Psalm 119:21

Psalm 119 is the longest psalm and the longest chapter in the Bible (Psalm 119). It is an acrostic of twenty-two stanzas, one for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and each stanza has eight verses that all begin with its letter. Verses 17–24 are the third stanza, and the KJV prints the name of its letter, GIMEL, at the head. The psalm does not name its author, and tradition has linked it with David.

The whole psalm is about God’s word, and it calls that word by many names. In this stanza every verse uses one of them: word, law, commandments, judgments, commandments again, testimonies, statutes, and testimonies again. The stanza before closes with the psalmist’s resolve to delight in God’s statutes (Psalm 119:16), and this one closes with God’s testimonies as his delight.

The psalmist calls himself “thy servant” in the first verse and again in verse 23, with the same word, ʻebed, both times. The first verses ask for grace and for sight. Then trouble comes into view: the proud who stray, the reproach and contempt laid on the psalmist, and princes who sit and speak against him. Through all of it his answer is the same. He asks God for help, and he holds on to God’s word.

“Deal bountifully with thy servant, that I may live, and keep thy word.” The verb gâmal means to treat a person well or ill, to benefit or to repay, and here it plainly asks for good: deal generously with me. The same verb can also mean to ripen, or to wean a child. The psalmist comes as God’s ʻebed, his servant or bondman. Scripture gives that name to Moses, the servant of the LORD (Exodus 14:31), and God speaks of David as “my servant” (2 Samuel 7:5). A servant lives by his master’s kindness, and so the psalmist asks humbly, leaning on the goodness of God.

He says at once what he wants that kindness for. “That I may live” uses châyâh, to live in the plain sense or a wider one, and in other forms to revive, to keep alive, or to give life. The life he asks for includes his breath and also the well-being of a person who walks with God. Moses set life and death before Israel and told them to choose life by loving the LORD and obeying his voice (Deuteronomy 30:16, 30:19–20), and Proverbs promises length of days and peace to the one whose heart keeps God’s commandments (Proverbs 3:1–2).

“And keep thy word” follows. To keep, shâmar, is properly to hedge about, as with thorns, and so to guard, protect and attend to. The word he means to guard is dâbâr, a word or saying, which can also mean a matter or thing, and here it stands for all that God has spoken.

The order of the prayer matters. Life comes from God first, and the keeping of his word grows out of that life. God gives the very obedience he asks for. Ezekiel tells of God putting his Spirit within his people and causing them to walk in his statutes (Ezekiel 36:27), Paul says that it is God who works in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure (Philippians 2:13), and Jesus tells his disciples that the one who abides in him bears much fruit (John 15:5). So we are told to keep God’s word, and we ask him for the life to keep it.

“Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.” The verb gâlâh means to uncover or lay bare, and it is used of exile as well, since captives were usually stripped. The psalmist asks God to uncover his eyes, ʻayin, so that he can see what is already there. The wonders are in the law, and the covering lies over his eyes.

To behold, nâbaṭ, is to look intently, and by implication to look with pleasure, favour or care. The psalmist wants a long and glad look, and the thing he wants to see is “wondrous things”, from pâlâʼ. The root may first mean to separate or set apart, and from that to be great, hard to grasp, or wonderful. Its forms often describe God’s mighty acts, as when he tells Moses that he will smite Egypt with all his wonders (Exodus 3:20). Here the psalmist looks for wonders of that order in God’s tôwrâh, his law. The word means a precept or statute, especially the Ten Commandments or the five books of Moses, and the psalm uses it for the whole of God’s instruction.

“I am a stranger in the earth: hide not thy commandments from me.” The word stranger, gêr, means a sojourner or resident alien, someone living in a land other than the one he came from. Such people were counted among the weaker members of society, and a gêr might stay for a long time or for good. God’s law told Israel to love the stranger (Deuteronomy 10:19), and Abraham called himself a stranger and a sojourner in the land God had promised him (Genesis 23:4). The earth, ʼerets, can mean the whole earth or one land.

So the psalmist describes himself as one living away from his own country, with few rights and great need of help. Scripture uses the same picture for all God’s people. The patriarchs confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth (Hebrews 11:13), Peter calls believers strangers and pilgrims and urges them to abstain from fleshly lusts (1 Peter 2:11), and Paul says that our conversation, our citizenship, is in heaven (Philippians 3:20).

