Psalms 119:169 The Wisdom of Wanting Understanding

Hidden Treasures of the 119th Psalm. Today we get to jump into the last section of the 119th Psalm. The last eight verses are on the Hebrew letter Tav, and how amazing, how beautiful that letter is. This is the last letter in the word Truth, Emet. And in so many different ways, the letter Tav represents that, what's true, and what's right.

Absolutely amazing. And in so many different ways as you study the word, I think you'll see as we go through these eight verses, it's like what happens at the end of the story. That, you know, when the seeds have been sown and everything's been reaped, you know, what ended up happening.

You know, as a result of what you planted. You know, so here, you know, the fruit is going to be harvested. Literally God's stamp on things in so many different ways. And so this letter is absolutely beautiful as we dig into it in eight different verses. So as we always talk about the first verse, which is verse 169, would be the wisdom of the letter Tav.

And oh my goodness, the wisdom of this letter is absolutely spectacular, in my opinion. So the verse reads in English, let my cry come near before thee, oh Lord, give me understanding according to thy word. And so, you know, as always, the first word in the verse is going to start with the letter Tav. And in this particular case, the idea of let, which is that it's a really beautiful idea. But then the word let is actually a cuff, which we've talked about so many times is proximity and getting close to God. And so, you know, this idea of this cry coming before the, in other words, this person. Well, we, as we're saying this particular part of the prayer is we're wanting to get close and we're wanting God to hear us. Right. And what are we, what we're doing is actually asking a question.

That cry is kind of what it is. Like when you, when disciples have questions. And so I think it's absolutely the wisdom of the letter Tav is to tell us that when we have questions, who are we supposed to take that to? We're supposed to draw into God and we're supposed to ask him. And think about how many things in your life happened as a result of you pushing into God and asking him the big questions. While here, the big questions that were to ask are according to thy word.

In other words, how wonderful, how wonderful and wonderful when we have big questions about the word of God. Because what I have discovered, Morgan Snyder, who is sort of John Eldridge's protege, tells this story on discipleship. Morgan Snyder was a young college student in one of John's classes. And after class, one time he stood kind of back and then he came out and asked John if he could be his disciple. And John said, well, you know, in order to be my disciple, I need to know, what are your questions?

And Morgan didn't have any right that minute, but he went back and prayed about it. And then he came back and, you know, here we are, whatever, 30 years later, as, as that idea of, you know, the way we learn is we have questions, right? We don't understand everything. And the way we get understanding is if we ask, and if we let our cry come near before thee, right?

If we want to hug, harvest some truth, we have to ask those big questions. And so, you know, one of my favorite stories along this line is for years and years and years, um, I love the Song of Solomon and I studied it and I read it and I read it and I studied it. But the part that just had me perplexed and did have me perplexed for years was the part in, in, in the fifth chapter where the beloved, you know, has got do drops like drops of the night on his head.

And, and he reaches his hand through the lock of the door and he ends up with this mirror on his hand. And, you know, it says I was sleeping, but my heart was awake. The beloved, in other words, us, the church. And so many times I've been there, I slept, but my heart was awake. I rose to find my beloved, you know, but he was gone. And so he, she went into the city if you keep reading in, in the chapter. And what happens is the watchmen in the walls, they took me, they beat me, they took away my coat and they took away my cloak. And I thought, you know, clearly there's something significant about this, but I have no understanding of why we're hearing that she rose to go find her beloved. And as she's walking through the city, the watchman took her, they beat her, they took away her cloak.

And, and what would be the benefit of such a discussion? So I studied it and I thought about it and I prayed about it and I studied it and I thought about it. And at some point in time, he answered that prayer.

About maybe four years ago and when my mind was open to the understanding of what the question was that I had here on what that was all about, oh my goodness, it's beyond beautiful. You know, I'd always put it together that clearly when we're talking about this passage, it has to be related and somehow to the Garden of Gethsemane, right? Because, you know, there Jesus was, had great, you know, drops of blood on his, you know, that he was dripping from his hair, from his forehead. And, and also, right, if you remember the disciples couldn't stay awake, you know, he kept asking him, can't you wait with me for one hour? So as I pictured this and put myself back into that situation, I went, oh my goodness, there was a situation where the watchman took somebody and beat them and took away their cloak.

And who was that? That was Peter, right? Because what happened was, as Peter had told Jesus earlier that night, don't worry, I'm here for you no matter what. Well, later that night, as he was standing around these different fires, you know, they kept asking him, you know, aren't you one of them?

And in three different ways, obviously, he denied Christ. But I don't know if you thought about it, but what he was doing, he was wearing a cloak. He was wearing a mask, like we often do, that we are something that we're not necessarily, as Peter was to find out. Jesus's trial from afar, they beat him, and they took away his mask, so he could see for himself, right, where his heart really was. And so what a beautiful, beautiful passage, as we begin to see what the Song of Solomon, chapter five, is really telling us, is that, you know, when we sleep on our hearts awake, we're not aware of the mass that we're wearing, and God, fortunately, right, he is going to move in there and show us, right, we need those watchmen on the wall sometime. They may seem like they're being brutal to us, but what's actually happening is they're showing us the mask that we're wearing, and this is critical understanding to being able to get rid of that cloak, so we can move in closer to God, right? That letter of kuff, that idea of getting closer to God.

Well, what gets in the way so many times is the masks that I wear that I don't even realize I'm wearing. So, you know, I love the idea of, you know, the watchman beating me. And bruising me and taking away my cloak, because when that cloak is gone, then I can get up there close to Jesus like Peter did, right? And Jesus clearly restored Peter in so many different ways. And as a result, the fruit, the tav, you know, of that relationship, of the wisdom that he was given as a result of that beating is unbelievable. And there we have, for the beginning of the letter tav, this idea of truth, right?

It's amazing. It is the last letter in the word emet, which is truth, to give you an idea that at the end of the story, we will know the truth, which it's aleph, mem, tav. So that idea of, you know, aleph being the first letter, we talked about the middle letter being mem, which is the Messiah.

So you kind of got the father and the son in their own ways. But at the end, we're going to know what the truth is. So the last letter in the word truth has everything to do with what the letter is, emet.

You can hear that t sound. And it is also the first letter in the word torah. But the idea again of emet and torah and tav is that, you know, when you look at the beginning of the alphabet, it's true. The middle of the alphabet is true. And certainly when you get down to the end, you will know it's all true. Everyone will know what's true in the end. And that's we get to study these eight verses in the tav section. Yeah.