In My Trouble (Psalm 119:25-32)

Who is the most unusual person in the world? The answer is a Christian, and he is so for different reasons. He is unusual because he trusts in the promises of God; he is unusual because he goes through opposite experiences; he is unusual because he talks to God about them. In this section of the psalm, the author refers to such occasions.

 

Cry for restoration (vv. 25-27)

In verse 25, the psalmist finds himself feeling lifeless and dry. Clinging to the dust could suggest that he was stuck in the arena of spiritual death. The effect was so strong that he could not lift himself above it. If a person’s body was clinging to the dust, it would mean that he was lying on the ground. Here, the psalmist’s soul is weary. Yet we can say with regard to his spiritual dryness that there is clear evidence that he was spiritually alive. The evidence is that he knew that he was like that, and he knew that he had to pray about it. 

 

Such times are not unusual in the spiritual life. They can be caused by different reasons. Sometimes, they happen because of the personal choices of the believer; at other times, the causes can be outside of them. A believer will bring himself into this state when he refuses to use the means of grace that God has provided. When he stops reading the Bible and praying and attending church, he will soon become spiritual dry.

 

At other times, spiritual lethargy and dryness can come from the outside. An example of this is the experience of Job who found himself under attack from the devil. His circumstances became so bad that he could not be comforted. Even his friends discovered that they did not know what to say to him, and it would have been better if they had remained silent.

 

The world also can bring spiritual problems to a believer. He may live in a family that do not understand the desires of a Christian. His neighbours may engage in a lifestyle that disappoints him. Society might approve of what God forbids. All these issues cause a believer to be downcast.

 

Therefore he prays that the Lord would restore him. Maybe he had in mind the words of Psalm 23 where the Shepherd restores the soul of his tired sheep. Or perhaps he was thinking of Psalm 51 where David, after his great sin, asked the Lord to restore to him the joy of his salvation. The divine method of giving life is that it is given freely and abundantly.

 

In verse 26, he records that he received an answer from the Lord: ‘When I told of my ways, you answered me.’ He discovered that spending time with God produces great benefits. Whatever was causing his spiritual state – whether his own sin or the actions of others, was dealt with by his gracious God. The psalmist once again found himself in the place of religious liberty. The benefit of being open and frank with God is spiritual recovery.

 

What does a person who has been restored want? He wants to know more about the ways that please the Lord. He asks his Restorer to become his Instructor. Humans can tell us truth in our ears. Only God can write his truth in our hearts. That is the way of making progress in spiritual things.

 

The psalmist’s response is not finished with his petition for instruction. In verse 27, he expresses what he will do once he has been taught by the Lord. When he has been enlightened, he will meditate on God’s wondrous works. 

 

Meditation is the outcome of divine instruction. A healthy Christian is one who wants to use his mind for thinking about what his good for his soul. Paul reminds us of this when he writes in Philippians 4:8: ‘Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.’

 

But meditation in a biblical sense is not a detached analysis of a biblical statement. True meditation usually occurs when the heart is amazed at the riches of God’s grace. The psalmist had been restored by the Lord and had been instructed by him. His experience had been so rich despite his unworthiness, and therefore his heart was marked by wonder at the goodness of God.

 

Cry for protection (vv. 28-30)

A believer can face many dangers. Sometimes, those dangers cause him great sorrow. The psalmist describes such a situation in verses 28-30. In his experience when he wrote, the cause of his sorrow is described in verse 29 as ‘false ways’. He does not specify what those ways were or how they had come to his notice. Yet he was disturbed by them.

 

While we cannot know the precise cause, we can refer to other biblical references that point to the causes of spiritual distress. Take, for example, Paul’s words in Philippians 3:17-19: ‘Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.’ Here were a group of people who pretended to follow Jesus but whose practice said the opposite. The apostle’s response was to weep.

 

Later in this psalm, the author will write, ‘My eyes shed streams of tears, because people do not keep your law.’ He saw them following false ways and he did not merely criticise. Instead, he was deeply upset when he saw the disdain that people showed to the authority of God.

 

But there can be deep sorrow within a believer because of his own succumbing to false ways. Recall the words of David in Psalm 31:9-10: ‘Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted from grief; my soul and my body also. For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away.’ Here is the author of many joyful psalms reminding us that there were times when his distress was great at his own sins.

 

As was the case in the previous problem described in verses 25-27, which the Lord had resolved, the psalmist turns again to God and asks to be strengthened according to his word. When we come to God, we must come on his terms, and he tells us to come boldly, with confidence. The only place where we can get reasons for confidence is in God’s word. There we find promises to suit our situation and we can use them in prayer, looking for God’s help. The fact is that we need God’s strength for everything. It is good to remind ourselves that God is our refuge and our strength, a very present help in trouble.