A stranger in an unfamiliar land needs someone to show him the way, and so the psalmist asks God to keep his commandments open to him. To hide, çâthar, is to hide by covering, to conceal, or simply for a thing to be hidden or absent. The commandments, mitsvâh, are commands, and taken together the word means the Law. God has already given them, and the prayer asks that their meaning stay clear to him day after day. Moses said that the secret things belong to the LORD, and the things revealed belong to us and to our children, that we may do all the words of the law (Deuteronomy 29:29). Later in this psalm the same man asks God to teach him the way of his statutes (Psalm 119:33) and calls God’s word a lamp to his feet (Psalm 119:105).

“My soul breaketh for the longing that it hath unto thy judgments at all times.” The soul, nephesh, is properly a breathing creature, and the word covers life, the self and the whole person. “Breaketh” is gâraç, to crush, and also to dissolve or break. The psalmist’s whole being feels crushed by taʼăbâh, desire or longing. Words of that strength describe a hunger for God’s word that presses on him like pain. “At all times” uses ʻêth, time, and tells us that the longing is with him in every season.

The thing he longs for is God’s mishpâṭ, his judgments. The word is properly a verdict given by a judge, favourable or unfavourable, a sentence or formal decree. In this psalm it names God’s rulings, the righteous decisions that make up his law. Another psalm speaks of a soul that pants after God as the hart pants after the water brooks (Psalm 42:1–2), and Jesus calls blessed those who hunger and thirst after righteousness (Matthew 5:6).

“Thou hast rebuked the proud that are cursed, which do err from thy commandments.” To rebuke, gâʻar, is to chide or reprove, a word of strong correction. The proud are the zêd, the arrogant and presumptuous, who despise God’s authority. The KJV calls them cursed, from ʼârar, to execrate or bitterly curse, and to be under God’s curse is to be cut off from his blessing. They “err from” his commandments, and shâgâh means to stray, to go wrong, and especially to transgress. The commandments here are the same word, mitsvâh, that the psalmist prayed would stay open to him in verse 19.

The psalmist speaks of the rebuke as done: God has rebuked them, and he has seen it. The verse follows straight on from his prayers for life and open eyes, and it puts beside his humble asking the people who go their own way. The Law set out blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience (Deuteronomy 28). Proverbs warns that pride goes before destruction (Proverbs 16:18) and that everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD (Proverbs 16:5), and Isaiah says the day of the LORD will come upon everyone proud and lofty (Isaiah 2:12). James writes, “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble” (James 4:6), and Peter says the same (1 Peter 5:5).

“Remove from me reproach and contempt; for I have kept thy testimonies.” The verb gâlal means to roll, and the prayer asks God to roll reproach and contempt off him and away. Reproach, cherpâh, is disgrace, shame and insult, and contempt, bûwz, is disrespect and scorn. In Israel a person’s honour and good name counted for a great deal, and public scorn was a heavy thing to bear. This scorn has come on the psalmist because he is faithful.

“For I have kept” uses nâtsar, to guard, protect, maintain or obey. It shares the English “keep” with verse 17, where the word is shâmar. What he has guarded is God’s ʻêdâh, his testimonies, a word meaning testimony or witness. God’s testimonies are his solemn witness to who he is and what he requires.

Prophets such as Jeremiah were reproached for speaking God’s word (Jeremiah 20). Jesus calls blessed those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake (Matthew 5:10–12), and Peter says that those reproached for the name of Christ are happy (1 Peter 4:14–16). God has promised, “them that honour me I will honour” (1 Samuel 2:30), and the psalmist leaves his good name in God’s hands.

“Princes also did sit and speak against me: but thy servant did meditate in thy statutes.” The princes, sar, are chiefs, captains, rulers and officials, people holding authority. They “did sit”, yâshab, a verb for sitting down, and especially for sitting as a judge, lying in ambush or resting quietly. Here it may picture a council or a court where charges are laid against him, or simply powerful men sitting together. They “speak against” him with dâbar, the ordinary verb to speak, and the words “against me” make that speech hostile. Men with that kind of power could ruin a man by slander or by legal charges.

