The Bible is not like any other book. It's not merely an inspirational book full of helpful advice and encouragement.
It's a book filled with instruction. It gives life to the soul the way the Son gives life to the earth. Today on Truth for Life, we'll learn about the power and perfection of God's Word. Alistair Begg continues his examination of Psalm 19. Psalm 19, to the choirmaster, a psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words whose voice is not heard. Their cry goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.
In them he has set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and like a strong man runs its course with joy. Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat. The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul. The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever. The rules of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.
More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold, sweeter also than honey, than drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them, as your servant warned, in keeping them there is great reward. Who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults. Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins.
Let them not have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless and innocent of great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD my Rock and my Redeemer." Thanks be to God for his Word. We turn to God and ask his help. Father, now we come and humbly ask that you will speak to us through the Word.
We realize that the voice of a man is a tiny thing. It flies away, but that your Word is all that we have just affirmed in our song. And therefore, we look to you, and we listen to you, and we pray in Jesus' name.
Amen. Well, for those of you who were present this morning, you know that we began to look at this psalm. We said that we would consider, first of all, in the opening six verses, God's revelation in his works, or, as we put it under a heading, the majesty of God's works, and then that we would turn to the way in which God reveals himself in his words—so, if you like, from the majesty of God's works to the clarity of God's Word, or from, if you like, the eloquence of creation to the straightforward and clear expression of who and all that God is in his Word itself. Now, as we come to this, it's perhaps helpful to recognize that in the opening section, God is referred to in his most generic name, The Heavens Declare the Glory of God, EL. When the psalmist moves to the clarity of the Word itself, he changes, and he refers to God by his revealed name of Yahweh.
And he does so, I think, some seven times, at least when I counted them before. And it would seem that he is helping, as it were, to advance things in the very terminology that he uses to make clear the nature of the relationship that the saints of God enjoy in a way that is distinct from routine humanity, if you like, insofar as everybody who exists is capable of seeing the glory of God as revealed in creation, even though they may deny that it expresses that, that they may choose to suppress that truth. But only those, the children of God, who have been brought into the family of God, are then in a covenant relationship with Yahweh and therefore are the ones who are able to affirm the truths concerning God's Word itself. And what you have here in this section is a classic expression of Hebrew parallelism. In fact, for those of you who like to draw things out, you can diagram these verses very easily in three columns. And you can put the adjectives and the nouns and the verbs in three separate columns, and you will see both by looking across the column and by looking up and down the columns that God's Word is affirmed for us in this very important and clear way.
So, for example, just allow your eyes to scan the adjectives with me. The law of the Lord is—here's the first one—perfect. And then it is the sure testimony of the Lord. And then the precepts of the Lord are right. The commandment of the Lord is pure. The fear of the Lord is clean. The rules or the ordinances of the Lord are true.
And what you really have here is a succession of words that are, if you like, combining to make one great truth clear for the reader. When it says that the law of the Lord is perfect, this is the same word that is used, for example, of the will of God in Romans chapter 12, where it says—and then you can test and approve—the will of God, which Paul says is absolutely perfect. In chapter 18 of the Psalms—in fact, it's on my page if it might be on yours as well—this God, his way is perfect, the word of the Lord proves true. So David is affirming the fact that the will of God and the way of God and the Word of God is perfect. When he speaks concerning the surety of the testimony of God, the word is simply to remind us of the fact that this is a word that God has confirmed, or, if you like, that this is a word that God himself has verified. The precepts of the Lord proving to be right—the word that is used there for right—is a word that is not simply distinguishing between right and left or even right and wrong, but it has to do with morality. And it's making the point that the way in which God has established his world is within the framework of moral cleanliness. And then the remainder are simply pure and clean and true. It's not my purpose to delay on these.
We could spend… We could go through them all one at a time and be here until late in the evening. The point that we need to make sure we understand is that when you take these words and we set them against the background of our world tonight, then we're setting them in a context that is a dark background. Because the culture in which we live—and this is not entirely the case, but it is largely the case—is a culture that deals in half-truths, is a culture that has become adept at false news, a culture that is relativistic, a culture that is embracing compromise. And so, for us to be confronted by words like perfect, sure, clean, pure, right, true, is to immediately realize that the Word of God shines, then, into the darkness of the world in which we live.
Some years ago, when we were down having table talk downtown in the Old Stone Church, we had three talks, I remember, on a succession of Wednesdays. One was purity in a dirty world, the other was integrity in a shady world, and the other one was stability in an uncertain or in a shaky world. And most of that was grounded in what we find here in this particular section. The contrast, then, I put to you is unmistakable. But let's just pause for a moment on this opening statement in verse 7. The law of the Lord is perfect. The law of the Lord is perfect.
