169 Welcome my cry before Your face, O LORD; give me understanding according to Your word!
170 Welcome my supplication before Your face, deliver me according to Your word. 171 Worshipful shouts my lips will pour forth, for You teach me Your statutes. 172 Wake, my tongue! – to sing of Your word, for all Your commandments are righteous! 173 With Your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen Your precepts. 174 Watchfully waiting for Your salvation, O LORD; what great delight is Your Torah† to me! 175 Would that my soul may live and praise You, while Your ordinances deliver me! 176 Wayward I have wandered like a lost sheep – seek Your servant!* Wherefore I will never forget Your commandments! *Or, “Wayward I have wandered like a lost sheep – You seek Your servant. Wherefore I will never forget Your commandments!” The translation depends on the vowel pointing. Meditation: “Tau” It is now Thanksgiving, and it is a special delight that we have come in this writing to the meditation for the letter Tau. Several things come together. Number one, I learned at some point in my education that there is a Proto-Hebrew or Paleo-Hebrew. During the history of the language the shaping of the letters shifted to be much closer to the letters of Aramaic. Aramaic was spoken in many more countries and was a more popular and widely used language. The Aramaic letters were more squared and “boxy.” There were less curves and angles. Number two, while taking a class in Ezekiel we studied chapter 9. While in exile in Babylon Ezekiel said (in typical Ezekiel imagery) that the Spirit of God picked him up by the hair and carried him off to the temple in Jerusalem so he could see what they are doing. While going to the temple Ezekiel saw: altars to foreign gods; what I can only describe as a “frat-boy bug-eating” cult. Outside Ezekiel saw the worship of sun, moon and planetary bodies. “And shall they not be swept away?” But beforehand in chapter 9 a man in a white linen garb with a tablet and either brush or pen was commissioned to go through Jerusalem and mark with a Tau on their foreheads all the faithful who would be preserved. Number three, and then the ad came on the radio that the Field Museum in Chicago would be hosting a display of the Dead Sea Scrolls. There was only one thing to do. Pack a few things in the car and the wife, who is also interested in languages, and head off for a seven hour drive to go see. So after seven hours of driving, and an overnight stop at my mother’s, we got to the Field Museum and went in. I spent hours staring at and reading everything that I could on the Dead Sea Scrolls, and went over to the Paleo-Hebrew display. Now, the Paleo-Hebrew Tau was very different. The more modern begins at the top left and has a horizontal line that then curves downward and follows the right-hand of the block of the letter and reaches the bottom right. There is at the bottom left what looked to me like a backward L and then a short stroke off to the left. The Paleo-Hebrew Tau is what looks like a lower case “t” leaning off to the left 45 degrees. I’m not going to ask you to look it up and see if you think it does not look like a cross, leaning to the left 45 degrees, but it sure does look like that. It’s like if you picked up a cross, put a shoulder under the junction of the upright and the crossbar, and started dragging it along the road, outside the city of Jerusalem. Again, I may not tell you to be impressed by the significance of that, but I sure am. Impressed by how this amazing Psalm, finds its way at the end to the cross of the hill of Calvary. This amazing meditation on the Word of God and all of the related terms comes home. And I remember that same professor who taught Ezekiel said “Torah” can be translated in many ways, including one of them being “Gospel.” Exactly! That is also why I chose throughout the translation to render the word “Torah” as the same word “Torah” with an inserted superscripted small cross following the “h”. Now to verse 169. There is the concentration of more frequent words beginning with the appointed letter. (In English it is W.) (There is a bit more alliteration going on in this section.) 169 Welcome my cry before Your face, O LORD; give me understanding according to Your word! Verse one is a call out from a sheep, a disciple, who must walk following his shepherd in an alien and hostile world. But God is the God who hears and the God who welcomes our cry. 170 Welcome my supplication before Your face, deliver me according to Your word. And why should our prayers and supplications be heard? Simply because they, and we, are carried along in the prayers of Jesus from the cross. There are three: one “Father, forgive them . . .” ; two “Eloi, Eloi” (My God, My God); three, “Father, into Your hands . . . “ 171 Worshipful shouts my lips will pour forth, for You teach me Your statutes. Now the cry out of the sheep, disciple, becomes the celebrating shout of worship. Assured, we celebrate because You connect me with Your Word. 172 Wake, my tongue! – to sing of Your word, for all Your commandments are righteous! And the call goes forward, “Wake my tongue!” That is similar to Psalm 103, “Bless the Lord O my soul.” The sheep, disciple, calls out to his own tongue, and then shifts who he is addressing and calls out to God, to sing of Your statutes. 