(Psa. 119:121-176121AIN. I have done judgment and justice: leave me not to mine oppressors. 122Be surety for thy servant for good: let not the proud oppress me. 123Mine eyes fail for thy salvation, and for the word of thy righteousness. 124Deal with thy servant according unto thy mercy, and teach me thy statutes. 125I am thy servant; give me understanding, that I may know thy testimonies. 126It is time for thee, Lord, to work: for they have made void thy law. 127Therefore I love thy commandments above gold; yea, above fine gold. 128Therefore I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right; and I hate every false way. 129PE. Thy testimonies are wonderful: therefore doth my soul keep them. 130The entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple. 131I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for thy commandments. 132Look thou upon me, and be merciful unto me, as thou usest to do unto those that love thy name. 133Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me. 134Deliver me from the oppression of man: so will I keep thy precepts. 135Make thy face to shine upon thy servant; and teach me thy statutes. 136Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy law. 137TZADDI. Righteous art thou, O Lord, and upright are thy judgments. 138Thy testimonies that thou hast commanded are righteous and very faithful. 139My zeal hath consumed me, because mine enemies have forgotten thy words. 140Thy word is very pure: therefore thy servant loveth it. 141I am small and despised: yet do not I forget thy precepts. 142Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is the truth. 143Trouble and anguish have taken hold on me: yet thy commandments are my delights. 144The righteousness of thy testimonies is everlasting: give me understanding, and I shall live. 145KOPH. I cried with my whole heart; hear me, O Lord: I will keep thy statutes. 146I cried unto thee; save me, and I shall keep thy testimonies. 147I prevented the dawning of the morning, and cried: I hoped in thy word. 148Mine eyes prevent the night watches, that I might meditate in thy word. 149Hear my voice according unto thy lovingkindness: O Lord, quicken me according to thy judgment. 150They draw nigh that follow after mischief: they are far from thy law. 151Thou art near, O Lord; and all thy commandments are truth. 152Concerning thy testimonies, I have known of old that thou hast founded them for ever. 153RESH. Consider mine affliction, and deliver me: for I do not forget thy law. 154Plead my cause, and deliver me: quicken me according to thy word. 155Salvation is far from the wicked: for they seek not thy statutes. 156Great are thy tender mercies, O Lord: quicken me according to thy judgments. 157Many are my persecutors and mine enemies; yet do I not decline from thy testimonies. 158I beheld the transgressors, and was grieved; because they kept not thy word. 159Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O Lord, according to thy lovingkindness. 160Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever. 161SCHIN. Princes have persecuted me without a cause: but my heart standeth in awe of thy word. 162I rejoice at thy word, as one that findeth great spoil. 163I hate and abhor lying: but thy law do I love. 164Seven times a day do I praise thee because of thy righteous judgments. 165Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them. 166Lord, I have hoped for thy salvation, and done thy commandments. 167My soul hath kept thy testimonies; and I love them exceedingly. 168I have kept thy precepts and thy testimonies: for all my ways are before thee. 169TAU. Let my cry come near before thee, O Lord: give me understanding according to thy word. 170Let my supplication come before thee: deliver me according to thy word. 171My lips shall utter praise, when thou hast taught me thy statutes. 172My tongue shall speak of thy word: for all thy commandments are righteousness. 173Let thine hand help me; for I have chosen thy precepts. 174I have longed for thy salvation, O Lord; and thy law is my delight. 175Let my soul live, and it shall praise thee; and let thy judgments help me. 176I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek thy servant; for I do not forget thy commandments. (Psalm 119:121‑176).)