It's possible to go immediately wrong by this word law. If you immediately start to think in terms of the Ten Commandments, if you immediately start to think in terms of legislation, then you need to be corrected in your thinking. The word that is used here is Torah. And it is a comprehensive term for the will of God as revealed in the Word of God. It is, if you like, a comprehensive term for God's revealed will.
And its root meaning is instruction. So what he's saying is that the essential instruction that God has given to us, has revealed to us, is that which converts, revives the soul. In fact, Jim Boyce, the late Jim Boyce, says, if you want to consider our best equivalent, it would be the Scriptures or the Word of God.
Okay? So instead of us immediately thinking about laws and rules and regulations, think in terms of a comprehensive statement concerning the nature of God and the revealing of his mind and of his will. It has to do with everything that God has revealed to us. And, he says, this instruction is absolutely perfect, and it revives the soul. If you use a King James Version, an authorized version, or if you remember memorizing this as I do, then you will know that the word that is used there is the word converting—that the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. Plummer, who lived in the nineteenth century, I think in New England, says in his commentary, there is no good reason for limiting the meaning of the word converting to anything short of a saving change of heart. So that not all revivings are conversions, but all conversions are revivings, and that it is this word which God provides for us that gives life.
Now, this is very, very important, you see. When you think about it this morning, we said, the sun, which penetrates the entire globe, is actually the source of life on earth. Now he moves on, and he says, now, when we come to the instruction of God's law, to his Word, then this, in the way that the Son provides for us physically, this is the source of life spiritually. And the hymn writer, I Know Not—and I quote this all the time, it's one of my favorite songs—I Know Not How the Spirit Moves, Convincing Men of Sin, Revealing Jesus Through the Word, Creating Faith in Him. And what he's describing here is Truth for Life.
Truth for Life. In other words, he's not saying the law of the Lord is perfect and will make you a very skillful theologian. He's not saying the law of the Lord is perfect and is full of a lot of terrific ideas for how to live your family life.
No. He's saying the law of the Lord is perfect, and it revives, it converts the soul. It is a reminder, again, of what we want to happen, what we expect may happen, what we pray will happen when we study and teach the Bible.
The late Mark Ashton from St. Andrews in Cambridge writes very helpfully in a little book that was done before he passed away as just a young man. And here's what he says. In preaching, the primary aim is not to achieve increased biblical understanding, along with a few practical ideas for applying it to life. Rather, the aim is that after the text is proclaimed, we will encounter God himself in a life-changing way, i.e., that the Word will make a difference, will produce change. Now, it seems to me that that is perfectly in accord with this opening statement here in verse 7. And it's certainly in accord with what we read in the rest of the Bible. One of the great tests of the Old Testament is when you go into the New Testament and you see whether these truths and themes are carried forward, whether they're reinforced and reapplied and so on.
And of course, you wouldn't have to search very hard. And those of you who have an inkling of the Bible would be able immediately to affirm what I'm saying to you. Here we go. This is Peter now, and he's speaking to the scattered believers of his day. And he's describing in part what has happened to them. And he says—this is what he says—"You have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and abiding Word of God." So the Word of God was the agent applied by the Holy Spirit to these people when they heard the Bible being taught. That is why, you see, we want to encourage people again and again to come and hear the Bible being taught.
You know, when the pastors say that, it can sound very much as if what they're trying to do is raise a crowd. No. What we're saying is, if this is worth hearing, it's worth telling, it's worth sharing. Why? Because of who's sharing it?
No, because of what's being shared. Because we actually believe that the law of the Lord is perfect, and it converts souls. Therefore, if it converts souls, and if the hearing of God's Word brings light into darkness, then the more darkness you can bring into the context of light, the greater the opportunity there is for people's lives being radically transformed.
It really just makes perfect sense. You have been brought to faith through the living and abiding Word of God—and this is in accord with the song we've just sung—"for all flesh is like grass, all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever." And then he says, "'And this word is the good news that was preached to you.'"
James, he actually says the same thing, doesn't he? In his opening chapter, in his most practical little letter, of his own will, he brought us forth by the Word of Truth. Or, in the NIV, he chose to give us birth through the Word of Truth. Psalm 119, which is another Torah psalm, as is Psalm 1, incidentally—Psalm 119 says, the unfolding of your Word gives light, or the entry of your Word gives light. Today is kind of Luther Day for me, and so I'll just give you another quote from Luther as it fits with this thought. Here is Luther in The Bondage of the Will, page 73, in James Clark Publishers, London, 1957, for those of you who want to go and look for it.
