Canon Rob's Reflections

We have reflected on other verses of today’s psalm before, which isn’t surprising as it is, by far, the longest in the psalter. The verses set for today though, reveal the faith in a God who teaches His people if they are open to His guidance. Today the Church remembers Allen Gardiner, who was born in 1794 and who founded the South American Missionary Society. He travelled a great deal in his missionary work but, along with seven others, died of starvation in 1851 on the shores of Tierra del Fuego. He kept a diary during his journeys and, near the end of his life, he wrote a prayer including these words: “Help me to see myself in the light of your holy word, and to search and try my heart by it.” [Quoted in ‘Celebrating the Saints.’] Whether or not the verses of today’s psalm came to his mind, they certainly resonate with this prayer. For they are a prayer that the author will turn towards God in order that he may keep His laws. Yet the opening words make clear, in order to even begin to do this, the author needs to be taught by God how to do so. “Teach me, O Lord, the way of your statutes, and I shall keep it to the end.” Keeping God’s laws comes as a result of loving God. Thus, Psalm 119 begins with the words, “Blessed (or happy) are those who…walk in the law of the Lord.” The law in this psalm is not just the Ten Commandments. It includes religious, moral, civil, constitutional laws, most of which are found in the Old Testament books: Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Adherence to them all is what the Pharisees were renowned for but for Jesus they were summed up in just two: “love God and love your neighbour as yourself.” However, the author of today’s psalm, and others concerned with the subject, found it a delight, even a way to freedom, in keeping them. As we see in verse 35, “Lead me in the path of your commandments, for therein is my delight.” Walter Brueggemann, the American scholar and theologian wrote of Psalm 119, as well as Psalms 1 and 19, “These Jewish prayers are affirming and joyous, celebrative of the realization that the Torah (God’s Law) is not only command but assurance, not only a rule but a bulwark.”  In the psalm, as in all scripture, we are considering the relationship we have with God, who is Our Father in Heaven, and other people, especially those in need. [As you reflect upon this, think too of Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10.25-37.]


The main subject of Psalm 119 is clearly God’s Law, the Torah. However if you read all the verses set for today in one go, you will see that they are all prayers. Indeed all 176 verses are addressed to God! It has been described as a meditation stressing the happiness which comes from walking in the way of the Lord. In verse 40 the psalmist prays, “…in your righteousness give me life.” This, perhaps, sums up the meaning behind the entire psalm. What does ‘life’ mean to you? What really matters? Three verses earlier, the author had prayed, “Turn away my eyes lest they gaze on vanities; O give me life in your ways.” [Verse 37.] Here, he is asking God to help him get the priorities right in his life. To focus on what really matters. For Christians, and people of other faiths, the answer will start from believing and experiencing the eternal and steadfast love which God has for each of us, a love which leads us to respond by trying to live in the way that God wants us to, trusting that He knows what is best for us. You might like to consider this by asking yourself if this is what you see as the purpose of life, life for you and for all humanity.


One of George Herbert’s well known hymns is in the Hymn Book we use at St Dunstan’s and is appropriate as we reflect upon these verses of Psalm 119: “Teach me, my God and King, in all things thee to see; and what I do in anything to do it as for thee.” [629 in:‘Complete Anglican Hymns Old and New.’] This hymn is based on Herbert’s belief in an incarnational God where nothing is outside His love. “The world is the theatre of God’s activity….Nothing is unimportant to God and, for us humans, everything has the capacity to unlock eternity.” [‘Love Took My Hand: The Spirituality of George Herbert’ by Philip Sheldrake.]