Thou hast enjoined thy precepts, to be kept diligently.
The psalm has just described the people who are blessed as they walk in the Lord's way. Now the writer speaks straight to God, and the first thing he says is that God has given commands — and expects them kept.
The verse starts with God, and what He gives is not advice.
There is first of all complete submission. Remember what a "commandment" is: an order given by God with full authority. Whether to Adam or to Noah, they had to submit. Adam did not, but Noah did submit. Are we willing to submit our will to His will? This submission is not imposed upon us, we are not forced to submit to our Lord Jesus! That would be the obedience of a slave. No, it is because we love Him that we willingly and gladly submit to Him.
Psalm 119 uses many different words for God's word. What does "precepts" add?
Verse 4: PIK-KOO-DEEM = Precepts (or Commandments). It occurs 21 times through the psalm (always in the plural). It means a charge given to us by God for which we are responsible, "to place in trust", or "to take oversight".
Others put it the same way, listing "precepts" among the psalm's ten terms as "the law as a charge upon man" — the word coming twenty-one times through the psalm.
The last word of the verse settles how much God asks.
The verse continues: "…to be kept diligently." There is nothing superficial about this submission! It is not a partial submission, but complete. There is no reserve, no holding back part, no hesitation, but a glad and whole-hearted surrender.
That raises a question. May we keep the commands that suit us and leave the rest?
We must not pick and choose. We tend to take up the commandments and precepts that suit us, but this is really self-will. What right do we have to select some precepts from the word and neglect others? None at all. To do so is, in principle, simply self-will and rebellion. What business has a servant to decide which of his master's commands he will obey? Surely, none at all. Every commandment carries the master's authority, so it has a claim on the servant's attention. And we may add: the more fully a servant obeys, giving respectful attention to every one of his master's commands, however small, the more he strengthens his position and grows in his master's confidence and esteem.
Does grace lower what God asks?
"You have commanded Your precepts" — the separate applications of God's principles — "to be kept diligently." God does not speak in plain, definite terms and then put up with us treating His words lightly. And that is not in the least what grace means. Nothing God has spoken is unimportant. Obedience is always what matters, and an obedience we can set limits on claims for us a wisdom higher than God's.
Being loved by God and being under His authority are not rivals.
But the God whose sons we are is holy, and demands in His children obedience. He would have us recognise His authority. If we stand in His grace, we are also under His government. We are just as much the subjects of His kingdom as we are the objects of His favour. We are as much His servants under His control as we are His sons in liberty… Knowing that I am His son makes me cry, "Abba, Father." Knowing that I am under Him makes me say, "Lord, what do You want me to do?"
A command can be kept out of fear of punishment. Is that Christian obedience?
It is not Christian to obey Christ merely because we must. Christ never obeyed like that. If someone only does a thing because he knows he will be punished if he does not, that shows his heart is not in it — he does not want to obey. Christian obedience is wanting to do a thing because it is the will of God. The Holy Spirit gives us the power for that by setting Christ before our hearts.
That changes how God's law feels to the one obeying — "no longer condemnation and the threat of death, but perfect delight and liberty."
- Commanded — the verse opens with God. A commandment is an order, so the fitting answer is to bow my will to His.
- Charged — "precepts" means something placed in my trust. God makes me responsible for it, not just informed about it.
- Completely — "diligently" leaves no room for reserve, hesitation, or holding part back.
- Consistently — picking the commands that suit us is self-will in disguise. Every command carries the Master's own authority.
- Cheerfully — grace never lowers the claim, but it changes the motive. Obedience becomes desire, and the law becomes delight.
Oh that my ways were directed to keep thy statutes!
The verse before speaks of God's command to keep His precepts, and this verse is the heart's answer — not a promise to perform, but a sigh. It asks who steadies a life, and why the psalmist prays about his ways and not just his good intentions.
The verse opens with a wish, not a claim. One writer hears a prayer in that sigh, and explains what a "statute" is:
Then there is a complete giving up of self. This is a prayer! It is the deep longing of the heart expressed in a sigh! There is a deep sense of complete weakness, and of our own inability to do anything that is pleasing and acceptable to God. Here is a cry for aid, for help, for power! Surely the Lord hears such a sigh! Surely the Holy Spirit will direct you and me to "keep Your statutes," to do His will and not our own! A "statute" is a direction from God to secure our obedience, or to stop disobedience.
