In this exposition, we will work through Psalm 119:11.
I have stored up your word in my heart,
that I might not sin against you.
Psalm 119:11
Let’s first note who is speaking.
The Identity
The writer of this Psalm identifies himself simply as ‘the servant of the Lord.’ This is noted eleven times throughout the entirety of the Psalm. Specifically, in verses 17, 23, 49, 65, 84, 91, 124, 125, 135, 140, and in the last verse, 176. Stated simply, this is the servant of the Lord.
What that means is, he does the will of the Lord. He is under the authority of the Lord. He willingly serves God. But notice—this is an individual, a person, one in particular. It says “I”—not them, they, us, or we. But “I.”
God deals with individuals. He said to Adam after the fall in the garden, “Where are you?” He said to Moses from the burning bush, “Moses, Moses!” When Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord, God called him, “Samuel, Samuel!” So, too, the Lord called out to Saul on his way to Damascus, “Saul, Saul!” God deals with individuals.
Has he dealt with you? Has he called you? No, not audibly. Has he demanded that you acknowledge him, that you bow the knee to him? Has he invaded your life? Has he identified you? Has he hounded you? God deals with individuals. God calls individuals. You. Not them, not somebody else out there. But you.
So, we have noted first of all the identity: the servant of God.
Next we come to…
The Activity
The activity is found in this phrase: stored up your word.
This is action. This is movement. This is work. This is labor. This is accumulation. I have stored up. It does not say, “I sat still, twiddled my thumbs, thought for a very long while… and did nothing.” No. It says, “I have stored up.”
This servant is acting, as all good servants do. He is working for his master. Other translations render it, “I have hidden” or “I have treasured.”
Question: what will you store up, what will you hide, what will you treasure but that which you love? that which you want? that which you desire? that which you need?
It is useless to store up wood for the sake of wood. But to store up wood in order to warm a house in the winter—this is wise labor.
Do you store up?
Or do you skip your duties?
Do you act? Do you labor? When the harvest comes, do you have fruit to show? Or did you linger inside, lay in bed, fold your hands to rest… and now you wonder why poverty has overtaken you? Don’t be fooled. That which is stored up and treasured is that which is acquired. And that which is acquired is that which is labored for.
Shall a businessman suddenly find himself with great riches—spontaneous, random, arbitrary? No. That’s nonsense. He labors. He toils. He endures. He stores up and hides away and treasures. So too, you must labor, toil, store up, and hide away. You must treasure. So wake up. And store up the Word of God.
A Mystery
Now, I must confess a mystery. All that we have is received.
It is true. One must labor. One plants, another waters. But. God gives the increase. Understand? What do you have that you did not receive? It has all been given to you; life, a body, a mind, a soul, shelter, food—all good gifts from the Giver of gifts, God; he who gives rain to the just and the unjust, who satisfies the desire of every living thing.
One can only labor in the garden because of the strength which God supplies. One can only have a garden to labor in because God created this whole world. So, while it is your duty to labor, recognize that it is God who works in you both to will and work of his good pleasure, and that all crops are given by God.
Now, we see this servant of God taking action. And his actions are enabled by God. Notice that the action is specific. He says, “I have stored up…”
Your Word
It is the Word. The Word of God.
All his storing up, all his hiding away, all his treasuring is in relation to the Word of God. This is specific. This is precise. This is central. The treasure which he treasures is the Word of the Lord.
Listen to the writer of this very Psalm when he speaks of the word: v.9 How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word; v.16 I will not forget your word; v.17 Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word; v. 25 give me life according to your word!; v. 28 strengthen me according to your word!; v.42 for I trust in your word; v. 43 And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth; v. 49 Remember your word to your servant, in which you have made me hope; v.65 You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to your word; v.67 Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word; v. 81 I hope in your word; v.89 Forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens; v.101 I hold back my feet from every evil way, in order to keep your word; v.103 How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!; v.105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path; v.107 I am severely afflicted; give me life, O Lord, according to your word!; v.114 You are my hiding place and my shield; I hope in your word; v.130 The unfolding of your words gives light; v.139 my foes forget your words; v.160 The sum of your word is truth; v.161 my heart stands in awe of your words; v.162 I rejoice at your word like one who finds great spoil; v.169 give me understanding according to your word!; v.170 deliver me according to your word.
