Psalm 119 God's Love Letter
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Tonight we are going to take another sweeping look at the Law of God in . Pastor Josh provided an overview last week but this week we want to look at the entire Psalm a little differently. We are going to consider Two main points, what teaches us about God and what it teaches us about man, specifically God’s men and women of course.
We cannot begin this study without starting with the author of God’s law, God himself! So, the first point we will consider tonight are:
e Attributes of God
e Attributes of God
The Attributes of God
The Attributes of God
Now, in this Psalm the following truths about God are revealed. His steadfast love, His salvation, His Goodness, His Righteousness, His Mercy, His faithfulness, His wisdom, His grace, and His truth. This is not an exhaustive list, but one larger than we will be able to cover tonight, so what I have done is selected 3 of the most repeated attributes of God for us to consider tonight.
The first is the:
A. Righteousness of God and His Law
A. Righteousness of God and His Law
That truth that God and his law are righteous is mentioned 10 times in this Psalm which means it is a theme the psalmist wants us to recognize. But before we get into the specific references let’s consider first what the psalmist means by the righteousness of God!
Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible Righteousness
Righteousness. Conformity to a certain set of expectations, which vary from role to role. Righteousness is fulfillment of the expectations in any relationship, whether with God or other people.
MacArthur and Mayhue write, God’s righteousness is his perfect absolute justice in and toward himself, his prevention of any violation of the justice of his character, and his revelation of himself in acts of justice.
Now that we have an understanding of righteousness let’s see what the psalmist teaches us concerning this attribute of God.
I know, O Lord, that your rules are righteous, and that in faithfulness you have afflicted me.
Psalm 119:
The psalmist is not tossed about by doubt. He is not unsure whether or not God’s rules are right. He say’s “I know, O Lord, that your rules are righteous.” There is no question if God’s rules are unjust but they are perfectly just and right.
Notice when the psalmist affirms this truth, in the midst of affliction. You hear people who begin to question God’s goodness and justice when so called “good people suffer.” The psalmist says in the midst of God’s faithful affliction he has a confident assurance that God, God’s rules, and God’s ways are righteous.
Notice how this causes the psalmist to respond in....
Psalm 119:
I have sworn an oath and confirmed it, to keep your righteous rules.
When the psalmist comes to the understanding of God’s righteousness in suffering is sures up his commitment to keep God’s rules. He desires more and more to be faithful to his faithful God, the one whose righteousness is perfect.
Now, what understanding God’s righteousness does is not only stabilize our standing on the promises of God, but is causes us to have a insatiable desire for the ultimate fulfillment of God righteous promise. Look at....
My eyes long for your salvation and for the fulfillment of your righteous promise.
The Psalmist is saying Lord I know your rules are right even as I am under your affliction, I am committing to keeping your righteous rules, and at the same time I am longing for you to fulfill your righteous promise, because when you do Lord all will be made right the suffering will be over, the affliction will be ended, and you will make all thing new and right!
The more he meditates on God’s law the more he proclaims,
Psalm 119:
Psalm
A Song of Ascents. To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens! Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maidservant to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till he has mercy upon us. Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt. Our soul has had more than enough of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.
Righteous are you, O Lord, and right are your rules.
Psalm 119
You have appointed your testimonies in righteousness and in all faithfulness.
The psalmist has no doubt of the righteousness of God. He has a confident hope and commitment that no matter what he is facing in this life it is exactly what God knows he needs. He he understand and knows that God’s righteous law is eternal!
Psalm 119:
Your righteousness is righteous forever, and your law is true.
God righteousness will never end.
Psalm 119:
Your testimonies are righteous forever; give me understanding that I may live.
God’s righteous testimonies are not only eternal but they equip His people to live according to His will.
Psalm 119:
The sum of your word is truth, and every one of your righteous rules endures forever.
Not a single one of God’s rules are unrighteous, everyone of them are righteous and the more we come to know them the more we love them and their author.
Psalm 119:
Guess what happens as God’s people being to understand the righteousness of God’s law? Worship!
Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous rules.
Psalm 119:
My tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments are right.
When the psalmist considers how good and right God’s rules are he turns to praise, he says seven times a day I praise you for your righteous rules. He says his tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments, every one of them, every jot and tittle, every letter and syllable, every word and sentence is righteous!
Psalm 119:
Do we worship according to God’s righteous Word! God’s word ought to be the means and provide the method of our worship.
This brings us to the next attribute of God, the...
B. Wisdom of God
B. Wisdom of God
God’s wisdom is his perfect knowledge of how to act skillfully so that he will accomplish all of his good pleasure—to glorify himself. The definition is based on the Hebrew word for “wisdom,” hokmah which can mean skill. MacArthur and Mayhue
Know the verses we are going to consider do not use the words wisdom one time. But what the psalmist does is ask the Lord to, teach him and give him understanding.Now who do you want to teach you? The simple or the wise? Who do you want to ask to help you understand, someone who has wisdom or someone who is ignorant? I am going to pick the wise one every time!
