v1-4a show the splendour of our LORD. Creation shows it in a manner, though inaudible, which transcends language and is heard by all.
Oh how grand His creation. Each day He paints a thousand pictures in the sky and each moment He weaves the growth of the flowers in a thousand fields, that someone may glance at them and see His great glory, know Him and rejoice.
V4b - 5 tell of His great kindness show to all. He bring the sun out to warm the whole world. No one is deprived.
The sun himself delights in this task. He rejoices in serving the King.
Ah great God! How majestic are your ways in creation. In wisdom you brought created and it was good. Yet You have revealed Yourself more clearly still: v7-8: The words/ways of the LORD are perfect, trustworthy, right and radiant. They bring life, wisdom, joy and vigour to these who meditate on them and stay in them.
V9 shows the value of get response. There is no fault or wrong in the fear of the LORD. It will pass through the fire unchanged and last forever. The decrees of the LORD are a firm foundation and are in every way without deceit and are good.
What are the ways of the LORD? In wisdom He created and it was good. He revealed Himself to this creation. In love He came to the world in person, and against all expectations He served the world and redeemed it. Thus He instituted a new order where the greater serve the lesser, rather than oppress them; an order of peace and ever increasing love. He humbled Himself and so was raised above every authority. So He serves all, securely and with all power. Making Himself our firm foundation and great lover.
He has served us and invited us in. And yet more: He has invited us to join Him in this new order, in serving all things. To bring life, wisdom, joy and vigour to the world. Indeed we were made and are being renewed into this image. And we are loved, we are the bride of this great King.
Oh how blessed is man for this place in creation! Oh how good it is for man to walk in the ways of the LORD!
Reflecting on these thing the psalmist exclaims, v9-10, they are precious and sweet. In meditating on what this means, v11, "so am I warned and shown the path to great reward."
Then his reflection turns to himself. v12 "I am small and have not yet attained this, so forgive me". v13 "I am wicked so restrain me, then I will be like You." This is the great prayer of repentance and reliance reflected throughout the new testament.
Then the psalmist extends his plea, v14, "May my thoughts and deeds (words) be pleasing in Your sight." Again this is pray reflecting the response and praise throughout the new testament (see Phil 4: what ever is noble, good, ... think on these things.)
So in v12-14 we have a great, intimate prayer of repentance, faith and hope: "Forgive me, keep me and draw me to You."
The psalmist ends with the precious name of God: Oh LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer. You in whom I trust and who save me.
So praise our LORD and love Him, for we have a greater revelation then the psalmist. We know the wonderful person of Jesus. He who has achieved our redemption, who stands forever, a secure footing, and who has called us His bride!
Often when reading scripture we come away burdened. At least that is my expedience. I would come across some scripture which would say something I did not really want to hear and think “Ah man, now I must do that too?” Often we give this the euphemism of “I have come away challenged.” But the reality is that reading scripture can be quite difficult. It is hard work and the rewards seem only to be confusion or impossible tasks that I must keep. Even worse all that it says seems to keep me away from what I actually want to do.
This was my experience of reading scripture for many years. It is particularly difficult if you are struggling with sin and come across a passage saying “be holy.” My response was, yes yes I know, bother sorry, I’ll try again tomorrow. And then I was further than ever from God.
With this background I read psalm 19. I understand the beginning of the psalm: creation is great and speaks of God’s wonderful works. But then the psalm moves on in an unexpected direction: the law of God is perfect giving light to the eyes. The psalmist clearly thought this was reasonable, the psalmist knew something I did not.
The LORD, in His wonderful persistence, showed me that this is indeed the case. His laws, statutes and precepts show who He is. The story of the Bible is the expression of who He is, of His glory. We, now, have a wonderfully full revelation of this in Jesus. God is profoundly humble, deeply loving and immeasurably wise. Couple this revelation of how great our Lord is with the revelation in Genesis 1, we are created in God’s image, then the whole story becomes a rich mine of revelation of who Jesus is and a profound treaty on who we are, each feeding into the other. Thus it is true that the ways of Jesus give light to the eyes, a firm foundation for wisdom, and joy to the heart.