The psalmist’s answer is “but thy servant did meditate in thy statutes.” He calls himself ʻebed again, the servant of a greater Lord than these princes. To meditate, sîyach, is to ponder, and by implication to talk things over with oneself, even aloud, or to utter. It is the turning over of God’s words in the mind, often half spoken. His statutes, chôq, are enactments, things God has appointed.

This is the blessed man of the first psalm, whose “delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night” (Psalm 1:2). The second psalm tells of kings and rulers taking counsel together against the LORD (Psalm 2), and Isaiah says that the LORD keeps in perfect peace the one whose mind is stayed on him (Isaiah 26:3). Paul describes the same habit when he says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly (Colossians 3:16).

“Thy testimonies also are my delight and my counsellors.” The testimonies are the same word, ʻêdâh, as in verse 22. The “also” ties the verse to the one before: while princes speak against him, God’s testimonies are his joy. Delight, shaʻshuaʻ, means enjoyment, delight and pleasure. The psalmist finds in God’s word a pleasure he loves, and the word “my” makes it his own.

“My counsellors” stands for two Hebrew words, ʼĕnôwsh, a man or mortal, and ʻêtsâh, advice, counsel or plan, so the phrase reads “the men of my counsel”. The psalmist speaks of God’s testimonies as advisers who sit with him. In Israel people from the king down sought counsel from elders, prophets and wise men, and the psalmist takes his counsel from God’s word. God promises in another psalm, “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye” (Psalm 32:8).

Delight and counsel belong together here. The blessed man who delights in the law of the LORD is like a tree planted by the rivers of water (Psalm 1:1–3). The nineteenth psalm calls God’s judgments sweeter than honey and says that by them his servant is warned (Psalm 19:7–11). Proverbs promises that the one who seeks wisdom as hidden treasure will find the knowledge of God (Proverbs 2:1–6), and Jeremiah found God’s words and ate them, and they were the joy and rejoicing of his heart (Jeremiah 15:16).

People ask how commands and prohibitions can be a delight. God’s commands come from his holy and loving character, and he gave them for the good of his people. A heart made right with God through faith finds his ways good, and obeying him becomes a glad answer to his goodness.

The prayers of this stanza come to their fullness in Jesus Christ. He is the Servant in whom God delights (Isaiah 42:1), and at his baptism the Father called him his beloved Son, in whom he is well pleased (Matthew 3:17). He is the Word who was with God and was God (John 1:1), made flesh and full of grace and truth (John 1:14, 1:17). He came to fulfil the law (Matthew 5:17) and always did the things that pleased his Father (John 8:29). In these last days God has spoken to us by his Son (Hebrews 1:1–2), who is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6).

Jesus knew the stranger’s life. “He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1:10–11), and “the Son of man hath not where to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20). He knew reproach as well, for “even Christ pleased not himself” (Romans 15:3), and he endured the cross, despising the shame (Hebrews 12:2). The chief priests and elders took counsel against him and delivered him to Pilate (Matthew 27:1–2), and on the Mount of Olives he prayed to his Father (Luke 22:39–44). He bore the curse that falls on those who stray, and God dealt with his Servant in the fullest bounty when he raised him from the dead (Acts 2:24). Now he gives life, and gives it more abundantly (John 10:10), and he has overcome the world (John 16:33).

He opens eyes too. The Scriptures testify of him (John 5:39), and the veil over the reading of the old covenant is done away in Christ (2 Corinthians 3:14). The Spirit he sends teaches all things (John 14:26) and guides into all truth (John 16:13). In him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Colossians 2:3). He is called Wonderful, Counsellor (Isaiah 9:6), and God has made him to us wisdom and righteousness (1 Corinthians 1:30). God writes his laws on the hearts of his people (Hebrews 8:10), so that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in those who walk after the Spirit (Romans 8:3–4). Since it is God who justifies, no charge laid against his people can stand (Romans 8:33–34).

This stanza shows a God who deals generously with his servants. He gives life and opens eyes, he keeps his commandments clear to strangers, and he hears the soul that longs for his word. He sees the pride of those who stray and the scorn laid on those who keep faith with him, and he answers both. Princes sit in council, and God’s word still has the last say, a delight to all who meditate in it.

Each verse of this stanza can be prayed as it stands. The servant who asks for life and open eyes is asking for what God loves to give, and the one who meets scorn with meditation follows the way his Lord walked. God’s testimonies are counsellors who stay beside his people, and their counsel is good at all times.