Devotional Short Note on Psalm 19: Half of Psalm 19 is dealing with nature as evidence of
God as Creator. The other half is dealing with the Bible as the revelation of
God as Savior. Our few notes will focus here on the second half. Revelation
through nature and revelation through His text goes hand in hand. One cannot
study the one without the other. This does not mean that the garbage of the
axioms of modern science and the glasses that the Victorian geologist Charles
Lyell gave the modern world should be used to superimpose Uniformatism over all
bio-data. All but. The Bible is the key to understand Biology and the sciences
and when it is in that correct perspective, Biology can help us understand the
text better as well. As we learn why pigs and other animals cannot be eaten in
Leviticus 11. Their digestive systems are designed by God to get rid of toxins
in the life cycle and thus toxic waste processing animals are not to be eaten.
That simple. Science is able to prove it. Psalm 19:8-15 is dealing
with the Revelation of God through the text in the first place and then what to
do with this world's deficit, sin as explained in Psalm 19:13-15. There are some
interesting concepts here. Humanity is served and helped by the text or
Revelation of God through the text in the following ways: 1. The Torah or Law of
the Lord brings the soul back (meshibat). This conversion role of the Law was
also seen by dr. LaRondelle in his book Deliverance in the Psalms, page
92. 2. The Testimony of the
Lord works on our IQ. It makes us wise (mahkimat). 3. The Precepts of the
Lord works on our EQ. It makes our hearts happy (mesamhe). 4. The Commandments of
the Lord gives a sparkling to our eyes. How does it give a sparkling to our
eyes? In this way: sleepy eyes means that people could not sleep enough since
they did not have the Sabbath rest the night before worship. Those who rest on
the Sabbath have sparkling eyes. Mitchel Dahood in his Anchor Bible
commentary on this verse draws our attention to an Amarna Tablet 142 lines 6-7
where the man from Byblos wrote a letter to the Pharaoh of Egypt, in my
understanding, Pharaoh Thutmosis IV who went through the 5 years of the entry
of the Israelites in Canaan between 1410-1405 BCE when the conquest was
completed. This is when this letter of Ammunira of Byblos or Gubla was written.
He said in typical Psalm 19:8 style: "Moreover, [I have
hea]rd the words of the tablet that the king, my lord, sent (thr)ough [Han]i
and when I [he]ard the words of the tablet of the king, my lord, my heart
rejoiced and my eyes [sh]one brightly". Byblos is not that far from
Israel. It is one of the Phoenician cities just above the Lebanon range of
mountains. Of course the Psalm was collected or put together by David between
1014-974 BCE. How archaic the Psalm is we do not know and whether David was
original here in his material we do not know either. 5. The Fear of the Lord
is clean. In our day and age there is no such thing as clean fear. Dictators
rule by fear and disguise, trick and treat. But the Lord rules with a fear that
is clean. It is rather holy respect that is in mind here. There is no time
limit to this kind of fear. 6. The Judgments of the
Lord is truth. Together with Judgment they are righteous. Since 1844 the Lord
has provided a special truth about Himself to the world through the ministry of
the Seventh-day Adventist church that the hour of His Judgment has come, the
investigative Judgment in heaven. The righteous are in a process of cleansing
the heavenly sanctuary of stigma objections by the heavenly jury who need to
see in opened life records whether the holy ones is fitting to join them in
heaven. Christ is our Righteousness. It should be successful. The saints do not
appear in court since Christ is their Representative Advocate. In Psalm 19:10 the writer
gave his own personal evaluation of the Revelation text of the Lord that it is
sweet and precious. In Psalm 19:11 the writer
is saying that the Revelation text of the Lord has a valuable function to
him/her as a servant. He is warned and in keeping it there is great reward. Psalm 19:12 explains that
a human is composed of hidden sins. "Errors, who can discern them?"
The word shegiot is used for errors. No one can understand them. They are not
always known. He asked to be acquitted from hidden ones (menistarot). As
LaRondelle repeatedly pointed out, as also many other Systematic Theologians,
we are sinful human beings even without any sinful act, however, the biblical
position is that we are judged by our sins and acts. Adam’s sin cannot be
accounted for my destiny simply because Ezechiel 18 says that the sins of the
son is not that of the father and that of the father is not the sins of the
son. Then again, a baby cannot be sinful and only when children reach the age
of knowing good and evil in maturity, the sins are theirs by their own actions.
Peccatum orginale or original sin is not biblical. Infant baptism was designed
to counteract superstitiously this skew doctrine of original sin superimposed
over the Bible. The Bible says that because of Adam’s sin, all men died but it
does not say all men are sinners because of that. It so happen that due to the
environment of sin that we are all born into, that no-one succeeded to be
perfect and the perfected faithful mentioned in the Bible, became so with the
relationship through Christ and assistance to overcome by the Holy Spirit, and
the Spirit is not weak but successful and efficient. In Psalm 19:13 he adds to
this request of atonement of hidden things, another list, this time he wants to
be kept back (hoshok) from presumptuous sins [mizedim]. According to BDB 267 at
2102 the word means "to boil up", "to act proudly",
"to act rebelliously". He asked to be kept from rebellious sins
[mizedim]. When a wrong is hidden in you and it boils up and out as severe acts
that hurts and damage others around you and especially the cause of God, then
that is mizedim or presumptuous sins. To be rebellious is to plan beforehand to
be rebellious and to resist. The premeditated rejection is ordered in the brain
to such a convenient arrangement that should someone confront you about it, you
have counteractions of rebellion to utter publicly, no longer hidden. This is
mizedim. Jesus wants us to pray: Lead us not into temptation. The temptation to
act what is sometimes our weakness in secrecy. The writer in this Psalm asked
that these premeditated thoughts should not rule over him/her [yimshelu]. As
long as it is thoughts they are not yet sin but when they form themselves in
acts they are accountable sins. That does not mean the thoughts are overlooked.
God reads the thoughts and that is why the writer pleads to be acquitted from
his thought sins in Psalm 19:13. It is then [az] says the
writer, that he shall be blameless [eytam from tamam = perfect] and he shall be
acquitted [wenigeti] from many transgressions [miphesha] (Psalm 19:14). If
he/she can get to the point that he/she is not acting out what he/she is
thinking, then at that point the person does not phesha or transgress (Psalm
19:14). Satan leads us into temptation but the Lord keeps us from presumptuous
sins or actualizing of premeditated thoughts, if we seek help. Some people do
not want to be helped. The writer is praying for this help in Psalm 19:14. His prayer is asking that
the words of his mouth may be acceptable and the meditation of his heart may be
before the Lord, his rock and his redeemer (Psalm 19:15). This Psalm has medicine
for everyone and victory as well.