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.