Blessed are those who keep His testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart, who also do no wrong but walk in His ways!(Psalm 119:2-3)
The psalms, and mostly all of the Bible’s
poetry, operate through what is called parallelism.
As a literary device, parallelism draws on this idea of connection and
similarity. Parallelism is when an
author constructs parts of a sentence to be grammatically similar, often
repeating a specific word, phrase, or idea. This repetition creates a connection
between the ideas discussed. These parallel ideas also become emphasized and
become more important for the reader. (Study.com, Parallelism in Poetry)
Parallelism, then, is used in the Bible to compare an idea previously mentioned
and paint how it should look like in another context.
The 119th psalm is chiefly
characterized with this poetic device. All throughout the psalm, the psalmist
would reword what he was describing in a preceding line and giving it a more
concrete picture. What struck me the most in today’s assigned reading (vv.
1-24) is in verse 2:
“Blessed are those who… seek Him with their whole heart.”
What really is to seek Him with my whole heart?
I’ve been crying out to the Lord about this. For the longest time, I’ve always
been burdened by the thought that I might not be seeking God with my whole
heart. That I feel like I’m not dedicating and devoting my whole life to Him
enough. I’ve always felt that I wanted to “do more” for Jesus. Serve God more.
And for years I have wrestled with the thought, “What else can I do for God?”
Through many nights and not a few tears, I have
tossed and turned with the thought. I always feared to look back at my life
after many years of pilgrimage in this world and regretfully say, “I wish I served
Jesus more, and better.”
And so I have always tried to figure out what I can do for Him, and for His
kingdom. I chose to teach to have wider opportunity to touch more souls. I
chose to specialize in humanities and the arts to have the license to talk of
life and life’s important lessons. I chose to constantly put myself out of my
comfort zone by talking and listening to other people for any chance of sharing
to them what Christ has done for me. And I have always, always desired to seek a way to take His word to the people more
explicitly. To be a biblical counselor, or even to be a teacher-missionary.
And I have been so consumed by this desire, that I’ve come to think that I must
be this, in order to be able to say I’m serving Jesus more; that I’m serving Him
with all that I am. With my whole heart.
But while these things indeed are so noble and
worth desiring and aspiring for, I think I’ve been missing the point of seeking
God wholeheartedly all this time. To seek God with your whole heart is not to
draw near to His throne to suggest to Him how you can serve Him better. It isn’t
coming up to Him with such excitement and saying, “Dear God, I figured out a
way how to use my life to best serve You. I think You’ll like it.”
But to seek God is to keep His testimonies. To seek God is to obey the precepts that He
has commanded, and obey it diligently. To offer your life to Him is to humbly
approach His throne to ask of Him, “What would you have me do, Lord?” To seek
God with your whole heart is to do no wrong, whether small or great, but to steadfastly
keep His statues in all areas of your life.
To seek him wholeheartedly is to soak yourself
in His word, find out what He demands of you from there, and steadfastly obey.
It’s sad that I have read through Psalm 119 so many times before, but that the
theme of the whole psalm has not been impressed in my heart until just this
morning.
With my whole heart I seek you; Let me not wander from your commandments!
(v. 10)
To seek God with one’s
whole heart is “to lie passive in God’s hands, and know no will but His.” (C.H.
Spurgeon)
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