The Golden Alphabet

An Exposition of Psalm 119

Charles H. Spurgeon

• Publisher: Aneko Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781622455119
• eBook ISBN: 9781622455126

Blessed are those who walk in the perfect way, who walk in the law of the LORD. – Psalm 119: 1The singular blending of testimony, prayer, and praise in Psalm 119 is admirable. In one verse, the psalmist bears witness; in a second verse, he praises; in a third verse, he prays. It is an incense made up of many spices, but they are wonderfully mixed and worked together to form one perfect sweetness. The blending greatly increases the value of the whole. You would not like to have the first third of the psalm composed of prayer, then second third made up exclusively of praise, and the third portion entirely made of testimony. It is best to have all these divinely sweet ingredients intermixed and worked together into a sacred unity, as you have them in this thrice-hallowed psalm. Its prayers bear witness, and its testimonies are fragrant with praise. This wonderful psalm, from its great length, helps us to marvel at the immensity of Scripture. As it keeps to the same subject, it helps us adore the unity of Scripture. Yet, from the many turns it brings to that one subject, it helps us see the variety of Scripture. How manifold are the words and thoughts of God! In His Word, just as in creation, the wonders of His skill are displayed in many ways.

Psalm 119:1-8

ALEPH

Blessed are those who walk in the perfect way, who walk in the law of the LORD.

Blessed are those that keep his testimonies and that seek him with their whole heart.

For those who do no iniquity walk in his ways.

Thou hast commanded us to keep thy precepts diligently.

O that my ways were ordered to keep thy statutes!

Then I shall not be ashamed, when I have insight unto all thy commandments.

I will praise thee with uprightness of heart when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments.

I will keep thy statutes; O do not utterly forsake me.

These first eight verses are taken up with a contemplation of the blessedness that comes from keeping the statutes of the Lord. The subject is treated in a devotional manner rather than in a teaching style. Heart fellowship with God is enjoyed through love of His Word, which is God’s way of communicating with the soul by His Holy Spirit. Prayer, praise, and all sorts of devotional acts and feelings gleam through these verses like beams of sunlight through an olive grove. You are not only instructed to devout feelings, but these verses influence you and help you to express those holy emotions that derive from being near God and His Word.

Those who love God’s Holy Word are blessed, because they are preserved from defilement (verse 1), because they are made practically holy (verses 2 and 3), and because they are led to follow after God sincerely and intensely (verse 2). It is made clear that walking in holiness must be desirable, because God commands it (verse 4). Therefore, the devout soul prays for it (verse 5) and feels that its comfort and courage must depend upon obtaining it (verse 6). In the expectation of answered prayer, even while the prayer is being answered, the heart is full of thankfulness (verse 7) and is fixed in solemn resolve not to miss the blessing if the Lord will give enabling grace (verse 8).

The changes are made evident with these words: (1) way – who walk in the perfect way, walk in his ways, and O that my ways were ordered; (2) keep – keep his testimonies, keep thy precepts diligently, ordered to keep, and I will keep; and (3) walk – walk in the law, and walk in his ways. Yet there is no redundancy of word or thought, though it may seem so to the careless reader.

The change from statements about others and about the Lord to a more personal dealing with God begins in the fourth verse and becomes clearer as we move forward, until in the later verses, the communion becomes most intense and soul moving. I will praise thee. I will keep thy statutes. O do not utterly forsake me. I wish every reader would feel the glow of personal devotion while studying this first section of the psalm!

1. Blessed are those who walk in the perfect way, who walk in the law of the LORD.

Blessed. The psalmist is so enraptured with the law of the Lord that he considers being conformed to it to be his highest ideal of blessedness. He has gazed on the beauties of the perfect law, and as if this verse were the sum and outcome of all his emotions, he exclaims, “Blessed is the man whose life is the practical record of the will of God.”

True Christianity is not cold and dry. It has excitement and delight. We not only consider the keeping of God’s law to be a wise and proper thing, but we are also warmly captivated by its holiness, and we cry out in adoring wonder, Blessed are those who walk in the perfect way! By this we mean that we eagerly desire to become such people ourselves. We wish for no greater happiness than to be perfectly holy. It may be that the writer labored under a sense of his own faults, and therefore envied the blessedness of those whose walk had been more pure and clean. In fact, the very contemplation of the perfect law of the Lord was quite enough to make him lament his own imperfections and long for the blessedness of an undefiled walk.

True Christianity is always practical, for it doesn’t allow us to delight ourselves in a perfect rule without producing in us a longing to be conformed to that rule in our daily conduct. A blessing belongs to those who hear and read and understand the Word of the Lord; yet it is a far greater blessing to be actually obedient to it and to carry out in our daily walk and lives what we learn in our searching of the Scriptures. Purity in our way and walk is the truest blessedness.

