Exposition
of Psalm 119
ד
DALETH
God’s Word Provides Therapy
Ps. 119:25-32
My soul cleaveth unto the dust: quicken thou me according to thy word.
I have declared my ways, and thou heardest me: teach me thy statutes.
Make me to understand the way of thy precepts: so shall I talk of thy wondrous works.
My soul melteth for heaviness: strengthen thou me according unto thy word.
Remove from me the way of lying: and grant me thy law graciously.
I have chosen the way of truth: thy judgments have I laid before me.
I have stuck unto thy testimonies: O LORD, put me not to shame.
I will run the way of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.
While the previous stanza of this Psalm ends with David reveling
in delight, this one opens with him reeling in despair. Here is a
sad scene, indeed—my soul cleaveth
unto the dust, the psalmist cries. How many of us have ever felt
that despondent? Dust is
the Hebrew āpār, which literally, of course, refers
to dry, loose dirt or dust that covers the ground. Figuratively, however, it
pictures “utter defeat (2 Kings 13:7) and humiliation (Job 16:15).”[1] Such language is rooted in ancient
practice, as mourners would sit in ashes and pour dust on their heads.
Satan often attacks when things are going good, such as right after we’ve experienced a great blessing or joy. Yes, just when we think all is well, Satan “lowers the boom.” David was overwhelmed by fights, fears, and frailties. The word cleaveth, as the Hebrew (dābaq) indicates, gives us the idea that this despair was sticking to him as though it were glued. As Puritan Charles Bridges writes:
As the dust of the summer road blinds the eye . . . how does this earthliness of soul darken the view of the Saviour [and] dim the eye of faith![2]
That reminds us of the old cattle drives in the American west. The last place any cowboy wanted to be was “riding drag,” that is, at the back of the herd. The dust would cover him in layers from top to toe. That is where David was—blinded by the dust that was glued to him.
What, then, are we to do in such situations? We are to pray. As the Scottish preacher Andrew Bonar wisely observed, “Let us be as watchful after the victory as before the battle,” and the only way we can do that is by prayer. We hear a lot about “therapy” in our day, and there are countless approaches: psychotherapy, group therapy, hypnosis therapy, reality therapy, ad infinitum. But David knew that the only cure for a troubled heart is God and His Word. He, therefore, prayed that God would work six realities in his life. Here is true therapy for our troubled souls.
. . . quicken thou me according to thy word.
The Hebrew behind quicken
(hāyâ) means to live, be alive, and to
sustain life, which is reflected by some modern translations, such as “preserve
my life” (NIV) or “give me life” (ESV). These miss the true point, however.
This word also speaks of reviving someone, as in reviving them from sickness or
discouragement, and it is that idea that is in view in David’s prayer. Only God
can revive us from despair. It will not come from self-determination, will
power, psychological technique, or clever cliché. It will come only from God’s Word working in our heart and
mind.
The Apostle
Paul faced such situations, but was able to write:
We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body (II Cor. 4:7-10).
As the old
adage goes, he was knocked down, but not knocked out. But the
only way he could get up was with God’s Word, God’s promises, controlling his
thinking. While most modern “therapy” is driven by emotion—as in how a
person “feels” about something—what matters is the mind and what controls that.
We are
reminded here of God’s promise in Hebrews 13:5: “I will never leave thee, nor
forsake thee.” This is a quote of Deuteronomy 31:6: “Be strong and of a good
courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the LORD thy God, he it is that
doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.” We are never alone
because not only does the Holy Spirit dwell in us, but we also always
have God’s Word with us. Whenever we faint in despair, wither in depression,
or collapse in despondency, the Word of God is always there to revive
us.
I have declared my ways, and thou heardest me:
Just as a physician cannot prescribe the correct cure or therapy until we tell him all our symptoms, we must declare everything before God and disclose all our sin. The Hebrew word translated declared (sāpar) literally refers to general mathematical activity, as in counting. It’s used, for example, in taking the census of the nation of Israel in I Chronicles 21:2 and II Chronicles 2:17. The idea here then is to recount, declare one’s ways to God.
