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Thursday, April 24, 2008

PSALM 119 ~ 28 APRIL 2008

Author Unknown

The Essential Word

Extracted from Warren Wiersbe’s “Be Exultant”
While we may not know who wrote Psalm 119, the longest psalm, we do know that this man hungered for holiness & the Word strengthened his inner spiritual life. We see the author use the following words to refer to God’s Word: law, testimony, precept, statute, commandment, judgement, word & promise. All verses except 7 verses (v3,37, 84, 90, 121, 122 & 132) make direct reference to the Word of God.

The cast of characters in Psalm 119 is similar to many of the psalms:

(i) The Lord God
(ii) A remnant of godly people
(iii) The psalmist
(iv) The ungodly also referred to as “the arrogant” (v21, 51, 69, 78, 85, 122)

The psalmist’s sole resource for victorious living & godliness is to feed on the Word. It’s alarming but Warren Wiersbe puts it quite accurately, “We are happy to settle down in our comfort zones & live as though Jesus never died, Jesus is not coming again and our lives will never end.”

May the Lord tutor our hearts to see that we need to centre our lives around the Word.

There are altogether 22 sections in Psalm 119. Each section is headed by a Hebrew alphabet & the sub-headings suggested by Warren Wiersbe as follows:

Aleph v1-8 – Blessed & Blameless
Beth v9-16 – Take Time to Be Holy
Gimel v17-24 – We Need God’s Word!
Daleth v25-32 – Down But Not Out
He v33-40 – Ending Well
Vau v41-48 – Walking & Talking
Zayin v49-56 – The Ministry of Memory
Heth v57-64 – God is All We Need
Teth v65-72 – God is Good, All the Time
Yodh v73-80 – Read the Instructions
Kaph v81-88 – Faith & Patience
Lamedh v89-96 – Change & the Changeless
Mem v97-104 – Beyond Bible Study
Nun v105-112 – We Will Be Faithful
Samekh v113-120– Dealing with the Enemy
Ayin v121-128 – Blessed Assurance
Pe v129-136 – A Chain Reaction
Tsadhe v137-144 – In God we Trust
Qoph v145-152 – A Primer on Prayer
Resh v153-160 – Strength for the Journey
Shin v161-168 – Blessed are the Balanced
Tav v169-176 – Hear my Prayer!

Application:

Psalm 119:11 “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.” One practical application is to memorise a whole psalm. Start with Psalm 63 or Psalm 84 or choose your own all time favourite.

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