Very much are we told of it.
I. ITS EARNESTNESS. It was "with the whole heart" (ver. 145). The very word "cry," repeated in this section so often, is full of suggestion as to what kind of seeking God this is. It denotes not only earnestness, but also sense of helplessness: if a man could do anything he would not "cry." It indicates, too, humility, simplicity, trust. It is the kind of prayer that has prevailing power
II. ITS PETITION. "Save me" (ver. 146). We know not what the nature of the peril was in which he then was, but it was evidently very great. This petition, though very concise, is very complete and direct and definite. We have many such prayers recorded. Blessed is it when the soul seeks to be saved - seeks with a cry like this told of here! If we knew our need of salvation, there would be more such crying unto the Lord.
III. ITS SEASONS OF UTTERANCE. (Vers. 147, 148.) Very untimely they seem. Sleep, surely, should have claimed such seasons. Very early in the morning, in the dim twilight, and through the silent watches of the night. "The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence," etc. (Matthew 11:12). Here was one of these violent ones. Blessed is the soul that is stirred to such intensity of earnest seeking as this man was!
IV. ITS TRUSTED PLEA. "Thy loving-kindness." (Ver. 149.) As suppliants for mercy, not as demanders of right due to us, must we come to God. As the publican, not the Pharisee.
V. ITS PROMPTING MOTIVE. (Ver. 150.) The drawing nigh of ungodly men. When we are going into the company of such, as we often have to do, we should specially seek for grace to be faithful and true. Here is a fit preparation for such a peril.
VI. ITS ENCOURAGEMENT. (Ver. 151.) True, they that follow after mischief are drawing nigh, but then, thou, Lord, art nigh likewise. Blessed recollection is this. It has helped God's people many a time, and ever will.
VII. ITS UNDERLYING CONVICTION AND SUPPORT. (Ver. 152.) He who possesses this will go to God, not as one who thinks his prayer may possibly do some good, there is just a chance - what a vast deal of prayer is of this sad sort! - but as one who knows that he cannot seek the Lord in vain.
VIII. ITS SUPREME AND CONSTANT AIM-HOLINESS OF HEART AND LIFE. See in every verse of the section how this aim is directly or indirectly avowed. To be right with God was his abiding desire. - S.C.
I cried with my whole heart; hear me, O Lord: I will keep Thy statutes.
Do we, or do we not, desire to get rid of every evil way? Are we anxious to be sincere and without offence, holy in our character, and obedient to God's statutes in our lives?
I. EVERY MAN WHO DESIRED PURITY OF HEART AND CHARACTER WILL BETAKE HIMSELF TO PRAYER. While struggling after purity he will soon discover that he is unable to reach it of himself. Sin will destroy us if we do not destroy it. Pray often, for sin will tempt often. Cry mightily, for Satan will tempt mightily. Innumerable snares will he place in your path; let your countless entreaties outnumber his devices.
II. THE MAN WHO DESIRES TO WALK IN GOD'S WAY NOT MERELY PRAYS, BUT HE RESOLVES. He will find out what God's statutes are; and when he has found them out, he will keep them, cost whatever it may. Need I say that nobody becomes holy against his will? No man keeps God's statutes without he exercises a resolve to do so. David sought after a thorough allegiance and a perfect conformity to the will of God. He says, "I cried with my whole heart; I will keep Thy statutes"; not some of the statutes that were agreeable to him, bur all of the statutes that had the Divine sanction. The true seeker for holiness is one who, while he resolves on obedience to God, will dare to be singular, if no man will accompany him in it. "I cried with my whole heart; I will keep Thy statutes." He meant to do it, though he should be without a companion, lie was prepared to stand alone.
