My lips shall utter praise, for You teach me Your statutes. 172 My tongue shall speak of Your word, for all Your commandments are righteousness. 173 Let Your hand become my help, for I have chosen Your precepts. 174 I long for Your salvation, O Lord, and Your law is my delight. 175 Let my soul live, and it shall praise You; and let Your judgments help me. 176 I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek Your servant, for I do not forget Your commandments. — Psalm 119:171-176
These are fitting words to conclude this long chapter about the incredible value of the Word of God. The psalmist’s mouth is dedicated to praising the Lord and preaching the Word, because all of God’s commandments are righteous. Think about it: how much more could we be like Christ and less like the world if we saw as our purpose in life (and even the reason for our existence as born-again believers) to praise God and to preach His Word? Paul wrote: “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? . . . So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God’” (Rom 10:14-17).
Although choosing to dedicate our lives to the admonitions in the Word may mean that we have fewer of the “things” of the world, what a treasure we have in store for us in heaven! When we choose God’s way, He will be our help. The more we understand His righteousness and realize that His commandments are good and perfect, the more we will delight in Him and praise Him with our very lives.
In the end, the writer confesses that he has not forgotten the commandments of the Lord but admits that he hasn’t always kept them. He asks God to come looking for him when he strays. Will God do that? Jesus said, “What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine and go to the mountains to seek the one that is straying? And if he should find it, assuredly, I say to you, he rejoices more over that sheep than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. Even so it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish” (Matt 18:12-14).
Aren’t you thankful that the Lord seeks His servants? He doesn’t just let us wander off, but with His rod and staff He corrects and redirects us. We know we’re to love one another, but we sometimes stray from that as well. Even so, God’s hand and judgments are there to help us! The more we live by the Word, the less we’ll be ruled by our failures. Proverbs 24:16 says, “For a righteous man may fall seven times and rise again, but the wicked shall fall by calamity.” If you find yourself “prone to wander,” as the hymn writer mourned, remember that when we fall we can always come home to the Father and be welcomed with open arms. Thus, we can also forgive one another! “The end of all things is at hand; therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers. And above all things have fervent love for one another, for ‘love will cover a multitude of sins’” (1 Pet 4:7-10). The word “cover” here means to set aside. What if the church stopped sniffing for sins and started covering sin with love and prayer? I’m not talking about heresy or unrepentant immorality. But what about the mistakes, the unkind words, the insults spoken in the heat of the moment? What if we let love cover those times when a Christian behaves rudely or is puffed up and boastful, or is slow to listen and quick to speak (See 1 Cor 13)?
Dear sinning saint, the Word of God says that you can rise up and come home, where you will find God’s judgments to be loving and where you may receive a helping hand. Don’t wait another moment. Your failures don’t have to rule you. Come home, and be free!
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