Ver. 121-128. There are three points in this section. He is fully in the presence of the power of evil, his regard is to Jehovah Himself; the energy of evil in its moral character only attaches him increasedly to God's word and testimonies. This is the effect of nearness to God, because His presence keeps the heart free and confident, and maintains the sense of value for what is in the word. There is, I think, progress here. In 82, it is, “when wilt thou comfort me.” This is not so here, though Jehovah's mercy is earnestly sought. He appeals on the ground of righteousness to God's protection, but, with this, if waiting in anxious desire for deliverance, yet for the word of God's righteousness, more, I think, than faithfulness to promised deliverance, as 124 shows. When delivered, his heart would be set free in obedience. But he looked for more than deliverance, or measuring this by the evil he was under. His heart had got to God, and he looked to be dealt with according to His mercy. This is progress too, and, I think, shows consciousness of integrity on which God has set His seal in the heart. When under the sorrows of God's chastening hand, we look for mercy, for deliverance: grace and caring for His favor leads us to it. But it is left to Him, as wholly undeserved; the pressure of the power of evil is felt as deserved, and deliverance from it is mercy enough; but when this has wrought its effect, when the heart has been purified to think more of God, and His holiness and will, and less of the sorrow and evil from without, so that it springs up from under it, so to speak—when the heart is morally restored, (and God's place in it in contrast with the sorrow is just the test of it,) it measures what it seeks for by God, into whose knowledge, revealed within, it has, so to speak, got back. Hence, in what follows, we see the fruit of this reconciliation with, or restoration to, God. The soul has got into the place of uprightness, and it says, “I am thy servant.” In such a shape we have not had this vet. Holy desires, confidence, true confession we have had—the general expression, “Thou hast dealt well with thy servant.” But this is another thing. He presents himself to God directly as being in this relationship, and place; “I am thy servant.” It is perfect submission, but one who holds the place, God owning him in it, and he knowing that He does. This is saying a great deal. What a ground to ask from God, understanding that we may serve Him! For what a thing it is to serve God rightly such as we are! No doubt it is a great encouragement being able to say “I am thy servant:” so the parable of the talents, where confidence in Him, who had enabled them to serve, was the spring of service. But there all was happy and right. Here the soul was only getting back to say “I am thy servant” after long chastening for wanderings. Verse 126 shows the same growing confidence and taking the blessed title of one free with God. God's law is precious to Himself; not a tittle can pass from it till all be fulfilled. And when the believer can look out of himself, it is a plea with God. It is time for Thee: “they have made void thy law. What a principle it is that God's authority must be maintained, so that the extreme of evil gives the assurance of deliverance. But it makes God's law exceeding precious. The love to the law (and here this is the egression of God's will) grows with the growth of the power of evil. We feel more how precious it is, how sure it is, how it comes from God; and what makes His intervention precious as against the power of evil, makes His word precious against the development of evil itself. There is a double feeling as to this. The commandments of God are loved above all that could be precious to man. There is decision of moral judgment. All God's precepts are taken as absolutely and the whole of what is right, and every way of vain falsehood is hated. The decision of good and evil is absolutely by the word.
Ver. 129-136. The soul has now got into a place where it not only obeys, and tastes the goodness of the law, but estimates its value in itself. There is intelligence. “Thy testimonies are wonderful: therefore does my soul keep them.” God's word getting into the heart gives light: even to the simple they give understanding. Thus they become to the heart the subject of earnest desire; the soul is engaged with the excellency of them. It was a thirst produced by them; not a filling of the heart, though a desire formed by them. There may be intelligence, obedience as regards the path we walk in on the way, and hunger and thirst after righteousness, a moral forming and tilling the desire, but the satisfying it will be only when the promises are fulfilled and God takes His place, of whose mind His testimonies speak. So with us, though in a higher way; for it is Christ, and a heavenly cry Himself. Hence the cry is for this mercy ordering his steps, delivering from oppression; and one sees he is in the midst of evil—only looks for God's face to shine upon him, and to be taught. He has deep grief, because the law is not kept; but this seems to flow more here from the sense of the excellency of the law, than from love to the persons who failed.
Ver. 137-144. But the righteousness of God's law, and the key it gives to God's ways, leads to the recognition of what Jehovah is who gave it. “Righteous art thou, O Lord, and upright are thy judgments.” That is the way Jehovah deals with a case, or the moral decision which He utters as to it. His testimonies He had commanded according to righteousness and faithfulness. This characterized them. The contempt of Jehovah's words had roused his zeal so as to consume him; he became as an earnest adversary, in collision with evil yet in power, as Christ in the temple. But whatever the evil around, there is in one rest and comfort for the heart when the word of God is known and loved. “Thy word is very pure,” try it ever so, it is only more proved to be purity itself; the heart loves it as its resting place and joy. And it gives greatness and courage to the heart. One may be small and despised, yet one has the courage to keep God's precepts in spite of the power of the world or its scorn, for they are God's words—what God is as judging evil and good; He is everlasting. His righteousness is everlasting, and His law truth. It is not here, surely, the truth that came along with grace by Jesus Christ; but in the presence of all else on the earth, which is a lie, that is truth, true religion, God's mind about everything in contrast with man's thoughts and all he sets up to be; and God will make His judgment therein revealed, good forever. (Comp. Isa. 42:33A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment unto truth. (Isaiah 42:3).) It is not the absolute revelation of God as He is; that is in Christ. But it is the revelation of God's judgment as to man as to good and evil, and that will be made good forever. Executed judgment will be verified. Those that have sinned against the law will be judged by the law; just as those that heard Christ's word will be judged by it. The tribulation of the power of evil will take hold of the remnant, but there will be the comfort of the commandments being their delight in the inner man. So we in all sorrow, in the evil day in a yet higher way. And now he arrives at the point we have touched upon. “The righteousness of Jehovah's testimonies is everlasting.” They come from God, His will and judgment concerning man; and that He will make good forever. What he has to look for is understanding; then he will live, guided in the path where life is found, found even when the wicked are cut off: yea, never so found here below as then. This is true of government as to us, yea, even of Christ, ("as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His love"). As to life, it was in Him, and in our case we have it by Him: so all that live; but it was only brought to light by the gospel. What was presented to them as the governmental way of life, and will be so literally at the end, is the governmental way of blessing for us here below.
