Last year my wife and I walked the coast-to-coast path across England. Our main concern was about my navigation and its potential impact on our relationship! We were saved by downloading the route for each day on my phone. So long as the red triangle (indicating our GPS position) was on the red line of the route, all was well. If we were ever in doubt, we could zoom in to get a more detailed map.

For the psalmist, the ‘law of the Lord’ is his map. He wants his ‘way’ to be perfect (v 1) and steadfast (v 5), staying on the path of purity (v 9). He wants to access as much detail as possible (v 18) so that he can walk with confidence and integrity. He is determined to memorise the route, so he won’t go off track (v 11).

At times we are unsure of which way to go. Is the map of the Word of God really reliable? We may be tempted to use our own judgement or to listen to directions from other authoritative voices (v 23), but the safest way is to let the map guide you (v 24). 

‘Open my eyes that I may see / glimpses of truth thou hast for me. / … Open my eyes, illumine me, / Spirit divine!’¹

There is deep sadness in this psalm. It affirms old-covenant faith, that God blesses people who live by his Law, but the psalmist, the young person of verse 9, knows that he is not one of them. ‘They … follow his ways’ (see v 3) – but he knows he doesn’t. He longs to be among those faithful people whom God blesses. Conscious of his past failings, he pleads with God not to forsake him. ‘How can those who are young keep their way pure?’ he asks. He answers that he must constantly study and obey God’s Law. My mind is drawn to the wealthy young man, whom we will soon meet in our Mark readings, who asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. When Jesus spoke of God’s Law, he replied that he had kept the Law since childhood. Jesus knew that was true, but it was not enough. The sadness of the rich young man, who turned away from Jesus, is the sadness of the young man who penned this psalm. The Law is, in the end, not enough.

There are verses here I have known all my life. ‘Hide God’s word in your heart’, we used to sing in Sunday School (cf v 11). Reading the Bible around our dining-room table of an evening, we used to pray verse 18, that God would open our eyes to see the wonders of God’s Law. Now I look back and wonder if I understood what the words meant. Yes, it is very important to know our Bibles, to be immersed in the Word of God, but that knowledge alone cannot save us. Not even knowing and obeying God’s Law, given on Mount Sinai, was enough, because it was in the end impossible. Only through knowing the Jesus of the Bible can we gain eternal life.

Jesus, Lord of the Bible, open my eyes to see you afresh in its pages and find once more my way to God, my path to eternal life.

¹ Clara H Scott, 1841–97