My Summer with Psalm 119 #23

As a few of you know, I love, love, LOVE Psalm 119. I thought it would be great to spend a summer focusing on that psalm and what others have had to say about it. I'll begin with Thomas Manton's Exposition of Psalm 119. It may take all summer to read all 158 sermons. But they're so GOOD, so RICH, I think it will be worth it.

Sermon 30 (Psalm 119:29)

• THERE are two parts of Christianity—destructive and adstructive. The destructive part consists in a removing of sin; the adstructive part makes way for the plantation of grace; there is eschewing evil, and doing good. We are carried on in a forward earnestness in the way of sin, but there is a great backwardness and restraint upon our hearts as to that which is good. The one is necessary to the other; we must come out of the ways of sin before we can walk in the ways of God.
• Here is— 1. The sin deprecated, remove from me the way of lying. 2. The good supplicated and asked, grant me thy law graciously.
• Error is very natural to us, and man doth exceedingly please himself with the figments of his own brain. All practical errors in the world are but man’s natural thoughts cried up into a voluble opinion, because backed with defences of wit, and parts, and secular interests, and other advantages; they are but our secret and privy thoughts which have gotten the reputation of an opinion in the world; for we speak lies from the womb;’ even in this sense we suck in erroneous principles with our milk.
• Nature carrieth us to wrong thoughts of God, and the ways of God, and out of levity and inconstancy of spirit we are apt to be carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men.’
• We need not only pray against lesser sins or spiritual wickedness, but from gross sins carried on presumptuously against the light of conscience.
• Man is strongly inclined to lying; it sticks close to our nature, so that God must remove it from us; as more fully afterwards. Thus for the object, a way of lying.
• Sin is removed either in a way of justification, when the guilt of it is done away; this David might intend. But rather in a way of sanctification, when the fault or blot is done away. This is mainly intended, as appears by the antithesis or opposite request, and grant me thy law graciously;’ that is, let it be impressed upon my heart, that such a temptation may be prevented for the future. Let me observe—Doct. That lying, especially a way or course of lying, should be far from God’s people.
• Examine— 1. What is lying? 2. Upon what grounds this should be far from a child of God? First, What is lying? Ans. Lying is when men wittingly and willingly, and with purpose to deceive, signify that which is false by gestures or actions, but especially by words. The matter of a lie is a falsehood; but the formality of it is with an intention to deceive; therefore a falsehood is one thing, a lie another. Then we lie when we not only do or speak falsely, but knowingly, and with purpose to deceive.
• Promissorily we lie when we promise things we mean not to perform.
• How do we lie to God? Partly when we put him off with a false appearance, and make a show of what is not in the heart, as if he would be deceived with outsides and vain pretences. God can see through and through all fair shows, and will not be mocked. We are said to lie to God when we perform not those professions and promises which we made in a time of trouble.
• As to men, there are three sorts of lies—Mendacium jocosum, officiosum, et perniciosum: there is the sporting lie, tending to our recreation and delight; there is the officious lie, tending to our own and others’ profit; and there is the pernicious and hurtful lie, tending to our neighbour’s prejudice.
• Where there is no truth, there can be no trust; where there is no trust, there can be no commerce; it makes men unfit to be trusted.
• We resemble Satan in nothing so much as in lying, and we resemble God in nothing so much as in truth.
• Truth is no small part of the image of God, for he is called the God of truth;’ and it is said of him, Titus 1:2, that he cannot lie;’ it is contrary to the perfection of his nature; nor command us to lie.
• Let our words consent with our minds, and our minds agree with the thing itself.
• In public worship, how often do you compass him about with lies! We show love with our mouths when our heart is at a great distance from God. Oh, how odious should we be to ourselves if our heart were turned inside outward in the best duty, and all our thoughts were turned into words! for in our worship many times we draw near to God with our mouths, when our heart is at a great distance.
• Nay, in our private worship, we confess sin without shame; we pray as if we cared not to be heard. Conscience tells us what we should pray for, but our hearts do not go out in the matter, and we throw away our prayers as children shoot away their arrows, which is a sign we are not so hearty as we should be. We give thanks, but without meltings of heart. Custom and natural light tell us something must be done in this kind, but how hard a matter it is to draw near God with truth of heart?
• Secondly, We now come to the blessing asked, Grant me thy law graciously.’ Where first the benefit itself, grant me thy law; secondly, the terms upon which it is asked, implied in the word graciously. The benefit asked, Grant me thy law.’ David had the book of the law already; every king was to have a copy of it written before him; but he understandeth it not of the law written in a book. But of the law written upon his heart; which is a privilege of the covenant of grace: Heb. 8:10, For this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel in those days, saith the Lord: I will put my laws in their minds, and write them in their hearts,’ &c.
•  Doct. 1. Then is the law granted to us when it is written upon our minds and hearts; that is, when we understand it, and our hearts are framed to the love and obedience of it; otherwise it is only granted to the church in general, but it is not granted to us in particular.
• We may have some common privilege of being trained up in the knowledge of God’s will, but we have not the personal and particular benefits of the covenant of grace till we find it imprinted upon our hearts. Well, then— 1. Press God about this, not only to grant his word unto the church, but to grant it unto you, unto your persons.
• The law is an enemy to them that count it an enemy, and a friend to them that count it a friend. It is a rule of life to them that delight in it, and count it a great mercy to know it, and be subdued to the practice of it; but it is a covenant of works to them that withdraw the shoulder, count it a heavy burden not to be borne.
• Doct. 3. That the law is granted to us or written upon our hearts out of God’s mere grace. Grant it graciously, saith David. I will do it, saith God; and God will do it upon his own reasons.

© Becky Laney of Operation Actually Read Bible