173 With Your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen Your precepts. And again the call out of prayer. He is not only the God who welcomes the prayer, not only the God who welcomes our worship. He is the God who acts “with Your hand. . . “ It goes together like two apologetics books back in the 1970’s titled “He is There” and “He is There and He is not Silent.” There specifically defined, He is not silent; He answers with His hand. He acts. Is He worth following then? Yes, yes, oh yes He is! Even if I do not see? More than me seen - He sees; and He acts. Yes, yes, yes He is! There is someone who comes along carrying and dragging what looks like a Paleo Tau. It is a cross, and He says “Follow Me.” And what the Spirit has put inside me, calls out in response “Lord!” And though my little-faith steps are faltering and I have no way of keeping up with Him, He patiently leads and guides. I know Him as my Shepherd and Savior. 174 Watchfully waiting for Your salvation, O LORD; what great delight is Your Torah† to me! Watchfully waiting, yes. What great delight indeed is Your Torah! And again, the final completion of the Torah, is the cross. 175 Would that my soul may live and praise You, while Your ordinances deliver me! The great desire is to live in praise and experience God’s great story of delivering. 176 Wayward I have wandered like a lost sheep – seek Your servant!* Wherefore I will never forget Your commandments! *Or, “Wayward I have wandered like a lost sheep – You seek Your servant. Wherefore I will never forget Your commandments!” The translation depends on the vowel pointing. Wayward have I wandered - notice the alliteration. It is the prayer of one who is far from God. Again, pointing to the cross and the middle prayer from the cross “Eloi, Eloi . . . “ He had to come all this way to meet me where I was. He comes all this way to stand with me and to carry my separation. He calls out “follow Me” as He begins to head home. Psalm 22 verse one, “Eloi, Eloi” must be the path that leads to Psalm 22:22 “I will praise You in the assembly.” There He will gather us, and as the One with the cross gathers us, it becomes the place of blessing. “Follow Me.” And then a little puzzle. Is it “You seek Your servant” or “seek Your servant!”? “You seek Your servant” is an imperfect (hifl) and a statement of faith. The first vowel point looks like a capital “T”, but it is a vowel point that comes from the “A” vowel. The other possible translation, “Seek Your servant!” is an imperative (piel). It is a call out to God in the prayer. The first vowel point that looks exactly like the other, looks like a capital “T”. Its origins are from a short “o”. They sound exactly the same. Look exactly the same. I spent a week trying to figure out which one it had to be, and concluded it’s a matter of take your pick. My choice is to take it as an imperative in the prayer. In the Hebrew, piel, it is an intensive form of the word. Great passion is expressed. The Psalm has been leading up to this great expression of feeling for one hundred seventy-six verses. Prayer: Psalm 119 is a Psalm of great feeling. In no way is it a dry psalm, listing 176 things I can say about the Word. Rather it is the Psalm of the Great Disciple, Who comes to gather His sheep, to stand with His sheep, and call to His Father as He begins to bring us home It is the Psalm of journeying and questing, discovery and gathering, the cry out and the long journey back home to where there will be celebration forever. Oh Lord, My Friend, You have come to seek and to save, and to bring us home. When I hear You call “Follow Me” and see Your cross, help me to know what lies ahead: the gathering, the celebrating, the rejoicing to be together and the long, long, path of eternal life. Amen.
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11 Buried deep in my heart I hold Your promise,
that I might not sin against You. 12 Blessèd are You, O Lord; teach me Your statutes! Psalm 119:11-12 “Lord, Build My Faith and Life on Your Words” Therefore – because God has planted His word in my soul – because He has put His hand on me – only because of that – I bend my heart; turning to seek God. Deep in my heart I hold and treasure His promise. Notice verse 11 does not say “promises.” Yes, there are many promises from God, too many to count. But they all come together in the One Promise. This One Promise is the Promise with hands and feet. He is God Himself who gives Himself for us, to win us back from being lost. It is Jesus who brings all the promises together in His cross and empty tomb! And He gives Himself to us, so that our life is bound together with His life and His life is connected to our lives forever. His life flows into and through our lives. He binds Himself to us. Day by day He is our Savior, our Shepherd, and our Brother. Week after week He gives Himself through words of blessing and in the meal of bread and wine. Together with His body and blood He gives the promise, “given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” Day and night He hears my prayers; and all through the years to come He has promised to be with me. How do I respond to all this? How can I respond? I am caught up in the wonder of it all! I have a treasure that is beyond price, beyond riches, beyond imagining! His word, His grace, His Spirit, His love – all of these work deeply in the soul. They move, they call, they invite and they draw me to Him. They change me. The promise comes from God and is enfleshed in Jesus. He comes into this world to bring the promises in Himself. He then teaches and brings the promises into our ears, from God, spoken deep within me and those words and promises begin to change me – first by creating a new heart and new me. And then God’s word works out into every