Psalms 119:144

The righteousness of Thy testimonies is everlasting: give me understanding, and I shall live.

Alive

I. Consider this prayer in its simplicity.

1. It is a suitable prayer for the awakened sinner. Christ is our life; but we need understanding, or we shall miss it.

2. It is equally applicable to one who is a Christian, and who is struggling against temptation.

3. It will often well up from the heart of the suffering believer.

4. It is suitable for workers. I want to get alive to the utmost; not only having life, but having it “more abundantly.” I have some life in me, thank God; but I want it to quicken me more completely.

5. It is a very proper and blessed prayer for aspiring minds in the Church of God.

6. Last of all, when we shall not be so much aspiring saints as expiring saints,--when we come to lie upon our last bed, and to look into the unseen, then may we still pray after the same fashion.

II. The prayer is to be more fully opened up.

1. Here is a want confessed, because it is deeply felt.

2. The prayer is evidently put upon the footing of free grace. Understanding must be a gift from God.

3. The psalmist speaks of understanding in a general way--“Give me understanding”--as if he wanted the faculty for use in many directions. We bear within our own natures so much to confuse, and confound, and entangle, that if we are not taught prudence and understanding we shall certainly never escape from the mischief that is within us.

4. Still, while the understanding sought for in the prayer is evidently of a general character, the former portion of the verse links it with a special understanding of the Word of God; and, oh, beloved, we need above all things to understand what God has revealed. Take care first that you know it.

III. Now we will go deeper, laying bare the argument of this prayer.

1. I think he means this--that the Word of God, when it is practically and experimentally understood by the mind, is a pledge of life. Do you think that God would take one of us to be His child and teach us His Word, and then after all permit us to be condemned to die? Is that His fashion?

2. The understanding of the Word of God is life, because we are told that the Word of God is the “living and incorruptible seed which liveth and abideth for ever.” Very well, then, if that seed is sown in my heart, my heart must live for ever. There can be no death where the seed is incorruptible. If the Word of the Lord be living within us, then there is within us a life eternal.

3. The Word of God is not only the seed of life, but it is the food of life. “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God shall man live;” and if you live on the word that cometh out of God’s mouth you cannot die.

4. The understanding of God’s Word is the very flower, and crown, and glory of true life. When a man so understands God’s Word as to experience it, and to practise it, he has reached a high point of spiritual culture, and his life will be loaded, like Aaron’s rod, with buds, and blossoms, and fruit unto God’s glory. He will be such a man that he shall only need to take one step and be in heaven. (C. H. Spurgeon.)