Older translations read, "Oh that my ways were directed to keep your statutes!" The prayer is not for clearer light on what is right. It is for the actual living of it — and that is where dependence begins.
"Oh that my ways were directed." This is not only seeing God's ways — what the heart approves as right in itself. It is the desire that the actual course of life be ordered to keep God's statutes; our will is not satisfied, but turned towards God's. Here a man feels his dependence about the course of his life, and longs for it to be directed.
This verse holds two things together. God has the right to command, and the man who wants to obey knows he has no strength of his own.
With the blessedness of God's way before his soul, the psalmist turns to God in prayer. He admits God's authority to "command," and our responsibility "to keep" His precepts. He also longs to meet that responsibility. Aware of human weakness, the godly man looks to God to direct his ways, so that he may keep God's statutes (v. 5).
A wish to be ruled by God's law sounds strange if the law is only a burden. One writer sets this psalm beside Mount Sinai, where the law was first given:
How different is the spirit of Psalm 119. At Sinai the law came to men in the flesh, and they loathed it and rebelled against it; in Psalm 119 the writer delights in the law of God. Clearly he has been born again.
The same writer notes that one of the psalm's words for the law, derek, means a trodden path — here it is "not the law of bondage, condemnation and death, but the trodden path of delight that the renewed man longs to take."
The cry has a result attached to it. One writer follows the line from the cry, through a conscience free from shame, to praise.
It is we who need to be taught wisdom. So the heart cries out: "Oh that my ways" — my goings in the path — "may be directed to keep Your statutes: then I shall not be ashamed when I have respect to all Your commandments." And it looks ahead to His judgments — His decisions in the court of conscience. These so approve His righteousness that learning them will produce a spirit of praise in an upright heart.
Not every phrase in this section transfers unchanged to the Christian. One writer explains why:
It was a time when Israel had gone wrong. So here there is a special looking to God not to give them up completely. We see that the form of this psalm cannot apply to the Christian. He never expects to be completely forsaken. In a particular course of action he may apply it, when he knows he has followed his own will. But from the general principle we may learn much, as to what is worked in the heart regarding its moral disposition.
- Command — God commands, and this verse admits both His right to command and our responsibility to keep His precepts.
- Weakness — the "Oh that!" is a sigh, born of a deep sense that we are unable of ourselves to do anything pleasing to God.
- Directed — the prayer is not for a clearer view of God's way, but that the daily course of life be shaped by it. Here a man feels his dependence.
- Delight — men in the flesh loathed the law at Sinai, but the psalmist delights in it; he has been born again.
- Praise — a directed walk leaves a conscience with nothing to be ashamed of, and praise rises from an upright heart.
Then shall I not be ashamed, when I have respect unto all thy commandments.
The verse turns on one small word: "then." It answers the prayer just before it, promising a conscience free of shame — but only to someone who keeps all God's commandments in view, not a favourite few.
The confidence here is not a beginner's optimism. One writer reads it as the conclusion of a man who has already tried the alternative and failed. He quotes an older wording, "respect" for all the Lord's commandments, where the ESV says "having my eyes fixed on all your commandments":
Here is complete confidence. "Then" — it follows! He has learned from experience. He has learned from past mistakes. He has learned that he will not be ashamed, when he has "respect" for all the Lord's commandments! He says, in effect: "Yes, looking back I am ashamed of those times when I acted in self-confidence and in my own strength and wisdom, and failed miserably. But now I have learned not to have this self-confidence, but to have complete confidence in the Lord."
The shame the psalmist dreads is not embarrassment in front of people. It is the verdict of his own conscience. It comes from standing outside a way that comes whole or not at all:
Shame does not come from people's disapproval. It comes from a conscience that is not good according to God's revealed will. But this way is complete, and it is the only one. Whatever is outside it is not clean — it is the world, which God hates. We must be in it in will, heart, and way. Otherwise we are out of it, and so ashamed — if the will of the heart is right. If my mind and soul have discerned the excellence of God's way, then my conscience makes me ashamed when I am out of it in every respect.
The clear conscience of verse 6 is not self-produced. It rests on the prayer of verse 5, where a man who knows he cannot manage asks God to steer his steps:
The blessedness of God's way is before his soul, so the psalmist turns to God in prayer. He admits God's authority to "command," and our responsibility "to keep" His precepts. He also longs for this responsibility to be met. Aware of human weakness, the godly man looks to God to direct his ways, so that he may keep God's statutes (v. 5). Walking this way, he keeps a good conscience (v. 6). When the conscience is good, praise flows, not from formal lips, but from an upright heart (v. 7).
