minds and remains unknown and mysterious (Deuteronomy 29:29).

David’s love for, and praise of, God’s revealed wisdom is obvious in this thirteenth stanza. He loves God’s law–referring not only to the legislative decrees God gave to Israel through Moses, but to all of the utterances from His mouth that are given by the Spirit’s inspiration–loves it with a passionate love that causes him to exclaim, “Oh, how I love Your law!” Like any thing or person that truly inspires our love, David’s heart and mind are drawn to the words of Yahweh continually, like a moth to a flame: “It is my meditation all the day,” he freely admits. His love for God’s word is echoed here as he said it in two previous verses of this same Psalm: verses 47 and 48. But in verse 97 he repeats it more emphatically!

Where has this love come from and where does it lead? How does a true, God-given love for the Scripture manifest itself in a Christian’s life? David goes on in this stanza to tell us what Yahweh’s words have done for him. And here, we can see some royal teaching that prefigures what David’s son King Solomon will teach in the opening lines of Proverbs: 

The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel:

To know wisdom and instruction, To perceive the words of understanding, To receive the instruction of wisdom, Justice, judgment, and equity; To give prudence to the simple, To the young man knowledge and discretion—A wise man will hear and increase learning, And a man of understanding will attain wise counsel, To understand a proverb and an enigma, The words of the wise and their riddles. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, But fools despise wisdom and instruction.

David praises the words of Yahweh as the supreme source of both wisdom and understanding. God’s commandments, he says, “make me wiser than my enemies.” Or, rather, the way God has USED those commandments in his mind and heart have MADE his wisdom superior to that of his adversaries. James the New Testament writer, points us to the same Giver of wisdom: “If anyone lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him” (James 1:5).

God gives us wisdom greater than those who would oppose Him and His people, because He loves us, and likewise, as a result of us returning that love for the words He has spoken. It is a two-way street! Those who truly love the Lord, truly will love His word–with all that love implies–and will grow in wisdom and understanding by entering the Lord’s classroom on a continual basis. Hearing, reading, digesting, studying, meditating on God’s revealed truth is what true lovers of the word will gladly do!

Think back to your own school days, especially to those teachers who made learning both challenging and enjoyable. You’ll agree that those teachers were not a dime a dozen–they were very rare! Most school children would rather stay home during a snowstorm and get a day off. But there was that ONE teacher who you always would look forward to learning from. It may have been because they encouraged you to be your best, or because their lessons were always doorways into something that interested you personally. You might lose track of the time in their classroom and be amazed when the bell went off!

Well, when was the last occasion that found you losing track of the time you spent in Bible study or listening to the Scripture read or explained? God is waiting each day for his children to take a seat in His classroom and gain more and more wisdom and understanding. Jesus came to teach us what God is really like. All of His teaching was meant to make us “wise for salvation,” as Paul wrote to Timothy (2 Timothy 3:15). This is the very kind of wisdom that makes one superior to all the brainiacs and egg-heads of this world who look down on the Bible as an old-fashioned, outdated book!

David compares what his love for God and His word have produced in him, with the wisdom and understanding of: his enemies…all his teachers…even “the ancients” or “the aged.” Did you know that just because you grow older, doesn’t necessarily equal getting WISER? So many people all over the world live their entire lives unaware of the riches of knowledge they are missing out on by neglecting the Bible. David credits Yahweh’s commandments as “ever with me”--always on his mind, guiding his thoughts. 

He says that the Lord’s testimonies are his meditation–matters of deep, continual reflection and study. His claim that he keeps God’s precepts means that the lessons he has learned through the word are held close and treasured like “thousands of pieces of gold and silver,” as he wrote in verse 72 of this Psalm. David’s love for the Scriptures considered their worth to be more than any amount of worldly wealth you could name. Is that true for you and me? Do we value the Scriptures that much?

