Key Verse: Verses 7-8 - “I will praise thee with uprightness of heart, when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments.” (vs. 7) “I will keep thy statutes: O forsake me not utterly.” (vs. 8)
Key Words: I will praise thee (vs. 7), I will keep thy statutes (vs. 8)
Most scholars agree that the human writer of Psalm 119 is unknown. But this we do know, God is the Author of all His Word. Although, I will confess to you… I believe that David is the human writer of Psalm 119.
Every verse in Psalm 119 mentions God and the Word of God. The psalm contains seventy prayer requests. The psalmist refers to himself 325 times and mentions his sufferings 66 times. The psalm is broken down into eight-verse stanzas. Each of the twenty-two stanzas is identified with the Hebrew alphabet.
The first eight verses of Psalm 119 show us what will happen if we make God’s Word the center of our lives.
- They will be undefiled (vs. 1), and
- They will do no iniquity (vs. 3).
The psalmist closes the psalm with a two-fold promise. First of all, he promises to praise God; and secondly, he promises to keep the statutes of God.
Booker T. Washington describes meeting an ex-slave from Virginia in his book Up From Slavery: “I found that this man had made a contract with his master, two or three years previous to the Emancipation Proclamation, to the effect that the slave was to be permitted to buy himself, by paying so much per year for his body, and while he was paying for himself, he was to be permitted to labor where and for whom he pleased.
“Finding that he could secure better wages in Ohio, he went there. When freedom came, he was still in debt to his master some three hundred dollars. Notwithstanding that the Emancipation Proclamation freed him from any obligation to his master, this black man walked the greater portion of the distance back to where his old master lived in Virginia, and placed the last dollar, with interest, in his hands.
“In talking to me about this, the man told me that he knew that he did not have to pay his debt, but that he had given his word to his master, and his word he had never broken. He felt that he could not enjoy his freedom till he had fulfilled his promise.”
Are you keeping your promise to God?
Dr. Mike Rouse
What to do:
✞Keep your promise to God.
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