Notice what the psalmist writes in....
Blessed are you, O Lord; teach me your statutes!
Verse 12 begins with praise and adoration. The psalmist recognizes how blessed, holy, and wise the Lord is. He calls out to the Lord to teach him His statutes. He know he needs to learn from God, he needs to gain understanding from the only wise and eternal God.
In verse 34 he pleads,
Psalm
Give me understanding, that I may keep your law and observe it with my whole heart.
God’s law cannot be kept without understanding it. God’s rules cannot be observed without knowing the reason behind them. In other words as we begin to gain understanding from God’s law, that he calls us to obedience for our protection for our good these rules become precious to us, not a burden to us.
Our hearts begin to desire obedience instead of being hardened to God’s law. As we grow in in understanding by the grace of God and recognize that He is wise, righteous, and loving we being to realize our understanding is simple, sinful, and selfish.
Psalm 119:
Then all of the sudden God’s wisdom begins to conform us into His image and as we have of heard said we being to hate the things we used to love and love the things we used to hate.
Through your precepts I get understanding; therefore I hate every false way.
As we receive wisdom from the Lord and His precepts we being to grow in our hatred to sin. We begin to understand the sin has on us individually, on those around us, especially the church. But most of all we continue to grow in our understanding of what Christ endured for sin on our behalf!
Spurgeon rightly states, “this final verse of the stanza marks great progress in character and shows that the man of God is growing stronger, bolder, and happier than before. He has been taught of the Lord, so he discerns between the precious and the vile, and while he loves the truth fervently, he hates falsehood intensely. May all of us reach this status of discrimination and determination so we can greatly glorify God!”
Psalm 119:
The psalmist continues pleading for the wisdom of God.
I am your servant; give me understanding, that I may know your testimonies!
Psalm 119:
The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple.
He cries out that the Lord would give him understanding that he may know God, and that the simple may be made wise.
Simple minded people may often be mocked and made fun of. However, give me a simple man or woman that is mighty in the Scriptures over a man who has all worldly knowledge and no godly wisdom.
I am
Psalm 119:
Many times those who are wise in their own eyes, end up looking like fools. But those who humbly seek and speak God’s wisdom not their own are recognized as wise!
This is because God has shown them favor and granted them understanding. Notice the psalmist’s plea in...
Make your face shine upon your servant, and teach me your statutes.
Psalm 119:
Your testimonies are righteous forever; give me understanding that I may live.
Psalm 119:
Let my cry come before you, O Lord; give me understanding according to your word!
Psalm 119:
The psalmist knows that any understanding he receives is a precious gift from God. He knows God’s words, rules, and instruction are righteous and wise and the only way to salvation.
For homework go back and look at verses 41, 94, 123, 165, and 174. In these verses the psalmist proclaims of the salvation and security found in God and His law.
However, due to our time constraints tonight let’s consider our final attribute of God we will consider in . Let’s look at,
C. Steadfast Love of God
C. Steadfast Love of God
God’s perfect love is his determination to give of himself to himself and to others, and is his affection for himself and his people. This definition affirms that God has affections or emotions, but once again, it is necessary to note that God’s affections are not passions by which he is driven but active principles by which God expresses his holy dispositions. - MacArthur and Mayhue
Let your steadfast love come to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your promise;
God’s steadfast love is what leads Him to save His people.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Psalm
but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
The primary way we learn of the steadfast love of God is through His word! His word is where we read about the way he loved his people from Genesis to Revelation. We learn about God’s covenant fidelity, His commitment to be close to, care for, and correct His people. Is all a fruit of the steadfast love of God.
Notice.....
The earth, O Lord, is full of your steadfast love; teach me your statutes!
Do you ever think about how the earth is full of God’s steadfast love? It doesn’t matter where we go, what we are going through God’s love is all around us. We often think of all of the sin and wickedness that is rampant throughout the world, let us not forget that God who is infinitely loving is greater than any sin, evil, or any affect of the fall. There is no where we can go that we can outrun the love of God.
That’s why the psalmist asks,
Psalm 119:
Let your steadfast love comfort me according to your promise to your servant.
The steadfast love of God is what God’s people need during time of affliction, during times of suffering and distress. God’s love expressed in his law is a great reminder during these times how much God has promised his servants, and provided for his servants.
Psalm 119:
In your steadfast love give me life, that I may keep the testimonies of your mouth.
The psalmist knows that he not only receives life from the steadfast love of God, but that God’s love is his motive for obedience to keeping the testimonies, rules, law, or word of God.
Ernie Reisinger explains, “Love has no eyes except the holy law of God, no direction apart from God’s commands. Paul spoke of the love of Christ constraining us. It moves us to duty. Love is the only true motive for all worship and duty.”
