Psalm 119:102

We continue working our way through the octave of Psalm 119 entitled Mem.  Remember?

Psalms 119:102  I have not departed from thy judgments: for thou hast taught me.

The thought of this verse dovetails perfectly with the thought of the preceding verse:  “I have refrained my feet from every evil way.”  The psalmist avoided every thing evil by never departing from God’s judgments.  Constant attention to God’s word is the means for refraining from every evil way.  It all boils down to this:  Get away from the Book and your feet will wander in the wrong direction.

Let’s define what it means to depart from. 

To depart from:  to leave, abandon; to cease to follow, observe, or practice.

The psalmist was constant in his obedience to God.  He had laid the judgments of God’s word before him to be his guide and counsel (Psalm 119:30), and he had not abandoned that course.  One of our greatest struggles is to remain constant since our fallen nature is so fickle and prone to go astray.

Isaiah 53:6  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

It was Shakespeare who wrote:  “O heaven! were man but constant, he were perfect:  that one error fills him with faults; makes him run through all th’ sins:  Inconstancy falls off ere it begins.”  How sadly true this is.

The psalmist attributed his adherence to God’s judgments to this fact:  for thou hast taught me.  He gave the Lord the credit for his constant obedience.  If a man is truly obedient to God’s word, the cause of that obedience must be traced back to the saving grace of God.  God by His grace gives His chosen people a new heart and a new spirit thus enabling them to keep His commandments and to keep them continually.  This is an inward instruction that the Lord gives to His people.

Ezekiel 11:19  And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh:

20  That they may walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.

Jeremiah 32:39  And I will give them one heart, and one way, that they may fear me for ever, for the good of them, and of their children after them:

40  And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from them, to do them good; but I will put my fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from me.

Titus 2:11  ¶For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,

12  Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world….

Ephesians 4:20  But ye have not so learned Christ;

21  If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus:

22  That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts;

23  And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;

24  And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

An unsaved sinner may keep some of the commandments of God now and then for self-serving purposes, like the scribes and Pharisees who did all their works “for to be seen of men” (Matthew 23:5).  But this is not a sincere obedience that comes from a heart renewed and taught by God’s grace.  This is not an obedience that is constant to do all that the Lord has commanded.

Now if the Lord has taught us by grace in our hearts, then we can hear, understand, and profit from the outward teaching of the word of God. Without this inward instruction of the Holy Spirit the outward teaching of the word of God will never produce genuine faith and obedience. A natural man devoid of a spiritual capacity cannot receive the spiritual things of God's word.  

1 Corinthians 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

So the Lord must teach us first by His grace. Then we are ready to be taught by the men He sends to preach His word to us.  Being taught by God we can answer the call of the preached word to keep the judgments of the Lord always and to never depart from them.

In addition, we have pointed out in previous meditations that human teachers of God’s word are but instruments through which the Lord teaches us.  If we receive their message as a lesson being taught us by the Lord Himself, then we will be far more prone to heed it than if we receive it as a mere lecture by a man.  Thomas Manton said it well: 

“David was taught by his ordinary teachers, and he did reverence them; but that he profited by them he ascribes unto God.  Paul may plant, and Apollos water; God must give the increase.”    

Psalm 119:101

I am now ready to take in hand the next verse in the octave of Psalm 119 entitled Mem.

Psalms 119:101  I have refrained my feet from every evil way, that I might keep thy word.

That the psalmist refrained his feet from every evil way suggests that he was speaking about the direction or way he chose to go in his life, since we proceed in this or that direction with our feet.  In order to avoid choosing the wrong direction, he refrained his feet. 

Refrain – To hold back, restrain (a person or thing) from something, esp. some act or course of action.

The idea of having to hold back or restrain a person from something suggests that the person has an urge or desire toward that something. Hence, it takes willpower to stay away from it. The psalmist maintained a strict self-control over his thoughts, words, desires, passions, and actions so that he stayed away from every evil way, whether that way was a way of thinking, a way of speaking, a way of feeling, a way of acting, a way of reacting, or even a way of worshipping. Any form of worship that is not according to God’s revealed will in His word is evil. Witness Cain who brought an offering to the Lord that was not according to His will. God pronounced that incorrect mode of worship as sin and evil. 

Genesis 4:5  But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect. And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell.

6  And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?

7  If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.

1 John 3:12  Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous.

The reason the psalmist refrained his feet from every evil way was that I might keep thy word. He restrained himself from things he desired to do just so he could be obedient to the Scriptures. He did not stay away from those things just to be healthy, or to be admired for his self-discipline, or even to gain an additional reward. He did it simply to be obedient. For the man who loves the Lord, keeping God’s word is his top priority and is itself a reward.  If you truly want to keep the word of God, that itself becomes a powerful incentive to refrain from everything evil. 

But to keep the word of God, one must refrain his feet from every evil way. No sin, no matter how small it may seem to be, can be tolerated.  The least evil if allowed to remain unchecked will eventually spread and corrupt everything else.  As the Scripture hath said:

Galatians 5:9  A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.

King Josiah is an excellent example of someone who refrained his feet from every evil way that he might keep the word of God

2 Kings 23:24  Moreover the workers with familiar spirits, and the wizards, and the images, and the idols, and all the abominations that were spied in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, did Josiah put away, that he might perform the words of the law which were written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in the house of the LORD.

Hezekiah cleansed his kingdom of idols for the express purpose of being able to “perform the words of the law which were written in the book.”  That is exactly what today’s verse is all about.

On the other hand, we read of the people that moved into Israel after the Israelites had been taken captive by the Assyrians.  These new settlers tried to mingle the fear of the Lord with their service to pagan gods.  It did not work.  Their fear of God was only in word.  It was empty lip service. They had no real fear of God at all.  They just served other gods and called themselves fearing the Lord, much as many people do today who say they are Christians but do not truly follow Christ.

2 Kings 17:33  They feared the LORD, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from thence.

34  Unto this day they do after the former manners: they fear not the LORD, neither do they after their statutes, or after their ordinances, or after the law and commandment which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel….

You cannot serve sin and the Lord together.  You serve one or the other.  It is an either/or proposition.  You cannot serve both.

Romans 6:16  Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

Matthew 6:24  No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

You can’t love the world and love the Lord at the same time.

1 John 2:15  Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

16  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

Therefore, if you would serve the Lord by keeping His word – and that is the only way you can serve Him – then you must be able to say with the psalmist, I have refrained my feet from every evil way.