Wednesday Bible Study: Psalm 119 deconstructed part 4

 

So last week, my big takeaway was, "God don't do 'intellectual exercises' ".  If your heart is open, truly open, any study can bring you to your knees with truths personal to you.  I anticipate another one this week.

Our concept this week is STATUTES.  Statutes means to be engraved- whether Moses' tablets of stone, the tablet of our hearts, OR...

Isa 49:16  Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me. 

It is the same root word; Isaiah prophecied of Jesus engraving US with Roman nails into Himself, and that's the way God told David here to engrave Himself onto David's soul.  And it is the rarest of our concepts from this Psalm; 6 stanzas do not contain "statutes".  But the ones that do, one powerful meaning becomes swiftly clear.  But, before I get to that...

We have 2 stanzas that hit statutes twice.  One of the pairs, in stanza Teth (vv 65-72) combine two ideas:  First, God is good, and does good (v68); second, that this good sometimes will come in the form of afflictions (v72).  I find it interesting that Strong's dictionary points out that the root word for "affliction" is the same spelling/pronunciation as another different word.  But are they different?  The one we translate as affliction means to beat down; the other means to heed or pay attention!  And that is the point of this coupling, sometimes God's good means He has to "pin us down" to make us pay attention.  Even then, God is good.  And with this word game, we see that God don't make mistakes!

The other couple is in stanza Samech (vv113-120).  They are the adjacent verses 117 and 118; in one God holds up in safety those who observe His statutes; the other, God rejects those who do not follow His statutes in order to perpetuate their falsehood.  The objects of my rant a few weeks ago would do well to learn that statute.

But here is the clear message in this concept:  No less than six appearances are phrased this way: "Teach me Your Statutes." (vv 12, 26, 64, 68, 135, and 171).  And here, I'm going to dip into a little of my Catholic past.  Several of the songs in our song book were direct adaptations of Psalms to music.  One of them that has always stuck with me is Psalm 136.  It told the history of Israel, with the refrain "Everlasting is Your Love" between each line.  And the verses that have "teach me your statutes" are structured just this way, if you pull them out:

Psa 119:12  Blessed are you, O LORD; 

teach me your statutes! 

Psa 119:26  When I told of my ways, you answered me; 

teach me your statutes! 

Psa 119:64  The earth, O LORD, is full of your steadfast love;

 teach me your statutes! 

Psa 119:124  Deal with your servant according to your steadfast love, 

and teach me your statutes. 

Psa 119:135  Make your face shine upon your servant, 

and teach me your statutes. 

Psa 119:171  My lips will pour forth praise, for you 

teach me your statutes. 

Now, notice how they link up, front to back: The earth is full of your steadfast love, so deal with me IN that steadfast love; You answered me, and made your face shine upon me; You are blessed, and I will pour out praise to You! A song within a song, to be sure.  Father God, I cannot possibly top that!