Another word for this, of course, is to confess. How many of our emotional, psychological, and even physical ailments can be traced directly to unconfessed sin? There is simply no cure or therapy without confession of sin. While dealing with sin in our day—or even mentioning it from the pulpit for that matter—is avoided at all costs, only when we confess it does God hear and forgive. We know the verse well that declares: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (I Jn. 1:9). “Confess” is the Greek homologeō; The root logeō means “to say,” and the prefix homo means “same,” yielding the literal meaning “to say the same words.” Therefore, to confess sin means “to say the same thing about sin that God says,” or in short, “to call sin, sin.” Only when we do this are we prepared for the next step.
teach me thy statutes.
Make me to understand the way of thy precepts: so shall I talk of thy wondrous works.
There is a three-fold request here with teaching at the core.
First, David prays that God will teach him His statutes. As we have noted, the Hebrew behind statutes (choq) is derived from a verb (chaqaq) that means “to cut, inscribe, or engrave.” The old euphemism “set in stone” illustrates it. God’s statutes (or decrees) are engraved in stone, showing their permanence. Following that analogy, what a contrast to modern thought, where things are “written in sand,” which change with the next wave of human opinion that rolls in. David, however, did not want what most people today want—syrupy sentimentality, personal opinion, or relativistic propositions that change with each situation. He wanted Truth, Truth that is set in stone and will never change. Oh, would that we wanted that today!
Second, he asks God to help him understand the way of [His] precepts. Oh, it is one thing to know, but it is quite another to understand! The first deals with facts, while the second deals with practice. Further, the word precepts (piqqud), as we’ve seen, speaks of injunctions and moral obligations. Here is the practical side of knowing. Not only are we to know God’s Truth in the mind, but we are to practice it in our living. We know His Word not by theoretical proposition but by tangible practice. We shall eaxamine the verse in more depth, but note what David write in verse 34: “Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law; yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart.”
Third, David prays that he will then talk of God’s wondrous works. Once we know the Truth, and understand the Truth, the one thing that is left is to proclaim the Truth. It’s interesting to note also verse 18 again: “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.” First David prays that he would see the wondrous works of God, but he now wants to speak of them. That is what the spiritual Believer does. He or she just can’t stop talking about the things of God. It is sad, indeed, when Christians want to talk about all sorts of things—job, money, sports, politics, entertainment—but don’t want to talk about spiritual things. What a joy it is to speak of creation, redemption, providence, grace, the Second Coming, and so much more.
The story is told of the discovery of King Tutankhamen’s tomb by the renowned archeologist Howard Carter in 1922. When he found the steps leading down into the burial chamber, he summoned the sponsor of the expedition, Lord Carnarvon, so he too could be present when the riches were uncovered. As the chamber was opened and Carter looked into the chamber, Lord Carnarvon excitedly asked, “Do you see anything?” Carter’s memorable answer was, “Yes, wonderful things.”[3] Indeed, Tut’s burial chamber contained the most riches ever uncovered in an ancient tomb, but compared to the “wondrous things,” the wondrous works, of God, Tut’s riches, all of which he left behind, are no more than wood, hay, and stubble (I Cor. 3:12).
Oh, how critical it is for us to recognize that there is no way to exaggerate the vital importance of teaching in the Believer’s life! In a day when churches are built on empty entertainment, shallow sermonettes, and tainted tradition, we see a church that is anemic and even septic. The only thing that will cure it is God’s absolute Truth. Let us pray with David: teach me thy statutes.
My soul melteth for heaviness: strengthen thou me according unto thy word.
The words, My soul melteth for heaviness, again underscores David’s despair. The Hebrew for melteth (dālap) means to pour out or to leak. It’s used, for example of a leaking roof in Ecclesiastes 10:18. Job also used it when his friends criticized him, causing him to “[pour] out tears unto God” (Job 16:20). Added to this was the heaviness (tûgâ) David felt; grief, sorrow, and anguish weighed upon him, which brought about deep depression and weeping. Spurgeon, who like other great men of God suffered from depression from time to time, put it beautifully: “He was dissolving away in tears.” Are there times when you, too, “leak” and feel you are dissolving away?
Because true persecution is virtually non-existent in America at present, it is difficult for us to identify with Believers who suffer for their faith, as do those, for example, in communist and Islamic countries. In this Psalm alone, David repeatedly mentions that he is suffering for his commitment to God’s Word (vs. 28, 50,67,71,75, 83, 92, 107, 109, 143, 153).