The reason is not arbitrary. God's whole will fits what we actually need:
We must learn not to pick and choose when it comes to the Lord's will for us. All His ways are blessedness and peace, all His will is good and acceptable and perfectly suited to our needs.
Selective obedience does more than leave gaps. It quietly produces a different book from the one God gave:
We are called to obey God's word as a whole — "All My law" — not just the part of it we prize most. When a believer follows only his favourite lines of truth, he is not strong and very courageous in obeying the whole of God's word. Some believers have selected certain portions of God's word for their obedience, the ones most agreeable to them, and so have in effect built a revised Bible!
An unashamed conscience does not stay silent. Learning what God judges to be right turns into praise:
No — it is we who need to be taught wisdom. So the heart cries out: "Oh that my ways" — my steps in the path — "may be directed to keep Your statutes: then I shall not be ashamed when I have respect for all Your commandments." The heart also foresees that His judgments — His decisions in the court of conscience — will so approve His righteousness that learning them will produce a spirit of praise in an upright heart.
Does this psalm apply directly to a Christian? One writer says its form does not fit a believer's position, though its moral lesson still holds:
We see, then, that the form of this psalm cannot apply to the Christian. He never expects to be utterly forsaken; in a particular course he may apply this, when he is conscious of having followed his own will. But from the general principle we may learn much, as to what is worked in the heart regarding its moral disposition.
- Then. This confidence comes from hindsight. The psalmist remembers how self-confidence failed him, and now leans on the Lord.
- Shame. He does not fear people's disapproval. He fears a conscience that cannot agree with God's revealed will.
- All. God's way is complete, and it is the only one. Picking and choosing among His commands builds a revised Bible of our own.
- Directed. He asks for the clear conscience before he claims it. Verse 5 confesses weakness, and that prayer opens the way to verse 6.
- Praise. A conscience with nothing to hide does not stay quiet. Learn God's judgments, and they come back out as thanksgiving from an upright heart.
I will give thee thanks with uprightness of heart, when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments.
Verse 7 makes praise the result of learning. That raises two questions: what are God's "righteous rules," and what makes a heart "upright"?
The opening eight verses of Psalm 119 move from blessing to prayer. One writer traces the steps:
With the blessedness of God's way before his soul, the psalmist turns to God in prayer. He admits God's authority to "command," and our responsibility "to keep" His precepts. There is also a longing desire to meet that responsibility. Aware of human weakness, the godly man looks to God to direct his ways, so that he may keep God's statutes (v. 5). Walking this way, he keeps a good conscience (v. 6). And when the conscience is good, praise flows, not from formal lips, but from an upright heart (v. 7).
One writer defines the phrase, and contrasts God's way of judging with ours:
The judgments of His righteousness are the decisions He makes about right and wrong. They express and carry out the righteous character of God. We have much to learn about His "judgments." We must learn that He always judges righteously — never on a whim, and never with prejudice, as men judge. We must learn from Him now on earth how to judge as He does. Then later, when we reign with Him a thousand years, we shall be able to put into practice what we have learned. Whatever He thinks best is good and right, even when He must discipline as a tender and compassionate Father. One day we shall stand before His judgment seat to be rewarded, and there we shall praise Him with uprightness of heart for all His righteous judgments.
The praise comes because the psalmist has learned God's rulings. One writer traces the cry of verse 5 through to the praise of verse 7:
It is we who need to be taught wisdom. So the heart cries out, "Oh that my ways" — my walking in the path — "may be steadfast in keeping your statutes! Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments." And it looks ahead: His judgments — His decisions in the court of conscience — so approve His righteousness that learning them produces a spirit of praise in an upright heart.
The phrase "upright heart" rules something out:
Real, deep desire is clear in verse 5, "Oh that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes!" If so, the psalmist would not be ashamed when he looked at all God's commandments. Instead he would praise the Lord, not in mere ritual, but in uprightness of heart, gladly learning God's righteous judgments (v. 7). So he has a settled purpose: "I will keep your statutes."
This praise is not a one-off. The same note runs through the whole psalm:
Psalm 119 has 176 verses, and no fewer than 174 of them mention the law of God under different names — law, commandments, precepts, testimonies, judgments, statutes, ordinances, word, way, path. Whatever name the law goes by, it is no longer condemnation and death threatening, but perfect delight and liberty. The writer bursts out, "My soul is consumed with longing for your rules at all times" (v. 20) — "Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous rules" (v. 164).