 

We can see from verse 29 that the psalmist recognised the dangers of false ideas and practices. The best place to have them is as far away as possible. False ideas can arise from within us, or they may come from others. The devil can put such ideas into our minds when he comes as an angel of light. A couple of years after I was converted, I recall attending an evangelistic service in which I heard a man say that repentance was only a response required of Old Testament believers. Thankfully, most of his listeners knew that he was advocating something false. But imagine the effect if a listener accepted that notion as true and stopped repenting of his sins. The fact is that all false teachings have consequences, and since we may not be able to appreciate what is wrong, it is very important that we ask God to put false ways far from us, which is what the psalmist did here.

 

The best way to prevent accepting what is false is by knowing what is true. This goes for beliefs and practices. We can see that there is a link between the prayer in verse 29 and the determination of the psalmist in verse 30: ‘I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I set your rules before me.’ Clearly, there must be resolve and deliberate choice to walk in God’s ways. What does it mean to set God’s rules before us? Spurgeon comments that they should be ‘the mark to aim at, the model to work by, the road to walk in.’ In other words, every stage in our lives, every step that we take, every ambition that we have, every word we want to say, should be in line with the word of God.

 

Devotion to God’s ways (vv. 31-32)

How do we hold on to something that is precious? Imagine carrying an expensive vase across a room. How strong would our grip be? Or even if the vase was not worth much in financial terms, but that it had been given to us by a relative or friend, we would still hold it carefully. The psalmist affirmed that he could not bear to let any of God’s instructions fall, except with him the desire was not that the instructions would not fall out of his hands, but that they would not fall out of his heart. He regarded them all as very precious and he valued them all very highly. His love for God’s ways revealed that he loved the God who gave them. We don’t keep God’s statutes because the church tells us to do so. Rather we keep them because we want to please God at all times.

 

We can see from verse 31 that the psalmist was aware of the possibility of somehow being put to shame. There are two ways by which this could happen. One is that the shame could happen if he was publicly slandered because of his commitment to God’s ways. That is always a possibility for God’s people, that they will face ridicule for practicing God’s requirements. When that happens, it is not easy to bear. It is right to pray to God to prevent that kind of situation arising.

 

The other way is when they will be ashamed because they have not followed God’s ways and will be found out. For example, a believer might tell a lie in order to avoid a difficulty. He gets found out, and he is ashamed. Peter is an example for us to avoid when he denied that he knew his Master in the high priest’s house. Or when he chose not to eat with Gentile believers in Antioch because some Jewish believers had come from Jerusalem. Paul rebuked Peter publicly for that choice, and he would have been ashamed. We should pray that we will be given strength not to forget God’s requirements in difficult situations. It is always best to put God first.

 

I have never been an athlete, so I am not a person to expound the ways of a runner. Yet it is obvious, even to an amateur, that the essential requirement for running a race is to have a healthy heart. That is true in the natural world, and it is also true in the spiritual life. We can only run a good spiritual race if our hearts are in good condition. The psalmist tells us that in verse 32: ‘I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart!’ 

 

Paul expresses the same idea in Philippians 3:13-14 when he writes: ‘But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.’ He uses the illustration of a runner determined to race well. Of all spiritual runners, Paul could have looked back on a well-run race so far. Or he could have thought of occasions when his race had been affected adversely by others. But he did not do so. Instead he ignored the successes of the past and the pain of the past and focussed on the remaining part of the race.

 

What does God do to give us enlarged hearts? In Psalm 4:7, David describes an experience he had when he says to God, ‘You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.’ That was a heart enlarged by God. David begins Psalm 45, a song about the Messiah, by saying, ‘My heart overflows with a pleasing theme.’ That was an enlarged heart. Paul reminds the Romans in Romans 8:5: ‘hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.’ That is an enlarged heart. Paul prayed for the Ephesians: ‘that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God’ (Eph. 3:17-19). That was an enlarged heart.

 

He shows us his love, he shows us his grace, he shows us his mercy, he shows us his power, he shows us his promises. That is all part of divine enlightenment. We can put it this way. At the fall, our heart became small because it became controlled by self. When we are born again, our hearts became bigger because they now had room for God to dwell there. But we discover that our hearts can keep on expanding because they can always know more of God and his divine communications to us. The psalmist already had a big heart, but he wanted a bigger one. That is a good thing to pray for.

 

The last detail that we can mention is this: how do we know if we are running a good race? The answer is straightforward – we will be living lives of obedience to God. This must be a priority in self-examination. Do I love the laws of God, the instructions of his word, from the heart? The more we do so with his help, the more will we run eagerly in the way of his commandments.