Psalm 119 has the distinction
of being the longest chapter in the Bible. It is made up of twenty-two stanzas
with eight lines or verses in each one for a total of 172 verses. I’ll never
forget taking the time and effort to memorize this psalm in its entirety back
in 1985-86. I worked very hard on it every day and at one time could quote it verbatim.
(Don’t ask me to do it today.) Over the past 40 plus years, I have also read 8
verses from this psalm every day for the first 22 days of each month. The
reason I was motivated to do this was because it was obvious to me that whoever
wrote this psalm was in love with the Word of God and desperately desired that
it was in his mind and heart to encourage and guide him each day!
Because there is no
inscription with Psalm 119, we do not know who
wrote this psalm. Suggestions have included David, Hezekiah, Jeremiah, Ezra,
Nehemiah, Malachi, and Daniel. The internal evidence makes it evident that the
author was a suffering saint who had to endure contempt if not downright ill
treatment. His enemies included Jews who were in a position of power and able
to do him harm. He was in physical danger, he was faced with apathy and even
apostasy in the ranks of his people, and he had successfully resisted
temptation. Some have thought he was a young man, others that he was old.
I personally always leaned toward Ezra being the writer of Psalm 119. One of my
favorite expositors, Warren Wiersbe, believes that Jeremiah the prophet was the
writer and gives several good reasons to support this. But again, whoever he
was he was in love with God’s Word. The psalm, as most Bibles show, is an
acrostic. It consists of 22 stanzas, each consisting of eight verses, and each
emphasizing, in order, a letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
Each verse in each stanza
begins with the letter of the alphabet to which the stanza is related. For
instance, each of the eight lines of vv. 1-8 begins with the Hebrew letter Aleph,
the lines in vv. 9-16 begin with Beth, in vv. 17-24 with Gimel, and so on.
There are 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet, and that his why there are 22
stanzas. This would be like using our 26 letters in our English alphabet, with
all the first 8 verses beginning with an A, the next 8 verses all beginning
with a B, and so on through all 26 letters. This psalm was probably written this
way as an aid to memorizing it.
The basic theme of Psalm 119
is the practical use of the Word of God in the life of the believer. When you
consider that the writer probably did not have a complete Old Testament, let
alone a complete Bible, this emphasis is both remarkable and important.
Christian believers today own complete Bibles, yet how many of them say that
they love God's Word and get up at night or early in the morning to read it and
meditate on it (vv. 55, 62, 147-148)? How many Christian believers ignore the
Old Testament Scriptures or read the Old Testament in a careless and cursory
manner? Yet here was a man who rejoiced in the Old Testament Scriptures—which
was the only Word of God he had—and considered God's Word his food (v. 103) and
his greatest wealth! (vv. 14, 72, 127, 162). His love for the Word of God puts
today's believers to shame. If the psalmist with his limited knowledge and
resources could live a godly and victorious life feeding on the Old Testament,
how much more ought Christians today live for the Lord. After all, we have the
entire Bible before us and two millennia of church history behind us!
I trust as we journey through
this psalm over the next several weeks that you will find yourself loving God’s
Word more than ever before.
God bless!
