Two weeks ago I started a series on the importance of Bible Reading. We're going to look at Psalm 119 and a few other passages...
Just a refresher on Psalm 119...
Psalm 119 is a wisdom psalm which means that it is about our relationship with God and a practical guide to life. It is an acrostic poem with 22 stanzas of 8 verses each. (This makes it the longest psalm and the longest chapter in the Bible!)
Acrostic means that the poem follows the Alphabet: in stanza 1 all the verses start with the first letter of the alphabet, in stanza 2 the verses start with the second letter of the alphabet and so on. This was done to aid memorization and to imply a full and thorough treatment of the subject.
We'll take a thought from each stanza, thereby going from Aleph to Taw in the Hebrew Alphabet.
Blessed
In English rhyming is considered to be a poetic device. Hebrew poetry doesn't rhyme, but OT poets used parallel lines to say things more fully.
This psalm starts with a strophe of lines beginning with Aleph, the first letter of the the Hebrew Alphabet.
Parallels are either complementary or opposite:
One line expands the other
or one line contrasts the other.
We're going to look at two complementing couplets.
Who are blessed? Those whose ways are blameless.
How do they become blameless? They walk according to God's law.
Who are blessed? Those who keep His statutes
How do they keep His statutes? They seek Him with all their heart.
Blessing is more than financial prosperity or the absence of trouble. Blessing is the result of a life lived in the deep comforting awareness of God's presence. Sometimes people with all the material comforts of the world are not at peace while people who are going through hardship or illness have a "peace that passes understanding." Blessedness is not about circumstances, but about relationship.
Psalm 1 very powerfully begins with the premise that the love God's Word is a critical key to a blessed journey through life.
To sum up:
Blessedness is found in a life well-walked.
God's Word can show us how and where to walk.
But blessedness doesn't come from Biblicism (just worshipping the Bible), it comes from a passionate relationship with God.
We must seek Him with ALL our heart.
| Blessed are they whose ways are blameless Who walk according to the law of the Lord Blessed are they who keep his statutes and seek Him with all their heart. (Psalms119:1-2) |