For what, then, does David pray? Does he pray that God will destroy his attackers? Does he pray for their misfortune? Does he pray that he will be vindicated? No. He was, in fact, burdened and sorrowful for them, as in verse 136: “Rivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not thy law.” As for himself, however, he simply prayed, strengthen thou me according unto thy word. Dear Christian Friend, the Word of God is always the answer. Only it will give you the strength to meet each day head-on and every attacker face-to-face.
Remove from me the way of lying: and grant me thy law graciously.
I have chosen the way of truth: thy judgments have I laid before me.
I have stuck unto thy testimonies: O LORD, put me not to shame.
David is reminded here of the underlying principle of faithfulness. We see here the first of four occurrences of the word truth in this Psalm (cf. vs. 43, 142, 151). This occurrence, however, is a different Hebrew word (’emûnâ) than the other three. This one literally means certainty and faithfulness. It occurs, for example, in Exodus 17:12, where as long as Moses held up his arms the Israelites prevailed in a battle against the Amalekites. As his arms tired and began to drop, however, the Amalekites prevailed. Aaron and Hur, therefore, “stayed up (’emûnâ) his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.” It appears several times in speaking of God’s faithful, one of which is later Psalm 119: “Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth.”
We all need to be constantly reminded of faithfulness, because that is what God blesses. In the context again of lying, as in our text, this word also appears in Proverbs 12:22: “Lying lips are abomination to the LORD: but they that deal truly are his delight.” Oh, how we must be constantly be reminded about lying! As Paul tells us, it is the most prevalent sin of human nature and is the first one he warns Christians about because he can so easily creep back into their lives: “Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another” (Eph. 4:25). In a society that is built on lying—from businessmen, to politicians, to the news media, to school textbooks, to our next-door neighbor—truth must rule the Believer’s life.
This Hebrew word appears still again in Proverbs 28:20: “A faithful man shall abound with blessings.” Indeed, blessing comes only by faithfulness in every area of our lives.
David also adds, grant
me thy law graciously. God gives His Word to us as a blessing,
not a burden. Some people look at the Bible and view it as a burden
because it says not to do certain things and tells us how to live. But we need
to realize that that is precisely why it is therapeutic. It is what keeps us
from disaster, from doing the things that are sinful and, therefore,
destructive to others and ourselves. Is that not what faithful parents do for
their children? Do we not tell them no to certain things for the purpose of
protecting them? God’s Word, then, is not a burden to be carried in the arms,
rather a blessing to be hidden in the heart (119:11).
One other beautiful picture of faithfulness is painted by the word stuck, which translates the same Hebrew word (dābaq) as does “cleaveth” back in verse 25, which expresses David’s depression: “My soul cleaveth unto the dust.” What a contrast! While at the beginning of the stanza despair was sticking to him as though it were glued, as the stanza closes it is now he who is glued to God’s testimonies, that is, sober and serious expressions of God’s standards for human behavior. “While the dust of despair is glued to me,” David says in effect, “I am ever glued to God’s standards.” Glue is used in many ways in construction and repair. A woodworker, for example, uses glue to join boards together, and so strong is that bond that the board will break in another spot before it will break on that joint. That is how we are to be glued to the Word God. If we do that, there will never be cause for shame.
I will run the way of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.
Oh, what a graphic verse this in light of our day and some of the prevalent teachings in the church! The Hebrew behind enlarge (rāhab) means to extend, to open wide, to gain living space or territory. As one authority tells us, “The root often occurs in descriptions of the spaciousness of the land of Canaan (Genesis 26:22). . . . It is repeated in reaffirmations of the extent of Israel's promised inheritance both during and after the conquest of Canaan (Exodus 34:24; Deut. 12:20; Isaiah 54:2).”[4]
But is the increasing of land David’s prayer? Prosperity teachers read the verse that way, but that is not what David says. While he uses a word that means the increasing of land and property, he applies it to something infinitely deeper. He prays, enlarge my heart, that is, make my heart larger and more spacious. Why? So more of God’s Word will fit into it so that that he might, therefore, be more fit to run the way of [God’s] commandments. As Paul challenges us: “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize?” (I Cor. 9:24), and again in Hebrews 12:1: “Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.” When we do that, we will then be able to say also with Paul:
I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing. (II Tim. 4:7-8).
Oh, that each of would pray with David, “Lord, make my heart bigger so I can fit more of your Word into it that I might be better equipped to run the race you have laid out for me.”
Dear Christian Friend, when you find yourself needing some spiritual therapy, needing to be revived, return to this stanza of Psalm 119 for a little heart adjustment.