Psalm 119:
God’s steadfast love provides us life, moves us to worship, and motivates us to obey His will. We must never separated the love of God from the law of God, because we could never rightly understand His love apart from the one who fulfilled His law.
Hear my voice according to your steadfast love; O Lord, according to your justice give me life.
Psalm 119:
God’s justice is displayed in the cross of Christ, if it is not from the cross you and I would not want to receive the justice of God, because we would meet God’s justice with God’s wrath. But because God loved his church so much He sent Christ to die for her that He might fulfill His own law and display his steadfast love!
Thomas Manton wrote, “the law of God is a love letter to the soul.”
There is much more we can learn about God in his love letter, but let’s look now at the....
II. The Anthropology of God’s Man
II. The Anthropology of God’s Man
A. God’s Man’s Shame apart from God’s Law.
A. God’s Man’s Shame apart from God’s Law.
Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments.
This phrase “not be put to shame” is used 5 times throughout . It reminds us of the result of not being tethered to, having our eyes fixed on, and committed to Gods’ law. Apart from God’s law the psalmist knows sin will bring him shame.
If he fails to keep his eyes fixed on God’s law, he will be focused on something else. Consider King David, what happened when his eyes were not fixed on God’s law? He fixed them on Bathsheeba didn’t he? He fixed them on his sinful desires. He sought to fulfill the desires of His flesh!
What followed? Sin, he gave into his sexual desire which led to what, deception, and murder and ultimately shame when his sin found him out!
How many of us have experienced the shame of sin? How many of us have failed to fix our eyes on the Scriptures and instead fixed our gaze on our own passions of the flesh?
There is nothing like be reminded of the grace and mercy of God following the shameful realization of our sin.
This should drive us to say with the Pslamist,
I cling to your testimonies, O Lord; let me not be put to shame!
The KJV says, “I have stuck unto they testimonies.” Do you get the picture? When we recognize how Good and Right God’s law is we will cling, cleave, and stick to it!
The only way you should be able to separate God’s man or God’s woman away from God’s law is by prying it from their dead, cold hands, but the truth is then it will be written on our hearts!
I will also speak of your testimonies before kings and shall not be put to shame,
The psalmist also reminds us that he will speak of God’s testimonies. How about that if we continually speak about God’s law, God’s precepts, and God’s testimonies are we more apt to obey it? If we are His we will!
Again if we keep our eyes on the God’s word, cling to God’s word, and keep talking about God’s word, we will be protected from shame by God’s Word!
Psalm 119:
Then we can proclaim,
May my heart be blameless in your statutes, that I may not be put to shame!
Don’t you want to be blameless, don’t you have a desire to be above reproach? As God’s men and women our desire to be faithful sons and daughters of God should stir up in us a commitment to keep the precepts of God.
Just so you know, 8 times in the psalmist commits to keeping God’s law! He clings to it, he cries out to God that he would be blameless by it and even asks God to....
Psalm 119:
Uphold me according to your promise, that I may live, and let me not be put to shame in my hope!
Psalm 119:
He understands that he cannot keep God’s law on his own, he cannot be blameless apart from being held up by His God!
Spurgeon explains, “It was so necessary that the Lord should hold up His servant that he couldn’t even live without it. If the Lord would withdraw His sustaining hand, our soul would die, and every grace of spiritual life would die also. It is a sweet comfort that this great need for support is provided for in the Word, and we don’t have to ask for it as if it isn’t promised by the covenant mercy. We must simply plead for the fulfillment of a promise, saying uphold me according unto thy word.”
A. Righteousness of God and His Law
A. Righteousness of God and His Law
B. Wisdom of God
B. Wisdom of God
C. Steadfast Love of God
C. Steadfast Love of God
II. The Anthropology of Man
II. The Anthropology of Man
A. Man’s Shame apart from God’s Law.
A. Man’s Shame apart from God’s Law.
B. Man’s Desire and Delight in God’s Law
B. Man’s Desire and Delight in God’s Law
C. Man’s Love for God’s Law
C. Man’s Love for God’s Law
J.I. Packer argued, “the root cause of our moral flabbiness is that we have neglected God’s law.”
J.I. Packer argued, “the root cause of our moral flabbiness is that we have neglected God’s law.”
Next one of the major themes in is....
B. God’s Man’s Desire and Delight in God’s Law
B. God’s Man’s Desire and Delight in God’s Law
In psalm 119 God’s man’s delight and desire is expressed. is an exposition and explanation of the man.
but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.
God’s man or woman takes delight, finds happiness, and enjoys God’s word. God’s statutes and precepts bring a peace to the soul of the sons and daughters of God.
I will delight in your statutes; I will not forget your word.
