Presented to The Salvation Army Alberni Valley Ministries, 06 August 2020, by Captain Michael Ramsay
Psalm
119 is a unique psalm for a couple of different reasons:
1) It is the
longest Psalm in the Bible
2) It is like an
Alphabet Book of Sorts (It is the most developed instance of an acrostic poem
in the Old Testament)[1]
For
Christmas or for Susan’s birthday a year ago we made her an ABC recipe book.
Psalm 119 is like an ABC Psalm book. Each of the different sections is based on
another letter of the Hebrew alphabet, i.e.:
·
A is for Apple and Alligator,
·
B is for Bear and Barium,
·
C is for Canada and confetti, and so on.
The
ABC Psalm has 8 lines dedicated to each letter of the Alphabet. And – this is
really neat – each line starts with the same letter (in Hebrew, not in
English). So for example if this was a contemporary English language ABC book
it may start out something like this:
Aa
An alligator ate a lot of apples, apricots, and
acorns
Apples were green and red
Apricots were orange
Acorns were hard and seemed angry
Angry like a wasp
After August when his time is coming to an end
And we are all like this alligator
Always answering to angry acorns
Psalm
119, of course, isn’t as much about angry acorns as it is about how we engage
with God and the world and how He engages with us. It wrestles with the
question of how we remain steadfast in the purity and blameless ways of the
Lord. Today we will look at –time depending - the first 2 or 3 letters of this
Alphabet book.
The
first stanza, the ‘A’ page of the Psalm 119 Alphabet Book says this:
א
Aleph
1 Blessed are those whose ways are blameless,
who walk according to the law of the Lord.
2 Blessed are those who keep his statutes
and seek him with all their heart—
3 they do no wrong
but follow his ways.
4 You have laid down precepts
that are to be fully obeyed.
5 Oh, that my ways were steadfast
in obeying your decrees!
6 Then I would not be put to shame
when I consider all your commands.
7 I will praise you with an upright heart
as I learn your righteous laws.
8 I will obey your decrees;
do not utterly forsake me.
Aleph
speaks about those who are blessed. (Blessed here means one who is happy, one
who is content.)[2] People whose ways are blameless are blessed
and people who keep the statutes, the Law of the Lord and seek Him with all of
their heart are blessed. The Psalmist says that people don’t do wrong but
instead follow the Lord’s way, obeying all His decrees, are blessed.
This
is quite a tall order though, isn’t it: doing no wrong! Fully obeying the Law!
Being absolutely blameless! Who can possibly do this? Who can possibly be
blessed? This is what the psalmist notes about himself, he says “Oh that my
ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees! Then I would not be put to shame…”
Realizing
the challenges of all this and realizing the importance of blamelessness and
blessing in one’s life, the psalmist resolves to praise the Lord with an
upright heart, he resolves to learn the Lord’s laws, he resolves to being a
law-abiding citizen and implores the Lord to not utterly forsake him.
Leading Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann
writes,
“Obedience
to Law is not a rule for rewards….It is not a cause of fidelity [faithfulness];
it is not a consequence of fidelity. It is itself the enactment of fidelity. It
is the joy of being in sync with the Lord of the covenant, the sense of
companionship in doing the things in which the partner delights. The delight in
such obedience is not in its outcome but in its performance…obedience to the
Law is not a work but a habit, a habit of the heart that becomes a way of
life.”[3]
Obedience
to the Law is not a requirement for salvation; it is not a result of salvation;
it is a way of life. In today’s world of identity politics probably the best way
to explain God’s Law, blessing and our blamelessness in relationship to it is
as our identity. We who love God are those who identify as walking in His ways
and so receive the blessings inherent to that.
It
is like when I quit smoking a million years ago. I became a non-smoker and I
self-identified as a non-smoker. It did not matter that for quite a long time I
still occasionally did slip up and have a cigarette or a drag from a cigarette.
Sometimes I would have a cigarette –or part thereof - alone in the car.
Sometimes I would have a cigarette –or part thereof - out with friends at night or over a cup of coffee in the day.
What mattered was that after I had a cigarette or part thereof, I did not identify as a smoker again. I
maintained my identity as a non-smoker. I did not quit quitting. I did not give
up on being a non-smoker. Even though I may have had a drag of a cigarette, my
identity was still intact as that of a non-smoker and God helped me live up to
that so I am a very much a non-smoker to this day. It has been decades now
since I last had my last puff.