III. THE MAN WHO IS THUS SEEKING PURITY, while he prays and resolves, if he be really wise and taught of the Spirit, WILL HAVE A DEEP SENSE OF HIS OWN WEAKNESS AND DEPRAVITY (ver. 146). As though he should say, "Oh, Lord, I am praying and resolving; but my prayers want Thine answers, and my resolutions need Thy might to fulfil them. My prayers — what are they? My resolves — what can they do? My God, I want sifting, I want sifting. Oh, save me, and then I shall keep Thy testimonies." Before ever we can keep God's testimonies we must be saved. We must he saved first from the guilt of the past, from our sinful selves. We whose nature is evil cannot do much with so bad a nature to baffle all our efforts to cleanse our way. This nature must be removed and a new nature implanted, or else, whilst the old nature is extant the old evil will assert itself. Lord, save me, save me; change my heart; renew my spirit; make the fountain clear; set the mainspring right! Oh, Holy Ghost, regenerate me, and, if Thou do this, then, not till then, shall I keep Thy testimonies.
()
People
Heth,
Nun,
PsalmistPlaces
JerusalemTopics
Cried, Cry, Guided, Obey, Observe, Save, Statutes, Testimonies, Trouble, UnchangingOutline
1. This psalm contains various prayers, praises, and professions of obedience.2. Aleph.9. Beth17. Gimel25. Daleth33. He41. Waw49. Zayin57. Heth65. Teth73. Yodh81. Kaph89. Lamedh97. Mem105. Nun113. Samekh121. Ayin129. Pe137. Tsadhe145. Qoph153. Resh161. Sin and Shin169. TawDictionary of Bible Themes
Psalm 119:145 5015 heart, and Holy Spirit
5017 heart, renewal
Library
Notes on the First Century:
Page 1. Line 1. An empty book is like an infant's soul.' Here Traherne may possibly have had in his mind a passage in Bishop Earle's "Microcosmography." In delineating the character of a child, Earle says: "His soul is yet a white paper unscribbled with observations of the world, wherewith at length it becomes a blurred note-book," Page 14. Line 25. The entrance of his words. This sentence is from Psalm cxix. 130. Page 15. Last line of Med. 21. "Insatiableness." This word in Traherne's time was often …
Thomas Traherne—Centuries of MeditationsLife Hid and not Hid
'Thy word have I hid in my heart.'--PSALM cxix. 11. 'I have not hid Thy righteousness in my heart.'--PSALM xl. 10. Then there are two kinds of hiding--one right and one wrong: one essential to the life of the Christian, one inconsistent with it. He is a shallow Christian who has no secret depths in his religion. He is a cowardly or a lazy one, at all events an unworthy one, who does not exhibit, to the utmost of his power, his religion. It is bad to have all the goods in the shop window; it is just …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
A Cleansed Way
Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed thereto according to Thy word.'--PSALM cxix. 9. There are many questions about the future with which it is natural for you young people to occupy yourselves; but I am afraid that the most of you ask more anxiously 'How shall I make my way?' than 'How shall I cleanse it?' It is needful carefully to ponder the questions: 'How shall I get on in the world--be happy, fortunate?' and the like, and I suppose that that is the consideration …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
'Time for Thee to Work'
'It is time for Thee, Lord, to work; for they have made void Thy Law. 127. Therefore I love Thy commandments above gold, yea, above fine gold. 128. Therefore I esteem all Thy precepts concerning all things to be right; and I hate every false way.' --PSALM cxix. 126-128. If much that we hear be true, a society to circulate Bibles is a most irrational and wasteful expenditure of energy and money. We cannot ignore the extent and severity of the opposition to the very idea of revelation, even if we would; …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
A Stranger in the Earth
'I am a stranger in the earth: hide not Thy commandments from me.... 64. The earth, O Lord, is full of Thy mercy: teach me Thy statutes.' --PSALM cxix. 19, 64. There is something very remarkable in the variety-in-monotony of this, the longest of the psalms. Though it be the longest it is in one sense the simplest, inasmuch as there is but one thought in it, beaten out into all manner of forms and based upon all various considerations. It reminds one of the great violinist who out of one string managed …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture
May the Fourth a Healthy Palate
"How sweet are Thy words unto my taste." --PSALM cxix. 97-104. Some people like one thing, and some another. Some people appreciate the bitter olive; others feel it to be nauseous. Some delight in the sweetest grapes; others feel the sweetness to be sickly. It is all a matter of palate. Some people love the Word of the Lord; to others the reading of it is a dreary task. To some the Bible is like a vineyard; to others it is like a dry and tasteless meal. One takes the word of the Master, and it …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year
Inward Witness to the Truth of the Gospel.