In the remaining four verses of this stanza, King David again mirrors Solomon’s proverbs by giving the results and outworking of the superior wisdom God gives. Proverbs 2 declares:

When wisdom enters your heart, And knowledge is pleasant to your soul, Discretion will preserve you; Understanding will keep you, To deliver you from the way of evil, From the man who speaks perverse things, From those who leave the paths of uprightness To walk in the ways of darkness;

Applying the wisdom of the Almighty always leads our steps away from evil, as the psalmist writes in verse 101. Wisdom and what the Bible calls “folly” or foolishness, are both proven by a person’s behavior and the way he directs his steps. There are ways “that seem right to a man, but the end thereof is the way of death” (Proverbs 14:12). Biblical folly is not necessarily a lack of intelligence, but is rather a failure to act in a way that pleases God and is in accord with righteousness. David writes that “I have restrained my feet from every evil way, That I may keep Your word.” Loving God’s word causes us to restrain ourselves, much like wearing a wedding ring may restrain us from offering our love to people other than our spouses. We cannot travel a path of loving God’s word and tread an evil path at the same time!

The title character in the Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan was instructed never to leave the straight and narrow path to the Celestial City, no matter how rugged and rough that path became. Even though that road was crossed by other ways, many of which promised that they, too, would lead him to his goal, the Pilgrim had to make a choice NOT to depart from the path he’d been given. The correct “judgment” had already been determined before he set out. “You Yourself have taught me,” David says to Yahweh. His God is the only Person who declares “the end from the beginning” (Isaiah 46:10). Therefore, it is sheer folly to think we can judge our correct pathway better than He can!

Doing what seems to make sense…doing what comes naturally…doing what “feels right”…living for the pleasures of the moment…going for the gusto…getting what we “deserve”… “following your heart.” Those are all approaches to happiness that come so quickly to our minds as fallen human beings. Our sinful natures are perfectly satisfied to proceed down a road that ignores God’s words and the path He tells us is the wisest and leads to our highest good. 

King David, however, found a way to happiness that was far “sweeter.” Verse 103 exclaims, not just “Sweet,” but “HOW sweet are Your words to my taste, Sweeter than honey to my mouth!” In ancient eastern cultures, nothing could compare with honey for sweetness. They knew nothing of sugar cane or maple syrup in those days. Sweetening common foods was practically unheard of, making honey from the bees like the nectar of the gods. The law of God had become such a thing of delight in this king’s mind, he was compelled to compare its “flavor” in his soul with the sweetest confection he could imagine. After all, the One who’d given him the words of life promised David pleasures that would be savored forever!

David then completes this stanza by giving a summary of what has come before: “Through Your precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way.” To understand something is to learn and hold onto the TRUTH of that thing. To see it as it really is. There are many kinds of teaching or doctrines at large in the world today:

HUMANISM, which teaches that mankind is the measure of what is good and true and normal. This teaching assumes that people are all basically good, and that the problem with the world is that men and women are just ignorant and must get better education and just “try harder to be kind.” This teaching borrows its ideals from the Bible, but sees them as just good suggestions, not really the words of God.

SECULARISM, which claims that we are better off without any religious beliefs being expressed in the public arenas of education, legislation, finances, politics, etc. Better to just rule on the basis of what the most people are comfortable with at the moment, and forget things like the ten commandments or the faith of the founding fathers. This doctrine would prefer that Christians just keep quiet about their beliefs.

SCIENTISM, the idea that practical science will eventually solve all our problems by conquering nature and analyzing the chemistry of human beings, one day re-making people into a brand new species, free from things like fear and hate and jealousy. Belief in the Bible is seen as unscientific and faith in Christ as unnecessary or even dangerous.

Those are just three of the “false ways” that seek to offer their understandings of reality. There are many more out there, and many more will come in the future. But to King David, the precepts, or teachings, of his God Yahweh are superior because they are TRUE. The Apostle Paul encourages his readers to be “speaking the truth in love,” so that they may become mature in the faith (Ephesians 4:15). God Himself is the One who began this pattern by speaking truth in love to his beloved people. The Bible is called by many God’s “love letter” to his church.

Our culture is telling us that there IS no absolute truth to be found, only “truths” that vary from person to person. The Bible, the words of Yahweh, the great I AM, David’s beloved Lord, sees reality in a different way. And He has shared His absolute view of reality in a way that can be understood by you and me, if we will humble ourselves along with the psalmist and say, “Oh, how I love Your law!”

Amen