Psalm 119:173

We come to the next verse of this last octave of Psalm 119 entitled Tau.

Psalms 119:173  Let thine hand help me; for I have chosen thy precepts.

This petition of the psalmist echoes one of the petitions of the prayer of Jabez recorded amidst the genealogies of 1 Chronicles.

1 Chronicles 4:10  And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.

That God’s hand be with us and help us is a thing to be sought. Consider what we are asking when we ask Almighty God: let thine hand help me. The hand of God is big enough to contain all the waters in the earth and skies in its hollow so as to measure them. This hand when outstretched is so large that it can measure the entire universe. This is the hand that “hath laid the foundation of the earth.”

Isaiah 40:12  Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span (the distance from the tip of the thumb to the tip of the little finger when the hand is fully extended)….

Isaiah 48:13  Mine hand also hath laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand hath spanned the heavens: when I call unto them, they stand up together.

This hand became flesh and blood in the hand of the Lord Jesus Christ. When this hand of God in Christ touched a fevered woman, the fever departed; when it touched a leper, the leprosy departed; when it touched the ears of a deaf man, he heard; when it touched the eyes of a blind man, he saw; and when it touched the body of a dead man, he came to life again (Mark 1:30-31, 40-42; 7:31-35; 8:22-25; Luke 7:11-15). This is the hand that rescued Peter when he began to sink in the boisterous sea (Matthew 14:29-31). I point all this out to show you the exceedingly great power of the hand of God to help! There is no greater help than the help of that hand for whatever your need might be because it is the help of Omnipotence.

But if you would have that hand help you, then you need to also be able to advance this as a plea: for I have chosen thy precepts. When it comes to the eternal salvation of God’s children, that does not depend upon their choice, but rather upon God’s choice of them (Ephesians 1:4; 2Thessalonians 2:13). But the quality of their lives in this earth and the help of God in their pilgrimage is conditioned upon their choice. Just consider how much of your life is shaped by the choices you make. If we would have God help us, then we need to choose His precepts to govern the course of our lives. It is as simple as this: “The LORD is with you, while ye be with him” (2Chronicles 15:2).

Think of it like this: in His precepts God is stretching His hand out to you. If you choose those precepts you are taking His hand in yours. In this way God’s hand will help you as you muddle your way through this fallen world. In fact, God has promised you the help of His hand when enemies arise against you. Note the words I have italicized in the following passage that lines up with today’s verse.
 

Isaiah 41:10  Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.

11  Behold, all they that were incensed against thee shall be ashamed and confounded: they shall be as nothing; and they that strive with thee shall perish.

12  Thou shalt seek them, and shalt not find them, even them that contended with thee: they that war against thee shall be as nothing, and as a thing of nought.

13  For I the LORD thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee.

14  Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel; I will help thee, saith the LORD, and thy redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.

But if you do not choose God’s precepts and if you refuse their counsel, then God’s hand will not be there to help you, even though you seek it.

Proverbs 1:20  ¶Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:

21  She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,

22  How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?

23  Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.

24  Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded;

25  But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof:

26  I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh;

27  When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you.

28  Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me:

29  For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD:

30  They would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.

Note the words I have italicized above. The Lord stretched out His hand and they refused; they did not choose to fear Him. If you refuse the hand of God outstretched to you in His precepts, He will refuse the help of His hand in your calamity. What a fearful thought!

Psalm 119:172

We come to the next verse of this last octave of Psalm 119 entitled Tau.

Psalms 119:172  My tongue shall speak of thy word: for all thy commandments are righteousness.

The psalmist was not only going to learn his Bible, he was not only going to obey the commandments of his Bible, he was going to talk about it: my tongue shall speak of thy word. And in talking about God’s word, he would be saying the right thing for all thy commandments are righteousness. If you are ever unsure of what is the right thing to say about something, then say what the Bible has to say about it, and you will be saying the right thing for you will be speaking righteousness.

All God’s commandments are righteousness. They are not only righteous, as the psalmist stated in Psalms 119:138, they are righteousness itself. And this is true of all the Scriptures in everything they say. When you hold a King James Bible in your hand, which is the preserved word of God in the English language, you are holding righteousness itself. It is not to be tampered with, altered, or taken lightly. It is to be heeded and reverenced with godly fear.

The very fact that the psalmist would speak of God’s word shows that the word of God was dwelling in him abundantly as our Lord Jesus said: “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34). When the word of God is dwelling in us richly, it will manifest itself in the things that come out of our mouth as this verse makes plain:

Colossians 3:16  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.

Or consider this instruction taken from the book of Proverbs:

Proverbs 22:17  Bow down thine ear, and hear the words of the wise, and apply thine heart unto my knowledge.