Ver. 145-152. Here the soul expresses, and expresses to God, the sense of its dependence. This is an important point. We are dependent, know ourselves to be dependent, and remain quiescently so. This shows want of interest in that for which we are dependent, and want of reckoning on God's faithful love. If we did, we should cry. “If thou knewest and who it is thou wouldest have asked, and he would have given “Here he cries with his whole heart, and declares his purpose of obedience to Jehovah's enactments. Then he looks for deliverance that, having, he may keep, them, no hindrance and his heart so disposed. There was diligence in the cry too, for the word, which led his heart, was trusted, but it was not only for the cry to be delivered he was diligent, but to meditate in Jehovah's word itself. Deliverance, no doubt, was sought, but the word itself is loved. All this goes together necessarily in the soul. Deliverance is to be with God, freed from transgressors of His law, from rebellious oppressors. The meditation of the law is to be with God, and the word which makes us hope is the testimonies we delight in. Still he looked, as we shall in true-heartedness, in distress, (so did Christ Himself) to be heard, and according to the kindness of Jehovah, but with the desire that the work of power might be wrought in him, to be quickened, receive life according to the mind of God, that is, which had its nature and desires according to God's judgment. He does not speak as dead, but of moral quickening. We know it must be a new life. The sense of the present power of evil was upon his soul. Jehovah only was his refuge he must draw near to. This is beautiful, the true only resource which gives a perfect principle. “I waited patiently for the Lord” —perfect submission to His will; no deliverance sought until it was so, till His will brought it; but faith knew Jehovah was near and the path plain. All His commandments were the one true path of security and of God. Jehovah's testimonies were founded forever. They could not change; they will be made good. Only God must come in, and that was his cry and demand here. These verses are a cry for deliverance, but it must be, if true and of God, according to His word and making good forever its truth, in its moral testimonies, and as the foundation of hope.
Ver. 153-160. The soul of him who opens out his heart to God is much more in presence of the persecutors and enemies, God's deliverance and of the need of help, than in the beginning. There what the law was for the heart was more in view. So it ever is. With Christ the word of blessing begins; at the end he is in presence of the enemies and looks for deliverance. So Paul: he begins with carrying out of the blessing; at the close he has to do with persecution and desertion too. So ever, when good is persevered in, because the testimony of God in every shape and faithfulness draws out opposition, and the place of the word in the world, not in the heart, is more distinctly, felt. Still there is no uncertainty of heart. Salvation is needed, i.e., present deliverance, but it is far from the wicked. But where righteousness of heart and way is, the affliction is a ground of pleading with God. But, with deliverance, quickening also is sought, the practical power of life according to the word and revealed judgments of God. Righteousness is sought in liberty and power when righteousness is loved in the heart. External security in the word is sought, but internal power too. In the thought of Jehovah's tender mercies quickening is sought according to God's judgments. The felt goodness of God leads always to the desire of His will. When the purity and blessedness of His word is thought of with delight, His loving-kindness is thought of as that in which He should quicken us. His word is so precious, we look to grace to form us freely into it. Truth and perpetuity characterize the word. I question whether “from the beginning” is the sense, and if not rather the sense the whole contents, but cannot now say.
