Psalm 119:1

Psalm 119:1

Blessed are those whose ways are blameless

We already have a mind-blowing statement! As we have seen before, to be blessed means so much more than to be happy. The “blessed” are those who do God’s will and who obey His laws. Some folk think that to be blessed means to be healthy and wealthy but it is so much more. You can be blessed and poor, you can be blessed and be sick, the truly blessed are those who live under the protective care of the Lord, who are guarded by Him and have complete trust in His will and His ways. The blessed are able to praise God in all situations because they know that He is in control, and He will care for them. 

Is it possible to be completely blameless before this God? No, but we can seek to obey Him and to walk as close to Him as is possible. This verse suggests that it is those who “walk according to the law of the Lord” who are the blameless. The Hebrew word for law here is “torah”, in other words, all the covenant instructions and directives that the Lord gave to his people through Moses. These are all found in the first 5 books of our Bibles and form a prohibiting prospect if they are the only route to true blessing! And indeed, this was the only way to relationship with the Lord for the Israelites. The keeping of the law was their one route to blessing and they were promised approval from heaven if they walked in God’s ways. The Lord said to Abraham, when he was ninety-nine years old, “I am God Almighty, walk before me faithfully and be blameless…” Genesis 17:1. 

Maybe, this Psalm will have little relevance for us unless we begin by seeking to live lives that are blameless before the Lord our God. Perhaps we need to make that commitment before we even get started on the rest of the Psalm! 

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