18  For it is a pleasant thing if thou keep them within thee; they shall withal be fitted in thy lips.

If you get the word of God “within” you, it will be “fitted in thy lips,” that is, you will be able to speak it forth. And it is a sign of spiritual growth when you not only know the truth, but when you are “speaking the truth in love.”

Ephesians 4:15  But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ….

If we are the Christians we should be, our tongue will be “as choice silver” (Proverbs 10:20); it will be “health” (Proverbs 12:18); our lips will “feed many” (Proverbs 10:21) and will “disperse knowledge” (Proverbs 15:7). Don’t you want your mouth to be a source of rich, healing, nourishing instruction to others rather than a fountain of destructive foolishness and non-sense? Well, if you get into your Bible and let it get into you, that will help! We would all be so much better off is we spoke more often of the words of God and less of the words of men. Alas, too many can expound extensively on what they hear in the news; read online or in a novel; or see on YouTube or in a movie; but grow strangely silent when the subject of the teaching of the Scriptures comes up.

When you are speaking of the Holy Scriptures, you have an inexhaustible subject for discussion. Charles Spurgeon said of the Scriptures: “the tale is for ever telling, yet untold.” How true! I have been preaching the story for going over 46 years and yet I feel I am but skimming the surface of all there is to tell.

Psalm 119:171

We continue making our way through the last octave of Psalm 119.

Psalms 119:171  My lips shall utter praise, when thou hast taught me thy statutes.

In this psalm we find seven verses before today’s verse in which the psalmist prayed to the Lord to teach him His statutes (verses 12, 26, 33, 64, 68, 124, 135). As we noted in our introduction to this psalm, God’s statutes are His laws and decrees. Praying to be taught God’s statutes, the psalmist was praying to learn the laws of God given to govern human conduct, and the decrees of God that affect the course of this world and the destinies of men. In verse 66 the psalmist prayed to be taught “good judgment and knowledge,” which come from God’s statutes; and in verse 108 he prayed to be taught God’s “judgments,” which entail His statutes. In short, the psalmist wanted the good Lord to teach him the Scriptures. He wanted to learn his Bible.

When commenting on verse 12 of this psalm, we pointed out that God uses instruments to teach us His statutes, instruments such as the Scriptures themselves, parents, pastors and teachers, fellow believers, tribulation, and chastening. But even though these instruments are used of the Lord, it is the Lord that is teaching us by them and, therefore, He is to be praised for the lesson learned. And that is precisely what the psalmist is doing in today’s verse.

When the Lord answered the psalmist’s prayer to be taught His statutes, the psalmist resolved this in response: “My lips shall utter praise.” The psalmist would verbally and audibly worship God for this answer to his prayer. And well it is that God should be praised for this blessing, for to have God’s words and to learn them is the chief blessing of all.

God bestowed many favours upon the nation of Israel. This following passage lists some of them:

Deuteronomy 6:10  And it shall be, when the LORD thy God shall have brought thee into the land which he sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou buildedst not, 

11  And houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, and wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, which thou plantedst not; when thou shalt have eaten and be full;

12  Then beware lest thou forget the LORD, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage.

The were miraculously delivered from oppressive slavery in Egypt; they were miraculously sustained in the wilderness for forty years; and then they were led into the land of Canaan, a land of plenty available for the taking. But above all these advantages was the advantage granted to them of the revelation of God in His word, which was written and preserved for their learning. It was this advantage that made Israel a truly great nation.

Romans 3:1  ¶What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?

2  Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles (the revelation) of God.

Psalms 147:19  He sheweth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel.

20  He hath not dealt so with any nation: and as for his judgments, they have not known them. Praise ye the LORD.

Deuteronomy 4:8  And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?

So if God has committed to you a copy of His pure, preserved word, you have the chief advantage. But in order to profit from that advantage, that word must be learned because it is “the entrance of” God’s words that give light and understanding (Psalm 119:130). You must be taught the statutes of the Lord. What is written on the page must find its way into your understanding if it is to benefit you.

Proverbs 2:10  ¶When wisdom entereth into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul;

11  Discretion shall preserve thee, understanding shall keep thee….

Therefore, with Bible in hand we must pray to God to teach it to us, to give us understanding of it. And when He does, we must praise Him for the gift of His instruction. Furthermore, we ought to praise Him chiefly for this since, as we have seen, it is the chief advantage we have from Him. So, do you thank God for what you learn in a sermon as much, or more, than you thank Him for food, health, family, and friends?

In conclusion, it is a sign we have learned God’s statutes when we are about the business of praising Him, since those statutes frequently instruct us in that business. As Matthew Henry wrote: “We have learned nothing to purpose if we have not learned to praise God.”