Psalm 119 Beth
Posted on Thursday, December 06, 2007 at 7:26 AM by David Zavadil
Originally posted on Wednesday, January 18, 2006 at 12:57 PM by David Zavadil
9 ¶ <BETH> How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word. 10 ¶ With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments! 11 ¶ I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you. 12 ¶ Blessed are you, O LORD; teach me your statutes! 13 ¶ With my lips I declare all the rules of your mouth. 14 In the way of your testimonies I delight as much as in all riches. 15 I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways. 16 I will delight in your statutes; I will not forget your word.
The psalmist begins this passage with a question. How can a young man keep his way pure? The question raises a question. Why is he picking on young men? Anyone who is a male, has married a male, born a male or has a father can probably answer the question. Young men tend to demonstrate, better than others, the influence of sin. Remember your school days? Who were the ones most often in trouble? The young men! When you purchase auto insurance, who's is most expensive? The young men! When we look at our prison population, who make up most of that population? The young men! sin is the problem we always deal with, young men provide us with the clearest picture of this struggle. Thus we are asked, How can a young man keep his way pure?
The psalmist quickly answers the question, By guarding it according to your word. What does this tell us? First, environment and upbringing won't protect us from falling into sin. Money won't protect us from sin. It is only as we look to God's Word and find His directions for avoiding sin that we can keep from it. Note it is not the Word that saves, but the one it points too. Reflect on these passages for a moment I Cor 10:13; I Cor 6:18; I Timothy 6:11; II Timothy 2:22 . The Scripture gives us guidance as to how to avoid sin and keep our way pure. This brings up a thought for parents. Rather than dwelling on choosing the right friends and environments, focus on teaching your child the Word of God. As the Word begins to dwell with in them, as they begin to use it to find answers, they will choose the right friends and environments.
In verse 10 we find the author combining two elements of Christian piety. 10 ¶ With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments! In this brief verse we find both a reference to the Word of God but also a reference to prayer. The author desires to know and seek God and cries out to Him. He has realized and teaches us that prayer and the Word together can keep us from wandering. It is hard to look at something else when your sight, mind and ears are focused on God.
11 ¶ I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you. Returning back to the question he asked in verse 9, the psalmist speaks about dealing with sin. How do we store up the word in our hearts? Reading and study is good and necessary, but what if you don't have the book with you? We can store the word by memorization and meditation. For most of us the meditation is easy to understand, it is the meditation that is more difficult to comprehend. A simple picture to remember is that of a cow chewing its cud. It takes a mouthful of grass, chews it, swallows, brings it back up, chews it some more and then repeats the process. Meditation of Scripture is just the process of chewing on and bringing back to memory the Word of God. Memorize the passages I gave earlier, in the paragraph on verse 9, then each day for the next week, bring them back to memory and think on them. Ask God to show you something new through them. Meditate on them. As the Word becomes a daily part of our thought process we find we move away from sin.
As we begin to grow in the Word of God and experience victory over our sinfulness, we are naturally led to praise God. 12 ¶ Blessed are you, O LORD; teach me your statutes! God is to be praised for He is the only one who can keep us from sin, the only one who can give us the strength not to sin, thus he deserves our praise.
What happens when we seek God with our whole heart, dwell on his word and praise him? We want to talk about Him. 13 ¶ With my lips I declare all the rules of your mouth. Remember your first love? All you wanted to do was talk about them. Your friends probably got sick of hearing, "she did this" and "she did that..." When we fall in love with God, as the psalmist has pictured for us, we want to talk about them. As we share, we take our faith from the intellectual element to a verbal. It becomes something we can give away.
Verse 14 returns the the relationship. 14 In the way of your testimonies I delight as much as in all riches. What do you delight in? What is it that makes you excited? The psalmist challenges us to consider God's Word our delight. What do you do when you delight in something? You want to be with it, hold it, know it as much and as often as you can. If you delight in something or someone, you never want them to leave your side. Oh, how I am challenged. Do I really delight in God's Word? Can I live without it in my life? If i had the choice between Bill Gate's billions and the Word of God what would I choose? For the psalmist the answer was easy. How about for you?
15 I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways. Because the Word is a delight, valuable beyond all riches, we are to meditate on it. We are to focus our eyes upon God and his Word. Why is it that the psalmist keeps returning to meditation instead of studying? What is the difference between the two? When we study the Word of God we make focus on a single theme, but we tend to get the big picture of that theme. When we meditate on the Word, we chew down through the theme, become singularly focused. What does this verse, word, thought teach? How does it apply? We become focused on learning His ways. Study should lead us to meditation as we take what we learn in our study and ruminate on it throughout the day.
As our understanding and meditation of the Word grows, we will find ourselves delighting in the Word. 16 I will delight in your statutes; I will not forget your word. Our delight will lead to a hunger that will only be filled by the Word. It will constantly be on our minds, keeping us from forgetting it and pointing out to us day in and day out how God expects us to live. This intimate love letter from God is his directive on how to live for Him. As we make it a part of our lives, we live more and more for Him. What can you do today to ensure that the Word of God becomes your delight?
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