This first verse is not only an introduction to the whole psalm, but it can also be regarded as the text which the rest of the psalm discusses. It is similar to the benediction of the first psalm, which is set at the beginning of the entire book of Psalms. There is a similarity between this 119th psalm and the entire book of Psalms, and this is one example of it − that it begins with a benediction.

We also see some foreshadowing of the Son of David, who began His great Sermon on the Mount in the same way David began his great psalm. We do well to open our mouth with blessings. When we can’t bestow them, we can show the way of obtaining them, and even if we do not yet possess them ourselves, it may be profitable to contemplate them so our desires can be stirred up and our souls moved to seek after them. Lord, if I am not yet so blessed as to be among those who walk in the perfect way, I will think much about the happiness which such people enjoy, and I will set it before me as my life’s ambition.

Young people should begin their lives in the same way David begins his psalm. New converts should begin their profession of Christ Jesus in this manner, and this is how all Christians should begin each day. Settle it in your hearts as a fact and as a certain rule, that holiness is happiness and that we are wise to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness (Matthew 6:33). Well begun is half done. To start with a true idea of blessedness is important beyond measure. Man began with being blessed in his innocence, and if our fallen race is ever to be blessed again, it must find blessedness where it lost it at the beginning; that is, in conformity to the command of the Lord.

The perfect way. They are undefiled in the way, the right way, the way of the Lord, and they keep that way, walking with holy carefulness and washing their feet daily, so that they will not be defiled by contact with the world. They enjoy great blessedness in their own souls. In fact, they have a foretaste of heaven where blessedness depends much on being absolutely undefiled. If they could continue completely and altogether without defilement, their days would no doubt often seem like heaven on earth. Outward evil would hurt us very little if we were entirely rid of the evil of sin − the attainment of which the best of us still desire, but haven’t yet fully reached. However, we eagerly press toward that goal because we have such a clear view of it that we see it to be blessedness itself.

He whose life is, in a gospel sense, undefiled, is blessed, because he never could have reached this point if a thousand blessings hadn’t already been bestowed on him. By nature, we are defiled and out of the way, and therefore we must have been washed in the atoning blood to remove defilement. We must have been converted by the power of the Holy Spirit, or we would not have been turned to the way of peace nor be undefiled in it. This is not all, for the continual power of grace is needed to keep a believer in the right way and to preserve him from the contamination of sin and the world. All the blessings of the covenant must have been in some measure poured upon those who have been enabled from day to day to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord. Their way is the evidence of their being the blessed of the Lord.

David speaks about a high degree of blessedness, for some who are in the way and are true servants of God are still flawed in many ways and bring defilement on themselves. Others who walk in the light more fully and maintain closer fellowship with God are enabled to keep themselves unspotted from the world. These people enjoy far more peace and joy than their less vigilant brothers and sisters. Without question, the more complete our sanctification, the more intense our blessedness. Christ is our way, and we are not only alive in Christ, but we are also to live in Christ. Sadly, we blemish His holy way with our selfishness, self-exaltation, willfulness, and worldliness. As a result, we miss the full measure of blessedness which is in Him as our way. A believer who errs is still saved, but he does not experience the joy of his salvation. He is rescued, but not improved; greatly tolerated, but not greatly blessed.

How easily defilement can come upon us, even in our holy activities, and even when we are in the way! We can even come from public or private worship with defilement on our conscience, gathered when we were on our knees. The tabernacle had no floor but the desert sand, and so the priests at the altar frequently had to wash their feet. By the kind foresight of their God, the laver stood ready for their cleansing, just as our Lord Jesus still stands ready to wash our feet so we can be every bit clean. Thus, our text sets forth the blessedness of the apostles in the upper room when Jesus had said of them, Ye are clean (John 15:3).

What blessedness awaits those who follow the Lamb wherever He goes, and who are preserved from the evil which is in the world through lust! These people will be the envy of all mankind in that day (Matthew 7:22-23). Though now they despise them as fanatics and Puritans, the most prosperous of sinners will wish that they could change places with them at that...

Table of contents

• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• Psalm 119:1-8
• Psalm 119:9-16
• Psalm 119:17-24
• Psalm 119:25-32
• Psalm 119:33-40
• Psalm 119:41-48
• Psalm 119:49-56
• Psalm 119:57-64
• Psalm 119:65-72
• Psalm 119:73-80
• Psalm 119:81-88
• Psalm 119:89-96
• Psalm 119:97-104
• Psalm 119:105-112
• Psalm 119:113-120
• Psalm 119:121-128
• Psalm 119:129-136
• Psalm 119:137-144
• Psalm 119:145-152
• Psalm 119:153-160
• Psalm 119:161-168
• Psalm 119:169-176
• Charles H. Spurgeon – A Brief Biography
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