So my challenge to you is to not read scripture with dread, thinking oh no what “challenge” am I going to receive today. Rather read it with expectancy: what treasure is hidden here? What am I going to learn about what it means to be truly human? What joy awaits me, what guidance? What intimate and glorious truth about our God? The scripture is indeed full with treasures more precious than gold and more delicious than honey.
Here is a prayer that may help when encountering difficult passages: “Oh Jesus, I know that this should bring life, wisdom, joy and vigour, resulting in love, so help me to understand correctly.”
Dear friends, there is a particular issue I have with many Bible studies. I want be upfront with it so that I do not continuously subvert our studies. Rather I want to ask if we can together lay a precedent that we can use going forward together.
Let me tell you a story. One day I was reading Psalm 19. Let us turn there. I read the first bit. V 1-6 (read it). My thought was, yes yes, God created all things and His Glory is reflected in them. That is wonderful.
Then I started reading v7: “The law of the LORD is perfect”. Again my thought was, yes yes, perfect. God cannot make mistakes. Then I read the next bit: “refreshing the soul”. This stopped me dead. I was stumped. For many years my reading scripture was burdensome to me. It kept telling me how wrong I am and what I aught to do. But this passage said that the law of the LORD refreshes the soul. What was I missing? How was I wrong?
This is the foundation for my issue. I believe that we, the greater Christian community, are inclined to sell the Bible far short of its true riches. Particularly when we draw application out of passages. We are inclined to use the Bible merely as a manual for how to live. In particular we are inclined to load ourselves with great burdens saying I aught to worship God more, I aught to have more faith, I aught to be a better person, I aught to try harder.
I think this is tragic and wrong. However it is very easy to fall into. To see this simply look at the religions of the world, including secularism. They are all based on the foundation of aughting to be better people.
Again it is very natural that this is how we are inclined to apply passages to ourselves. A check-list of aughts is an easier application point that a sense of Awe or Love.
Let me give an example. Consider the first beatitude: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” A natural, if naive, application may be: If I want to be in the Kingdom of Heaven I must be poor of spirit. Therefore let me belittle myself to attain this. Or a more REACH version: Let me contemplate how small I am and how truly poor of spirit I am. Or some other subtle version of saying I aught to become poor of spirit. Or if I am a Christian I will find that I am poor of spirit. Implying, of course if accidentally, that if I do not find this I am not a Christian. Just an aught in disguise. I don’t think this is correct. I would even say that this is unhelpful for understanding the gospel. It gets in the way and burdens us. Indeed this application is not “refreshing to the soul”. My issue is that I react rather violently to this.
However consider an alternate application: Oh how wonderful for I find myself poor of spirit and crushed. Yes Jesus says that I am blessed. Indeed though I feel like I have nothing I have the Kingdom of Heaven. Or again consider this application. Isn’t God strange that He will give His Kingdom to the poor rather than the strong? Who is this that would so value the poor? Clearly He is good. Let me submit to Him and worship Him for His love.
Don’t these last two applications much more “refresh the soul”? However I admit that they are harder to take home, it is much easier to say: I aught to do something, than simply to rejoice.
This then is the precedent I want to lay: can we commit to asking ourselves, as a point of application, how does this show perfection? How does this refresh my soul? how does this make me wise? why is this right? how does this give joy to my heart? how does this invigorate me?
These things lead to a treasuring of Scripture, deep repentance, profound trust and a desire to please Him.
This psalm finds its fulfilment in Jesus. However it also shows the response to understanding scripture: life, wisdom, joy and vigour resulting in enduring fear of the LORD and righteousness. As such this can be used as a statement of faith when approaching difficult and confusing passages. “I know that this should bring life, wisdom, joy and vigour, resulting in love, so LORD help me to understand correctly.” It helps combat the Evil One’s lie: “You will not surely die…”: God does not really want your best, and the other error of being oppressed by reading Scripture as a “Law” which binds us. Again caution should be used to remember that all Scripture (indeed all of creation) find their fulfilment in Jesus. Thus most life, wisdom, joy and vigour are drawn from the Scripture when we are loving Christ.