This is Luther. Nobody who has not the Spirit of God sees a jot of what is in the Scriptures. The people can come in, they say, Would you like to take a Bible? They look at the Bible. It might as well be written in Chinese.
Or they could read it upside down. They don't know a jot of what they see in the Scriptures. All men have their hearts darkened, so that even when they can discuss and quote all that is in the Scripture, they do not understand or really know any of it. They do not believe in God.
Nor do they believe that they are God's creatures nor anything else. The fool has said in his heart, The Spirit is needed for the understanding of all Scripture and every part of Scripture. So, you see, when sometimes we say, And I hope you will pray, as the pastor is teaching the Bible, well, why would you need to pray? Well, pray for clarity, pray for fluency, pray for brevity, perhaps, but also pray that the Spirit of God will use the agency of the Word of God to penetrate the darkness of people's hearts who have come into the context of this, and they regard it as the strangest thing that ever happened to them in their life.
And then they walk out the door, and they go, There's this strange thing that happened to me today. Some of that has begun to make sense. Well, you see, it is his Word that is absolutely perfect. And then the synonyms that follow down—this is one of the other columns now—here are your nouns. Law, testimony, precepts, commandment, fear, rules.
As I say, if you want to just diagram it, you can make sense of it on your own. The testimony of the Lord is absolutely sure. Someone in a court of law says, And is that your testimony? And the person says, Yes, that is my testimony. Are you prepared to swear to that?
Yes, I am. So in other words, he's saying that this testimony, this truth, is affirmed by God himself. If you like, in his Word, God appears as his own witness to the truth and to righteousness. In the same way, the precepts and the commandments of the Lord speak again to the way in which God has purposefully and clearly delineated all that he desires with an authority which addresses the reader as we bow to it. And the fear of the Lord is clean. Fear actually doesn't quite fit, does it, as you look at it? Because it's not a synonym for law or for precept or for testimony or for ordinances or for rule. It isn't strictly so. What it is is a description of the effect of the law of God, the effect that it has on the life of the believer.
We'll come to that. But the fear of the Lord is clean. And the rules or the ordinances or the judgments or the verdicts of God are entirely righteous.
Again, you have the same thing in the previous psalm. Psalm 18 verse 22, For all his rules were before me, and his statutes I did not put away from me. This refers to decisions, if you like, already rendered by God, where he has made a decision. I suppose the attorneys here might call it case law, if you like. And so the application of case law. Here, as a previous judgment has been rendered, a decision has been made, and in the light of that it is now applied, and the psalmist says, and these judgments of God, these rules of God, you can take it to the bank that they're absolutely true and they are completely righteous. Now, with all that said, you still have to come to the verbs. If these adjectives describe these nouns, what in actual fact are these verbs making clear to us in terms of the effect of the law of God or the impact of the Word of God?
Well, they're written for us here, aren't they? That not only do they revive the soul, but they also make the simple wise. They make the simple wise. Now, when in Proverbs chapter 9 you have that sort of personification of wisdom, and Solomon is speaking to his son, and he says, Leave your simple ways and live, and walk on the path of insight.
It's not that the person is a simpleton intellectually here, but rather it is that they are morally susceptible to the by-path meadow and so on. And so here, the psalmist says, you know, the testimony of the Lord actually makes wise the simple, so that God teaches from his Word lessons that are appropriate to our weakness, so that he might reach down to where we are. It is through the faithful teaching of God's Word that men and women are converted.
You're listening to Truth for Life with Alistair Begg. Here at Truth for Life, we believe God's Word is infallible and eternal. Its instructions are the guideposts for our life.
That's why we teach the Bible every day with the expectation God will work through his Word to convert unbelievers, to establish believers in their faith, and to strengthen local churches. We hope this has been your experience as you listen each day. And along with Alistair's messages, we choose books with great care and with our mission in mind to recommend to you. You've probably heard me talk about the current title we're recommending called Mere Evangelism, 10 Insights from C.S. Lewis to help you share your faith.
When you read this book, you'll find out what made C.S. Lewis so effective at compelling others to seriously consider the truth of the Bible. Mere Evangelism explores how Lewis responded to questions, how he broke down objections, and how he appealed to people's love of imagery. You can refresh your own approach to evangelism by looking at 10 specific ways Lewis approached gospel conversations. Draw from Lewis's strategies to become more confident about sharing the gospel with others. Request your copy of Mere Evangelism when you give a donation to support the teaching of this ministry.
Just click the picture in the app or visit truthforlife.org slash donate. I'm Bob Lapine. Thanks for listening. We hope you enjoy the weekend and are able to worship with your local church. On Monday, we'll look at why it's not enough to read through the Bible just once, even if you read it slowly and take notes. We'll see why we need to continually return to God and to His Word. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.