How far can a Christian make these words his own? One writer answers from the setting of the psalm:
But it was a time when Israel had erred. So here there is a special looking to God not to give them up completely. We see from this that the form of this psalm cannot apply to the Christian. He never expects to be completely forsaken. He may apply it in a particular case, when he knows he has followed his own will. But we can learn much from the general principle, as what is worked in the heart about its moral disposition. Verses 1-8.
- Learn — God's righteous rules are His decisions about right and wrong. He never judges on a whim and never with bias, and we are to learn from Him now.
- Conscience — those decisions are learned in the court of conscience. A good conscience is what opens the mouth in praise.
- Uprightness — the praise here is not ritual or formal lips. It rises from a heart that agrees with what it has learned.
- Practise — learning how God judges now is training for reigning with Him later.
- Overflow — one verse of thanks becomes a whole psalm of it. By verse 164 the same righteous rules draw praise seven times a day.
I will keep thy statutes forsake me not utterly.
This verse closes the psalm's opening section of eight verses. It holds two things together: a firm promise to keep God's statutes, and a plea that God will not abandon the man making it. Why does a promise end in a plea? And can someone who has already failed still say "I will keep"?
The confidence in the first half of the verse is not self-confidence. It follows two things: the psalmist has thrown himself on God, and he remembers how he has failed before.
Having cast himself upon God, the psalmist can say with confidence, "I will keep Your statutes," though recognizing past failure, which leads to the cry, "do not utterly forsake me!"
One writer defines both key words of the promise. He also shows where the strength to keep it comes from.
"I will keep Your statutes…" is what the Psalmist said he would do. "Keeping" means to observe and put into practice. His "statutes" are His directions, given to get our obedience. "If you love me, you will keep my commandments," the Lord Jesus said (John 14:15)… So God provides what we need to do what He asks. All this will keep us humble. We realize that by ourselves we can do nothing, as the Lord Jesus said: "…apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).
(The writer quoted John 14:15 from an older translation, where it reads as a command: "keep My commandments.")
The second half of the verse speaks to God as the one who governs. It asks Him to stay near a man whose heart is already set on His statutes.
The last verse is an appeal to divine government not to go far away from one who had in heart to keep the divine statutes.
The two halves of the verse fit together. Because the purpose in the first line is real, what is feared in the second line cannot happen.
Thus he has firm purpose, "I will keep Your statutes." If so, it is impossible that God would forsake him utterly (v. 8).
The prayer comes from a time when Israel had gone wrong. That background changes how far a Christian today can make the words his own.
Another part of this state of heart is a full will and purpose to obey and keep what God has ordered or appointed. It is what carries God's authority, not simply what is morally right or wrong. But this was a time when Israel had gone wrong. So here there is a special looking to God, asking Him not to give them up completely. We see then that the form of this psalm cannot apply to the Christian. He never expects to be completely forsaken. He may use these words about some path he has taken, when he knows he has followed his own will. But we can learn much from the general principle — what God works in the heart to shape its moral character.
Commentators differ on how far a Christian can pray these words. One writer says the fear behind the plea is already settled for a believer, and yet the prayer still has its use.
The Psalmist finishes this first section of eight verses with a prayer: "do not utterly forsake me!" But we who believe now, in this time of grace, have no reason to think that the Lord will ever abandon us. The Holy Spirit will not leave us and will not be taken from us, for He remains with us forever (John 14:16). This should not make us careless. It should encourage us to keep going with this constant prayer: "Lord Jesus, keep me close to Yourself."
- Kept — the promise. To keep God's statutes means to observe them and put them into practice. His statutes are His directions, given to get our obedience.
- Kept — by grace. The psalmist makes this promise after casting himself on God and admitting past failure. It rests on God's provision, not willpower — apart from Christ we can do nothing.
- Kept — the plea. The closing cry asks God's government not to go far away from a heart already set on His statutes.
- Kept — the certainty. Where that firm purpose is real, God will not forsake him utterly. The two halves of the verse answer each other.
- Kept — forever. A Christian never expects to be forsaken, because the Spirit stays with us forever. We use these words when we know we have followed our own will. The safe prayer is still this: "Lord Jesus, keep me close to Yourself."