Wisdom in the Word: A Meditation on Psalm 119:97-104

The psalms are a wealth of reflection, being the ancient hymnbook of God’s people.  Psalm 119 is a psalm of psalms, which are sequentially arranged according to the Hebrew alphabet.  In the selection for this week, we read of the wisdom gained from meditation on the Word of God, especially His law and testimonies.  Hear the song of the psalmist:

O how love I thy law!

 it is my meditation all the day.

Thou through thy commandments hast made me wiser than mine enemies:

 for they are ever with me.

I have more understanding than all my teachers:

for thy testimonies are my meditation.

I understand more than the ancients,

because I keep thy precepts.

I have refrained my feet from every evil way,

that I might keep thy word.

 I have not departed from thy judgments:

for thou hast taught me.

How sweet are thy words unto my taste!

yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!

 Through thy precepts I get understanding:

 therefore I hate every false way.

In our time and place, it is a sad reality that little is scorned more than the Word of God.  While history has certainly known many times where the Word has been rebelled against (the Scriptures themselves recount many such rebellions, together with their consequences,) our time seems peculiar in the way we have both ignored and attacked them.  Scholars inside and outside the Church have, for the last century or more, applied a theory arrogantly self styled as “Higher Criticism” to deconstruct the Scriptures like any other piece of western literature.  This methodology shows up in even our most commonly used modern translations of Scripture, where suppositions about relative antiquity and priority of ancient manuscripts flatters particular scholars, but does violence and undermines the text itself.  Higher Criticism as a theory presupposes the role of man over the Scriptures themselves, so that man becomes the judge of what is written—starting with the flawed assertion that Scripture is just another man made literary work.  Few people with their Bibles today, realize that the New Testament English translation they hold in their hands is based on an academically cobbled together “critical text,” giving priority to certain minority texts that were rightly neglected by the early church for their general lack of reliability (such as, manipulation by Alexandrian heretics, who clipped certain words and phrases out, to avoid conflicts with their heresies.)  While on the whole, the differences between the New Testament “critical text” (which Nestle-Aland now has in its 28^th edition) and the traditionally received New Testament text don’t create much doctrinal conflict, they do present to the reader an undermining of the authority and reliability of the Word of God.  If these “Higher Critics” have not succeeded in overthrowing the Scriptures themselves, they have succeeded in overthrowing the faith of several generations of biblical scholars relative to those Scriptures, so that broad swaths of the Church today do not think them reliable.

The world, already in conflict with the Word of God, takes the Church’s lack of confidence, and runs with it.  Why would a world that rejects the Law and Gospel of God on their own sinful pride, have any respect for a text that the Church doesn’t really believe anymore, anyway?  The world is happy to consign Scripture to the dustbin of history, so that they can recreate the world in their own sinful image, completely free of the shackles of the God they despise.  They desire to reformulate the definitions of marriage and family to suit their constantly evolving lust; they deploy a system of economics so that the wealthy prosper on the backs of the poor, suiting their own greed; they redefine the very nature of man into an evolutionary paradigm, where man sits at the top of a pyramid by the strength of intellect, tooth and claw rather than the Creator’s grace, suiting their own pride; they seek the abandonment of just law in society, bringing about a plague of anarchist “victims” who themselves victimize whole communities through insurrection and vandalism, suiting their own rebellion; they reduce the dignity of man to the utility he can provide, murdering children, the disabled, and the elderly, suiting their lazy convenience.  The world has always been striving to throw off the shackles of God and His Word, in their hearts always working out their true slavery to the devil and his evil angels, who have been murderers, liars, and rebels from the beginning.  As the Church loses her faith in the Word of God, we should not be surprised at the rapidly increasing degeneration of the world around us, anymore than we should be surprised that without preservative salt, how much faster meat rots in the hot noonday sun.

But what are we to do, against so great an onslaught of rebels, heretics, and degenerates?  As the psalmist reflects, the enemies of the people of God are ever present, urged on in maniacal fanaticism against God and His Word.  Where does the Christian take refuge, and find strength to resist so great a demonic hoard?  Our strength and our shield, our tower and our fortress, remain where it has always been since the foundation of the world:  the very Word of God.

Hearing His Word, and given faith by His Holy Spirit to believe and repent of our evils, we must turn from our corrupted and vain pursuits.  We must repent of letting God’s Word become the play thing of “Higher Critics,” who flatter themselves but destroy confidence in the Divine Word.  We must return to the Lord our God, whose Word alone breathes life and light, forgiveness and wisdom into hearts of all who will believe.  We must surrender to the Law of God, which points out our failures to be holy as He is holy, setting our eyes on the goal of loving God with our whole heart and soul and strength and mind, and our neighbors as ourselves.  We must surrender to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, receiving first the love of God which suffers and dies for our salvation, and which inspires us through His grace to live for Him and our neighbors.  We must be born again—born from above by Water and Spirit, fed by His very Body and Blood, Absolved by His very command, alive by faith and repentance in Him and His Word.

It sounds to be a daunting task, and indeed, it is.  No one alive on this globe has the power in himself to do all that is required, or even to believe and live.  But where our failure abounds, His Grace abounds all the more.  Where does the power come from, to submit to God and His Word, to turn from our darkness and come into His marvelous light?  Where does the strength come from, which brings us to faith and repentance, so that we might yield ourselves as living sacrifices to our saving God?  It comes by the very Word itself, as the Holy Spirit works faith in all who will hear and believe the Gospel.

Would you become wiser than your enemies that compass you all about?  Hear the Word of the Lord.  Would you be wiser than all your teachers?  Meditate on the Word of the Lord.  Would you understand more than the ancients?  Hold fast the Word of the Lord. Would you refrain your steps from every evil path?  Keep the Word of the Lord.  Would you not be severed from the righteous judgments of God?  Be taught by the Word of the Lord.  By the power of the Holy Spirit, the Word of the Lord will become to your taste sweeter than honey, and a meditation of love every day of your life.  By His Spirit, the love of Christ will save and transform you, so that your heart will delight in his righteousness, and despise every evil path.

If such conversion was your work or your decision, you would have every reason to despair.  But your salvation is accomplished by Christ and His Word, through which the world was made, and to whom the world and all its inhabitants shall return.  For the Word of the Lord endures forever, more sure than the earth and sun, stars and galaxies, physics and mathematics, which the Word itself brought forth.  The Word of God is itself your salvation, for the Word has become flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.  The Word of the Lord is the never ending life of His people.  Hear Him.  Believe.  Live.  Amen.