"I have more understanding than my teachers, for Thy testimonies are my study; I am wiser than the aged, because I keep Thy commandments."--Psalm cxix. 99, 100. In these words the Psalmist declares, that in consequence of having obeyed God's commandments he had obtained more wisdom and understanding than those who had first enlightened his ignorance, and were once more enlightened than he. As if he said, "When I was a child, I was instructed in religious knowledge by kind and pious friends, who …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII
A Bottle in the Smoke
First, God's people have their trials--they get put in the smoke; secondly, God's people feel their trials--they "become like a bottle in the smoke;" thirdly, God's people do not forget God's statutes in their trials--"I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget thy statutes." I. GOD'S PEOPLE HAVE THEIR TRIALS. This is an old truth, as old as the everlasting hills, because trials were in the covenant, and certainly the covenant is as old as the eternal mountains. It was never designed …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 2: 1856
The Dryness of Preachers, and the Various Evils which Arise from their Failing to Teach Heart-Prayer --Exhortation to Pastors to Lead People Towards this Form Of
If all those who are working for the conquest of souls sought to win them by the heart, leading them first of all to prayer and to the inner life, they would see many and lasting conversions. But so long as they only address themselves to the outside, and instead of drawing people to Christ by occupying their hearts with Him, they only give them a thousand precepts for outward observances, they will see but little fruit, and that will not be lasting. When once the heart is won, other defects are …
Jeanne Marie Bouvières—A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents
Of Deeper Matters, and God's Hidden Judgments which are not to be Inquired Into
"My Son, beware thou dispute not of high matters and of the hidden judgments of God; why this man is thus left, and that man is taken into so great favour; why also this man is so greatly afflicted, and that so highly exalted. These things pass all man's power of judging, neither may any reasoning or disputation have power to search out the divine judgments. When therefore the enemy suggesteth these things to thee, or when any curious people ask such questions, answer with that word of the Prophet, …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ
Seven-Fold Joy
"Seven times a day do I praise Thee because of Thy righteous judgments."--Ps. cxix. 164. Mechthild of Hellfde, 1277. tr., Emma Frances Bevan, 1899 I bring unto Thy grace a seven-fold praise, Thy wondrous love I bless-- I praise, remembering my sinful days, My worthlessness. I praise that I am waiting, Lord, for Thee, When, all my wanderings past, Thyself wilt bear me, and wilt welcome me To home at last. I praise Thee that for Thee I long and pine, For Thee I ever yearn; I praise Thee that such …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series)
And in Jeremiah He Thus Declares his Death and Descent into Hell...
And in Jeremiah He thus declares His death and descent into hell, saying: And the Lord the Holy One of Israel, remembered his dead, which aforetime fell asleep in the dust of the earth; and he went down unto them, to bring the tidings of his salvation, to deliver them. [255] In this place He also renders the cause of His death: for His descent into hell was the salvation of them that had passed away. And, again, concerning His cross Isaiah says thus: I have stretched out my hands all the day long …
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching
The Christian Described
HAPPINESS OF THE CHRISTIAN O HOW happy is he who is not only a visible, but also an invisible saint! He shall not be blotted out the book of God's eternal grace and mercy. DIGNITY OF THE CHRISTIAN There are a generation of men in the world, that count themselves men of the largest capacities, when yet the greatest of their desires lift themselves no higher than to things below. If they can with their net of craft and policy encompass a bulky lump of earth, Oh, what a treasure have they engrossed …
John Bunyan—The Riches of Bunyan
Excursus on the Choir Offices of the Early Church.
Nothing is more marked in the lives of the early followers of Christ than the abiding sense which they had of the Divine Presence. Prayer was not to them an occasional exercise but an unceasing practice. If then the Psalmist sang in the old dispensation "Seven times a day do I praise thee" (Ps. cxix. 164), we may be quite certain that the Christians would never fall behind the Jewish example. We know that among the Jews there were the "Hours of Prayer," and nothing would be, à priori, more …
Philip Schaff—The Seven Ecumenical Councils
The Daily Walk with Others (I. ).