It is the same with blamelessness and
holiness in our world today. We don’t throw away our holiness just because we
do something not holy one day. We don’t throw away our salvation just because
we do something unsaved one day. God will never leave nor forsake us (Dt 31:6;
Hb 13:5) and we will live up to what we have already obtained (Phil 3:16). Thus
the psalmist declares he will praise the Lord with an upright heart as he
continues as God’s blessed, law-abiding, blameless citizen. As we continue in
the Lord’s blessing, we will continue to experience the Lord’s blessing both
now and forever.
This
brings us to the second letter in our Psalm 119 Alphabet Book today.
ב
Beth
9 How can a young person stay on the path of
purity?
By living according to your word.
10 I seek you with all my heart;
do not let me stray from your commands.
11 I have hidden your word in my heart
that I might not sin against you.
12 Praise be to you, Lord;
teach me your decrees.
13 With my lips I recount
all the laws that come from your mouth.
14 I rejoice in following your statutes
as one rejoices in great riches.
15 I meditate on your precepts
and consider your ways.
16 I delight in your decrees;
I will not neglect your word.
Beth,
the second letter and page in the Alphabet Book, further addresses the question
of how can one remain faithful to the Lord? How can one remained blessed? How
can one remain blameless? In our vernacular today, how can one remain saved?
How can a young person stay on the path of purity (given that life is long and
there will be many thoughts, actions, people, and problems trying to pull us
away from the blessings of purity). The psalmist answers this again with eight
lines all beginning with the same letter, Beth.
This
is neat. It is like a child or a young adult going to the fair. It is too bad
that we don’t have a fall fair in town this year due to Covid-19 pandemic. I
remember last year at the fair there was this one ride, the Himalaya that
Heather wanted to go on again and again and again. I am glad she ran into a
friend who would go with her because when you are my age those rides are quite
as fun to go on quite as many times as they are when you are Heather’s age.
Though it was really fun to see how much enjoyment she was getting from ride.
Here,
in our Alphabet Psalm, we have a young person experiencing the ride of
uprightness, the ride of holiness, the ride of salvation, the ride of blessing,
blamelessness, and purity. The concerned parent or the young person themselves
ask, how can we stay on this ride of purity? The rest of this stanza answers
this question with each of the eight lines beginning with Beth, the second
letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
How
can young people remain pure and blessed throughout their lives?
We
can do this by living according to God’s Word, not neglecting His Word,
reciting His Word, keeping His Word hidden in our hearts and rejoicing in it.[4]
How can we remain pure, blameless and blessed in our life? We can do this by
reading our Bible and praying continually.
When
we lived in Saskatchewan, there was a column in the Nipawin Journal
entitled ‘Questions of Faith’ to which various pastors were asked to contribute
regularly. One question to which I was asked to respond was, ‘As a Christian
why should I read my Bible?’ I opened my response this way:
‘My
five year-old asks us every night if we can read the Bible to her since at
Sunday school, not too long ago, the teacher sang with the children, “read your
Bible, pray every day and you’ll grow, grow, grow …” Sarah-Grace took this
truth to heart and has been faithful in reminding us to read her Bible.’[5]
Sarah-Grace,
even as young as 5, and her sisters too, have been very faithful in reading
their Bibles every day and encouraging us to do the same for that really is key
to purity, blamelessness and blessing.
The
psalmist tells us on page 2 of this Psalm 119 Alphabet Book, we can be pure,
blessed and blameless as we memorize God’s Word and keep God’s Word in our
hearts so we can draw on it and experience the Lord’s blessing, peace and
strength. We can experience purity, blessing, and blamelessness by letting the
Lord teach us His ways.
We
can experience purity, blessing, and blamelessness, as our scripture today
says, by seeking God with all of our hearts. This, I think, is so important.
One of the Bible verses that I had memorized as a child is Matthew 6:33 ‘seek
ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be
added unto you’. I have drawn on that many times in my life as many things have
threatened my purity and my experience of the Lord’s blessing in my life. Psalm
1:2 and Joshua 1:8 encourage us to meditate on the Word of the Lord day and
night. As we do this, as we keep His Word in our heart and seek Him with all
our heart, He promises we will find Him and we will experience His purity,
blessing, and blamelessness for now and forever.
