GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
PSALM 119:83-85
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83 Though I am like a wineskin in the smoke,
I do not forget your statutes.
84 How many days does your servant have left?
When will you punish those who persecute me?
85 The arrogant dig pits for me,
which is against your law.
Oppression, oppression, oppression. Our poet feels used up, put upon, and pitfallen. But he shows his faith in every situation, and his love for God’s word.
First, he feels like “a wineskin in the smoke.” This is life in a tent, when an unused or empty bottle (wineskin) would be hung up high, where the smoke from the fire would darken it and dry it out until it was ugly and useless, something you might only use to carry water for the dog dish. When a servant of God is no longer serving God the way he used to, this is a feeling that can come on quickly. But the devotion is still there in his heart: “I do not forget your statutes.” Since statutes is a word that emphasizes the duration and permanence of God’s will, it’s a carefully chosen word here for the reverence for God’s word one has even when I feel old and worn out and no longer very useful. But being useful in a new way is not the same as being useless, and we must be careful not to despair when we enter new phases or stages of life.
“How many days does your servant have?” Since this is equivalent to “How few,” I have included “left” in the translation to make the English clear. The life of the believer is just as short as anyone else’s life on earth. Moses’ statement about “seventy or eighty years” still stands today (Psalm 90:10), although there will always be exceptions, such as Moses himself (Deuteronomy 34:7). But long or short, it is our time of grace. Isaiah said, “Seek the Lord while he may be found” (Isaiah 55:6). And Paul said: “Now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2). And the writer to the Hebrews warned: “Man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).
The one who trusts in God can still say, “When will you punish those who persecute me?” In this context, his question about how many days he has left is a testimony to how weary he is of constant attacks. One of these days, the devil will finally kill me, he says, knowing the true danger of the devil’s desire, which is not only the corruption of man’s soul, but the death of every man (Matthew 17:15; Mark 9:22; Psalm 35:4; 54:3). But God is the one who has command over all things, and if my life is spent because of someone else’s sin, or the devil’s machinations, before my time of grace would have ended according to God’s holy will, then they (the sinner or the devil or both) will be punished accordingly in eternity.
Along the same line, the poet confesses that sinfully arrogant people “dig pits” or pitfalls (NIV), places for the believer to stumble and fall. These are done “against God’s law,” which St. Augustine points out to be the very definition of actual sins. Original sin is the status in which we are conceived and born (Psalm 51:5). It is the intimate and deep corruption of the entire human nature, “destitute of original righteousness,” coming from the fall into sin of our first parents and generated by them to all of their descendants until the end of time. Actual sins are voluntary, even when they are done out of ignorance, since people are not compelled to do them. When actual sins are done to trap and eliminate Christians, then the sinner is sinning (1) against the Christian he hates, (2) against the angels who are dispatched by God specifically to watch over the life, faith and spirit of the Christian (Hebrews 1:14; Psalm 91:11), and (3) against God and his will, for “sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4). Also, the cry of the oppressed shows one of at least four sins that “cry out to heaven” (Exodus 3:7). The Lord hears his people and he acts. What do we anticipate when we cry out, like Peter sinking into the waves, “Lord, save me!”? Jesus reaches out his hand to catch us (Matthew 14:30-31). Do not doubt. Do not worry. Ask him for help, and he will give it. He always has our good in mind, “and we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love him” (Romans 8:28).
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
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Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota
God’s Word for You – Psalm 119:83-85 A wineskin in the smoke