When the watcher in the dark Turns his lenses to the skies, Suddenly the starry spark Grows a world upon his eyes: Be my life a lens, that I So my Lord may magnify We come from the secrecies of the young Clergyman's life, from his walk alone with God in prayer and over His Word, to the subject of his common daily intercourse. Let us think together of some of the duties, opportunities, risks, and safeguards of the ordinary day's experience. A WALK WITH GOD ALL DAY. A word presents itself to be …
Handley C. G. Moule—To My Younger Brethren
The Talking Book
In order that we may be persuaded so to do, Solomon gives us three telling reasons. He says that God's law, by which I understand the whole run of Scripture, and, especially the gospel of Jesus Christ, will be a guide to us:--"When thou goest, it shall lead thee." It will be a guardian to us: "When thou sleepest"--when thou art defenceless and off thy guard--"it shall keep thee." And it shall also be a dear companion to us: "When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee." Any one of these three arguments …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871
How to Read the Bible
I. That is the subject of our present discourse, or, at least the first point of it, that IN ORDER TO THE TRUE READING OF THE SCRIPTURES THERE MUST BE AN UNDERSTANDING OF THEM. I scarcely need to preface these remarks by saying that we must read the Scriptures. You know how necessary it is that we should be fed upon the truth of Holy Scripture. Need I suggest the question as to whether you do read your Bibles or not? I am afraid that this is a magazine reading age a newspaper reading age a periodical …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 25: 1879
The Obedience of Faith
"Is there a heart that will not bend To thy divine control? Descend, O sovereign love, descend, And melt that stubborn soul! " Surely, though we have had to mourn our disobedience with many tears and sighs, we now find joy in yielding ourselves as servants of the Lord: our deepest desire is to do the Lord's will in all things. Oh, for obedience! It has been supposed by many ill-instructed people that the doctrine of justification by faith is opposed to the teaching of good works, or obedience. There …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 37: 1891
Faith
HABAKKUK, ii. 4. "The just shall live by faith." This is those texts of which there are so many in the Bible, which, though they were spoken originally to one particular man, yet are meant for every man. These words were spoken to Habakkuk, a Jewish prophet, to check him for his impatience under God's hand; but they are just as true for every man that ever was and ever will be as they were for him. They are world-wide and world-old; they are the law by which all goodness, and strength, and safety, …
Charles Kingsley—Twenty-Five Village Sermons
What the Truth Saith Inwardly Without Noise of Words
Speak Lord, for thy servant heareth.(1) I am Thy servant; O give me understanding that I may know Thy testimonies. Incline my heart unto the words of Thy mouth.(2) Let thy speech distil as the dew. The children of Israel spake in old time to Moses, Speak thou unto us and we will hear, but let not the Lord speak unto us lest we die.(3) Not thus, O Lord, not thus do I pray, but rather with Samuel the prophet, I beseech Thee humbly and earnestly, Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth. Let not Moses …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ
That the Body and Blood of Christ and the Holy Scriptures are Most Necessary to a Faithful Soul
The Voice of the Disciple O most sweet Lord Jesus, how great is the blessedness of the devout soul that feedeth with Thee in Thy banquet, where there is set before it no other food than Thyself its only Beloved, more to be desired than all the desires of the heart? And to me it would verily be sweet to pour forth my tears in Thy presence from the very bottom of my heart, and with the pious Magdalene to water Thy feet with my tears. But where is this devotion? Where the abundant flowing of holy …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ
Links
Psalm 119:146 NIVPsalm 119:146 NLTPsalm 119:146 ESVPsalm 119:146 NASBPsalm 119:146 KJV
Psalm 119:146 Bible AppsPsalm 119:146 ParallelPsalm 119:146 Biblia ParalelaPsalm 119:146 Chinese BiblePsalm 119:146 French BiblePsalm 119:146 German Bible
Psalm 119:146 Commentaries
Bible Hub