I
am not going to go through all of the stanzas of this, the Bible’s longest
Psalm, but I will take a quick look at the third letter of the Psalm 119
Alphabet Book. The third letter – with which every line of this stanza begins –
is Gimel. This page in the Alphabet book reads:
ג Gimel
17 Be good to
your servant while I live,
that I may
obey your word.
18 Open my
eyes that I may see
wonderful
things in your law.
19 I am a
stranger on earth;
do not hide
your commands from me.
20 My soul is
consumed with longing
for your laws
at all times.
21 You rebuke
the arrogant, who are accursed,
those who
stray from your commands.
22 Remove
from me their scorn and contempt,
for I keep
your statutes.
23 Though
rulers sit together and slander me,
your servant
will meditate on your decrees.
24 Your
statutes are my delight;
they are my
counselors.
This
stanza does not offer as much new information as the first to stanzas which is
understandable – they formed the opening argument from which the rest of this
book arguably flows and there is much to be said after Gimel as well.[6]
Gimel
does offer us this encouragement. Gimel states that we are strangers on this
earth (Philippians 3:20: For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also
eagerly wait for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, cf.1 Peter 2:11). We are
God’s servants. As God’s citizens we long to follow His laws and decrees over
and above all else. Gimel offers us this comfort: there will be people who
choose not to experience the blessing that comes from following the Lord and
His Word. There are those who, because of this, will scorn those who do follow
the Lord. There will be leaders of various countries – maybe even our own now
(I don’t know) or at some time in the future – who will slander believers in
the Word of the Lord. Gimel offers us an encouragement to perseverance: even if
the most powerful people in this country slander us, even if most of the people
scorn us, even if it seems as if the whole world is against us, the Lord will
be our delight and He will be our salvation.
Friends,
sometimes life is hard. Sometimes life is tragic. This week alone I can’t tell
you how many people have come to me with stories of addiction and illness and
injury coming upon them and/or their loved ones. Here is the encouragement of
Gimel: as bad as things get we can delight in the Lord. His Word can counsel us
to what is right, what will get us through it and He will be with us through
everything.[7] He will be
with us in all our trials and tribulations.
·
Gimel expresses lament but we can be encouraged for as we
turn to Him, in even our most difficult times, we will see that He is indeed
with us.
·
Beth contains Divine teaching on Wisdom: as we do seek Him
with all our heart, we will experience His purity, blessing, and blamelessness
and…
·
Aleph gives us a full appreciation of the Law of the Lord[8]:
As we continue in the Lord’s blessing, we will continue to experience the
Lord’s blessing both now and forever.
Let us pray
[1] Leslie C. Allen, 'Psalms
101-150', 2nd ed., (WBC 21: Word Books: Dallas, Texas, 2002),180
[2] Strong's Concordance, H835,
eh'sher, Blessed. Cited from Blue Letter Bible.
https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?t=kjv&strongs=h835
[3] Walter Brueggemann, God
Neighbour, Empire: The Excess of Divine Fidelity and the Command of Common Good
(Waco, Texas, Baylor University Press: 2016), p.137
[4] This relates to God’s
conveying His covenant to Israel(to us). It can refer to God’s prophetic
utterance, a collection thereof and/or all wisdom texts or Torah. Cf. Leslie C.
Allen, 'Psalms 101-150', 2nd ed., (WBC 21: Word Books: Dallas, Texas, 2002),
186.
[5] Captain Michael Ramsay, 'Why
Should I Read the Bible?' Nipawin Journal, (February 2008). Available on-line:
http://www.sheepspeak.com/sasknews.htm#Bible
[6] Charles H. Spurgeon, ‘The
Treasury of David Vol. 3: Psalms 101-150’, Peabody, MA: Hendrickson
Publishers,139: the whole Psalm develops from Verse 1.
[7] Willem A. VanGemeren The
Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Psalms/Exposition of Psalms/BOOK V:
Psalms 107-150/Psalm 119: The Joy of God's Law in Distress/II. The Beth Strophe
(119:9-16), Book Version: 4.0.2: Contentment is a true expression of inner
godliness. The psalmist declares repeatedly that his inner delight and joy is
in God and his revelation:
[8] Leslie C. Allen, 'Psalms
101-150', 2nd ed., (WBC 21: Word Books: Dallas, Texas, 2002), 184
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