Psalm 119:144

Psalm 119:144

Understanding gives life

 and unAs we have seen, the author of this palm took delight in God’s laws because they were all he had that allowed him to draw near to God, to God’s thinking, to His righteousness. He took delight because this was the principal way that God had chosen to communicate with men and thus to know Him meant that you must read, understand and live out the Law. For any man or woman living up to the time of Christ, the way to God was through the written Scriptures, and whilst the history books, the prophecies and the collections of songs and prose were wonderful, the Torah was the crème de la crème. Here was great I AM, speaking directly to Moses on Mount Sinai and asking Him to write down everything that was in His heart. Here was a direct revelation of God in all His glory and here was His mandate for mankind, written down so that there might be no misunderstanding. 

Reflecting on all of this, the psalmist writes, “Your statutes are always righteous; give me understanding that I may live.” The ancient Israelites had a confusing and complicated view of life after death. They believed in an afterlife, a place of rest, it was called Sheol, but they had no understanding of what that place was like since no one had returned from it! Some believed in resurrection, but this was a concept they had no understanding of, until Christ became the firstborn from the dead. And even then they didn’t believe it! So, when a man writes, “Give me understanding that I may live,” it seems that he was referring to his life on earth, he wanted to know God’s righteous laws better, for in the keeping of them was long life. Our eternal life in Christ is guaranteed by His resurrection but if we want the very best out of our time on this earth, we too need to heed the righteous ways of our God. 

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