This delight drives his people to remember His statutes. Verse 15 expresses the psalmist desire to meditate on God’s precepts and as he does, these same precepts bring joy and comfort to His heart.
We must be careful of what we set our mind and eyes on as the people of God. The words of God are to be delighted in and enjoyed above all things that this world has to offer.
Notice what else the Lord’s testimonies do...
Your testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors.
The testimonies of God teach us. As we delight in them we learn from them, we gain understanding from God’s wise words. They being to strengthen our simple thinking, they begin to correct our bad theology, the testimonies of God teach us about the wonders and work of God.
As we learn from him and his commandments, we speak of his commandments without shame,
Psalm 119:
Psalm 119:1
for I find my delight in your commandments, which I love.
The reason the psalmist speaks of the law of god is because He loves the law of God. He has a deep affection for God and His word. His affection is displayed in His commitment to, and constant speaking of God’s commands. He understands how good they are.
Psalm 119:
their heart is unfeeling like fat, but I delight in your law.
Here a picture is painted of the hear that does not delight in the law of God. It is dead, unfeeling, there is no emotion. The heart of the unregenerate has no desire for God’s good law. They desire the carnal things of this world.
They love the things of this world and the love of the Father is not in them. But not God’s man, his heart is not like the fat, but like the meaty flesh that is full of flavor and protein that sustains and strengthens instead of making flabby!
Psalm 119:
He remembers,
If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.
Psalm 119:
Trouble and anguish have found me out, but your commandments are my delight.
He understands that without God’s law death comes, without God’s commandments trouble and anguish are certain.
Peter expresses the Word of God’s work in salvation,
Psalm 119:
since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;
1 Peter
also expresses how the delight in God’s law intensifies the desire or longing for God’s law.
I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight.
Psalm 119:
Behold, I long for your precepts; in your righteousness give me life!
Psalm 119:
My soul longs for your salvation; I hope in your word.
Psalm 119:
My eyes long for your promise; I ask, “When will you comfort me?”
Psalm
Now, what do we long for? What do we delight in? Here is a truth I hope we all take away tonight.
We cannot claim to be God’s man or woman and take no delight in His law. We cannot claim to be a recipient of God’s wisdom, God’s love, and God’s righteousness and have not longing for His law.
Let me ask a couple of question here before we move on.
Do you and I seek understanding from God’s wise counsel in His law?
Do you and I understand God’s steadfast love expressed in His law?
Do you and I seek to repent of sin and shame as we are confronted with the truth of God’s law?
Do you and I truly desire and long for the word of God?
This brings us to our final truth we will consider tonight,
C. God’s Man’s Love for God’s Law
C. God’s Man’s Love for God’s Law
Notice first of all the contrast between love for God’s law and a disdain for the double minded.
I hate the double-minded, but I love your law.
Spurgeon’s exposition is helpful here. He writes,
“In this paragraph, the psalmist deals with thoughts, things, and people that are opposite of God’s holy thoughts and ways. He is evidently moved with great indignation against the powers of darkness and their allies, and his whole soul is stirred to stand against them with a determined opposition.” - Charles Spurgeon
Psalm 119:
The psalmist also expresses the Lord’s dealings with the deliberately disobedient.
All the wicked of the earth you discard like dross, therefore I love your testimonies.
God’s men and women are called to stand against all evil while at the same time expressing a love for the lost. The children of God are to hate wicked ways while humbly and fearfully witnessing to the goodness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are to be uncompromising in our commitment to Christ while at the same time calling sinners to repent.
We are to hate evil and wickedness understanding that the wrath of God will be poured out on all who refuse to repent.
:
We not only love God’s law in because of it’s contrast to wickedness,
We are to love God’s law because of its worth!
Therefore I love your commandments above gold, above fine gold.
God’s commandments are more valuable than anything this world offers. His eternal command will stand when everything else melts like wax, therefore we ought to love God and His word above all.
Psalm 119:
Turn to me and be gracious to me, as is your way with those who love your name.
Psalm 119:
Your promise is well tried, and your servant loves it.
Psalm 119:
Consider how I love your precepts! Give me life according to your steadfast love.
God’s name, God’s promises, and God’s precepts are eternally faithful and true. They are tried and tested, they cannot be found false. So we can say with the psalmist,
Psalm 119:
I hate and abhor falsehood, but I love your law.
Here is our final though on the love of God’s law tonight. Love for the law is expressed in the keeping of the law. Think about your husband or wife. You are faithful to them, you are committed to them, you do not forsake your vows to them because you love them. God’s people keep God’s law not out of legalism but out of love.
Psalm
My soul keeps your testimonies; I love them exceedingly.
Tonight I pray that we all recognize the righteousness, wisdom, and steadfast love of God and His law.
Psalm 119:
In light of that as God’s people I pray that we meditate, keep, and obey God’s law to avoid sin and shame, to show our delight, and to display our love for God and His law!