Committed to His Word
Psalm 119:1–11
While the songs that fill up the book of Psalms exhibit a great deal of variety and creativity in their expressions of worship, most follow a basic pattern: theme, development, resolution. The theme of a psalm is its “big idea,” an idea that psalmists go on to develop in the body of the psalm, before they finally bring this theme to a resolution. One technique for getting into the shoes of a particular psalmist is to read the first line or two of a psalm and zero in on that psalm’s theme. Once you have it, close your Bible and think about your own experience with this “big idea.” If the theme is God’s majesty expressed in creation (Ps. 8), you might think of moments when you’ve marveled at some natural wonder and been struck by the awesomeness of God’s creative power. If the theme is praise for God’s many blessings (Ps. 9), you might pause to consider ways God has blessed you, too. If the theme is feeling abandoned by God (Ps. 13), you might reflect on moments when you have felt those same feelings of loneliness and worry over whether you would ever find God’s presence again. Once you’ve had a few moments to mull over your own connection to the psalmist’s theme, open your Bible again and read the psalm. Now, you know this technique listen to the psalmist’s situation with a more sympathetic ear. You can converse with the psalmist, sharing the psalmist’s joy or pain in a way you might not have before.
God’s word guides our daily walk. (1–4)
A great psalm for this kind of Bible reading is the majestic Psalm 119. To do this properly, though, you first must correct a terrible mistranslation that mars the beginning of the psalm. Like Psalm 1, Psalm 119 begins in many translations with the word “blessed.” While “blessed,” the Hebrew word baruch, is found in a great many contexts in the Bible, Psalms 1:1 and 119:1 are not among them. Here, the Hebrew word is ashrey, a word that means not “blessed” but “happy.” In fact, the Hebrew term is a plural form that we just don’t use in English; it means literally, “O! the happinesses of the person who… .” Then, we close our Bibles and ask the important question, “What makes us happy?” The answer no doubt will be different for each of us, though there are some themes almost all of us would share: family, friends, good food and those sorts of things. With these ideas of happiness swirling around in our heads, we reopen our Bibles to see how our psalmist defines happiness. His answer: O! the happinesses of the person who follows God’s Law.
God’s word leads us to live unashamed. (5–8)
A million things can give us temporary pleasure. Too many of those temporary pleasures give us moments of happiness that flicker out in an instant and leave behind more grief than true joy. Long-term happiness, the kind of happiness that lasts a lifetime is happiness that comes from ordering our lives in accordance with God’s word. When we let God’s word set the guardrails for our lives, we gain a kind of enduring happiness that comes without guilt, without regret and without sorrow.
God’s word keeps us from sin. (9–11)
So often in Scripture, following God’s law is cast in images of a path, a way or a road. Psalm 119 makes ample use of this imagery as it asks how we can stay on the “path of purity.” The psalmist begs God, “Don’t let me stray.” How is it that we can stay on this path and not stray? It is by following God’s word. As Psalm 119:105 affirms, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a lamp unto my path.” It is when we let God’s word light our way that we are guided on paths that lead to true, enduring happiness.
By Jeffery M. Leonard, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Biblical Studies, Samford University
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