When a young man falls in love with a woman, or a young woman with a man, one of the first things that they do is to try and find out all they can about their beloved. They want to know what foods they like, what music they listen to. They want to know all about their job, their hobbies, etc. They want to dig deep, just as if they were studying for an important exam. It is only natural to want to know about someone you are interested in. The same should hold true about the Lord. Our psalm for this week gives us encouragement to pursue our knowledge of the Lord just as these young couples would.
Psalm 111 is one nine acrostic psalms in the Book of Psalms, where each line or verse begins with a different letter of the alphabet. You might remember back when you were a young child, learning the alphabet, and had a picture book to help you - A is for apple, B is for bear, etc. Psalm 111 has 22 lines (not verses, but lines), each beginning with a letter of the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
Our unknown psalmist dearly loved the Lord, and just like the young man in my example at the beginning, who wants to know all he can about the woman he loves, this psalmist wanted to learn everything he could about the Lord. He studied everything he could to learn about His works, the great things the Lord has done in the world (vs. 2). Do you and I really love the Lord? If we do, then we should love to study the works of God recorded in the Bible.
When we look into all that the Lord has done for us, and all of His mighty works, we can’t help but bring Him praise (vs. 1). The psalmist wanted to praise the Lord with his whole heart. This goes hand in hand with statements made in the Gospels, when Jesus taught us to love the Lord with all of our heart (Matthew 22:37). Believers should be both praising the Lord with all of our heart, and loving Him with all our heart, too.
As we look further into this psalm, examining all of God’s works, and things we can be thankful and praise Him for, we see that God is mindful of His covenant (vs. 5). A covenant is a binding, legal agreement between two or more people. When God makes a covenant, we can be certain that He will keep His end of the agreement. Man consistently has broken the covenants that were made with God, but not the Lord. The viability of the covenants the Lord makes rests in the Lord Jesus, not in man. The Lord is always able to carry out what He has promised. Because God has been faithful, we can trust His Word. He can be trusted!
God’s many works especially include that of redemption (vs. 9). Jesus paid the price to free us from sin’s power, giving His life as a perfect sacrifice. Now all believers can freely approach God’s throne in prayer (Hebrews 4:14-16). Our redemption, in addition to all of God’s works, is eternal because it is accomplished through Him (vs. 8).
Our author wraps up his psalm with a verse familiar to many, and that is that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (vs. 10). The only way to become truly wise is not by experience or academic knowledge, but it is found in fearing God. Fear of the Lord is having a reverential awe and a worshipful submission to Him. Without God, all of our decision-making is shaky. We are then prone to mistakes and foolish choices. A healthy fear of the Lord will lead to respect for His commands, precepts, and principles. When we fear the Lord, we will find it a joy to obey Him.
As we look through our own life, and the world around us, we can make our own list of all the works of the Lord that we have seen and experienced. Perhaps we could even make our own acrostic, our own alphabetical list. I know for myself, it would take way more than just one go-through from A-Z. Mere words can never plumb the depths nor scale the heights of the works which God has done!
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