Ver. 161-168. The soul goes something further in this portion. The heart stands in awe of God's word—a godly feeling. It comes with God's authority; yet he rejoices in it as one that has found great spoil. This, i.e., the connection of these two, characterizes the true, full apprehension of the word. It is God's—a most solemn thing; the soul trembles, as it is said, “at thy word.” It comes with divine and absolute authority; but as it is God's word, and we have a new nature, and are taught of God, we delight in an unspeakable way in that which is of and reveals Him. Nor is there any indifference as to good and evil, the law being taken as the truth or true measure of what is right. He hates and loves—hates lying and loves the law; not merely what is right, but God's authoritative expression of it. And all this begets praise, because the heart rises up to the source of these things. It is not merely that we have what is good; we have it. from God. He praises Him in the relationship he was in with Him. These are Jehovah's ways with His people. But the expressed will of God has another power when really received: the heart is in peace. It is a known perfect communication from God with which the heart is satisfied, and, if it trusts in God, circumstances cannot stumble the heart then, because it has and enjoys the mind of God which no circumstances can affect. There is no stumbling. I have what is perfect from God, know it to be so, and enjoy it in a new nature. That is affected by nothing without.
Another element of a godly walk besides obedience is found here. “All my ways are before thee,” but this leads naturally to obedience: but the heart and conscience is all before God. It is a most important principle. So Paul, “We are made manifest to God;” only this goes further. He looked at complete, final judgment of men, and for that knew the righteousness of God. And it was not merely his ways before God as to his earthly government. He himself was manifested, as men would be manifested, before the judgment-seat of Christ, who judges as Son of man—perfect, every secret emotion, the heart itself brought out.
Ver. 169-176. When men have gone astray, cries and supplications go first, praises and testimony after. Still the cry and supplication is a godly one, though it arise from need. He seeks understanding, intelligence, not exactly of the word, but according to it. It is that wisdom in discernment which those taught in God's word have. They see clear in what is before them. No doubt it is God's mind and will they discern; but they discern in circumstances. They walk not as fools, but as wise. The word has formed their judgment. Then the soul looks to be heard and delivered. Still its delight is in God's revealed will. It will praise when really taught them of God—for thankfulness comes first—for it is our own portion first of all; and from God; then we have liberty to speak of it to others. This is an important principle also: no testimony, no preaching, no teaching, even if the matter of it be all right, is right teaching, when the soul is not filled for itself first from God. We must drink for ourselves that rivers may flow, Indeed all else dries up the soul. “That thy profiting may appear,” says the apostle. It is only fresh, good, and powerful, when it is the soul's own portion first with God. The help of God's hand, the longing for His salvation, is not merely that we may be delivered. That may be sought, if only it be sought, in some bye way, not God's way. But when the heart is in God's precepts, only God's salvation is sought. So Christ: “I waited patiently for the Lord.” There was submission to God's will. God could not come in till His will was done, so that His glory should be made good in coming in—till His counsels were fulfilled and perfect judgment wrought by His coming in. And this the soul had learned to desire, though often out of sorrow. There was Christ's perfectness in this respect—there our path in submissive uprightness. Then the soul praises God, God Himself in it, and God's own judgments help us. This is a principle of great perfectness and great blessing. Yet here, though brought to this, yea because brought to this, the people then—some when occasion arises—acknowledge that they had gone astray (for that is their case and is the condition of the whole Psalm, the law being now written, in desire at least, in their hearts,) and gone astray like a sheep wholly lost. The humbled and repentant remnant, (and, I repeat, we, when we have wandered from God,) look for God's seeking them, for they were upright in heart, mindful of His commandments. This gives the key to the whole Psalm—Israel gone astray, the desire and love of God's law in their hearts, but their circumstances and condition not yet set right by Jehovah's deliverance, but their hearts set right that He may come in His word, and His deliverance being their desire, and His word the ground of their hope. In the restoring of any soul we have an analogous process, specially when under chastisement. It does not seek comfort without restoration, where uprightness of heart is. Only if we know the Lord, we stand in Him as our righteousness. This they could not speak of as established or their hearts in it. They were only looking for it when delivered. It had been prophesied of: Jehovah would be their righteousness. Gracious and true as this is, our place is infinitely higher.
I have thus closed this running notice of Psa. 119, of which I feel the poverty. But I feel every day more, that, true and applicable as this may all be to the government of our hearts, we are far away from Christian ground here. Nothing makes it more sensible than the Psalms. Neither the Father, nor divine righteousness, is known in them, nor that whole class of feelings, blessed and holy as those feelings are, which flow from them. May we remember we are Christians!