part of me. Because of what He has done, I want to guard this treasure through the strength of His word. I want to desire what God desires. So, the whole idea of wandering off from God and forgetting His word, His commandments and His promises – Preserve me dear Lord, may I never! This is not because I am afraid of God and think I had better obey; but simply because He is my God who has loved and saved me, and these are His words. They are my treasure. It is like something I learned about my grandfather. When my parents were going through papers, they found letters from my grandmother, and exclaimed, “He saved every one of her letters from before they were married!” So it is with God’s words and promises to me. They are His. They are from Him. And they call my soul. They are love letters from God. All of this leads to the cry. It wells up and comes from deep inside. “Blessed are You, O LORD; teach me Your statutes!” What do I want, O Lord? I want more of You! Prayer: Blessed are You Lord, my Savior and God. Blessed are You for Your promises of life, salvation, glory, fellowship. Blessed are You for every answer to prayer; and blessed are You for the hidden blessings held within Your wisdom. Blessed are You because You are the promise and You are the blessing. Guide me and lead me in Your word all through life . . . and forever! Amen. ב (BETH) – Verses 9-16
9 By what means can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to Your word. 10 Bending all my heart I seek You; let me not wander from Your commandments! 11 Buried deep in my heart I hold Your promise, that I might not sin against You. 12 Blessèd are You, O Lord; teach me Your statutes! 13 By my lips I declare all the just decrees of Your mouth. 14 Blissful, I exult in the way of Your testimonies as over all riches. 15 Bound to Your precepts I meditate and I fix my eyes on Your ways. 16 Boundlessly I will delight in your statutes; I will not forget your word. ב (BETH) – Part 1 Verses 9-10 “Remember Your Creator in the Days of Your Youth” (Ecclesiastes 12:1) Where do I; where can I find a firm foundation? On what do I build my life? On what can I rest my soul when so much in life is shifting and uncertain? I heard a saying decades ago: “Only when you are prepared to die are you then prepared to live.” All too often we think of our youth, our childhood, and our teenage years as a time of carefree wandering through life, putting off the days when we will have to get serious. The God of the Bible calls us to know Him in our youth. Never underestimate the importance of how God calls us even from our early years. Never underestimate the potential in your life, or in those around you of following, of having discipleship beginning to form at a young age, or of beginning early on to learn to share God’s love. One of the wisest people in the history of the world was Solomon. He looked back over his life and wrote down what he had learned. Part of it is, “Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth . . .” (Ecclesiastes 12:1) Think about David as a youth learning to walk with God and then standing up to danger and evil. Think about a young girl in Damascus telling about the God of Israel (2 Kings 5); or about the prophet Jeremiah called and sent by God in his youth (Jeremiah 1:6-7); or about Timothy the young pastor (1 Timothy 4:12). Through the centuries millions of us have learned this truth; that in our early years Jesus invites us to follow Him. He calls to us, He speaks His words of life and our lives are changed. All over the world He is even now calling children, young people and young adults to “Follow Me.” We hear story upon story of God calling the young. It makes sense. After all, Jesus was only a youth, 12 years old, when He was there in the temple with the Rabbis and teachers of the law asking and answering questions, and amazing them. (Luke 2:46-47) Think about the life and the prayer life of Jesus. As the psalm says, “From my youth I was cast upon You.” Jesus grew from infancy in a constant walk with God, a constant walk of faith. He tells us of His prayer life in Isaiah (50:4). “Morning by morning He awakens me; He awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught.” And earlier in the verse, “the Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word him who is weary.” Notice how Jesus treasured the word; how He focused all His heart on the words and promises of God. Jesus has words of hope and comfort for our time of need. All of this comes from standing under the trials of life holding to those promises. And so He calls us to follow Him in every time and age of our life. And then realize this truth. Even before our youth, God has called to us and invited us into relationship with Him. He knew me before I was me. He said to Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you. . .” (Jeremiah 1:5) David says, “You knitted me together in my mother’s womb.” (Psalm 139:13) And John the Baptist was still within the womb when he leaped for joy responding in faith to Jesus. (Luke 1:41-44) Prayer: Lord, call us to You in the days of our youth. Build in our hearts the foundation of Your word. Let my life be intertwined, woven together with, and held together by Your promises. Let me grow in faith, and in my soul let me treasure You in all that You are. In that way let me receive Your blessing and Your discipline, that I may grow as a disciple of Jesus. Amen. |
Rev. Mark WilligPastor Willig is pastor emeritus of Friends in Christ Lutheran Church. Archives
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