Why? Why does this matter? Why is this so central, so specific?
I answer the question with a question: why are we in this predicament known as sin? Why are even God’s precious people destined to fight against their sin till the day they die? You’ll remember, Adam, in the garden. The Lord said to Adam, “You shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
The Lord God told Adam, our father, our representative, do not eat from this tree or you shall die. And what did Adam do? Did he hide the word, did he treasure the word, did he store up the word? No. He cast it aside. And he set up his own law. And here we are, all of us. This is why it is so specific, so central, so necessary. It is the word which gives life. It is by the word that one is born again. Is it any wonder that it is by the word that we should live? And yet by casting it aside he died.
Do you see the centrality of the word just in this Psalm alone? Do you see its grand importance?
The word makes one pure, the word gives life, the word strengthens, the word gives hope, the word is instruction, the word is fixed forever, the word is sweet, the word is a lamp and a light, the word is truth, the word is awesome in every sense of the word, the word delivers. Jesus said, sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.
Paul says to Timothy, “from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”
It is the word that the servant of God stores up. All his activity is around the word. All his storing up concerns the word. Not man’s thoughts. Not man’s philosophies. Not modern psychology. Not psychiatry. Not your momma’s quaint, cute little sayings. Not fake news or real news or the latest scoop on the street. No. It is the word.
The servant of the Lord stores up. And what he stores up is the word.
When was the last time you opened your bible?
Can you say with the Psalmist, “your words are sweeter than honey?” Is the word precious to you? Do you treasure it? Maybe you read it every day. That’s good. But is it making a difference? Is it having an effect on you?
Shall a farmer work his fields to fill his barns and you, Christian, spend only fleeting moments in Scripture? The food purchased with ease at the store is good. But the fruit had from working your own soil is even sweeter. It is a greater thing, Christian, to work for your own food than to always be spoon fed from another. In fact, it is the mark of maturity.
Little babies are nourished at the breast. But it is ridiculous for a man to feed there. Young birds open their mouths wide in the nest to gulp the worms given by their mother. But a time comes to fly! To leave the nest and find your own food. I urge you: be in the word, read the word, study the word, meditate upon the word, so that you may store up the word.
And if you know nothing of this, plead with God to make it real.
So, we have seen the identity: the servant of God.
And we have seen the activity: storing up the word.
Now we come to…
The Proximity
What is the proximity? In my heart.
Deep within. In the inner recesses of my very being. The deep place of the human heart. Inside the inner sanctum. The heart is the secret place, the wellspring of all that I am and do, the fountain from which flows my very self. This is where I store up the word. Not primarily in my mind, not primarily in my memory—although that can help. But primarily in my heart.
It is out of the overflow of the heart that the mouth speaks. Surely it is out of the overflow of the heart that the eyes look, that the hands work, that the feet walk. It is the heart of man that determines the working of man. The car moves because the engine is at work. The man moves because the heart is at work.
Should the searchlight of God’s piercing and perfect sight plunge the depths and details of your heart, what will he find? When he opens the storehouse of your heart, will there be a stench? Shall he find within you the venom of serpents, the sting of scorpions, the blackness of death? Is your heart a great and awful abyss of depravity? Is the light within you darkness?
Surely. It is possible, terribly possible, to say with the lips and lie with the heart. To be a Judas. To kiss the savior with your lips and murder him in your heart. To say, “I know God” and yet your heart is a dwelling for demons. “This people honors me with their lips but their heart is far from me,” says Jesus of the Pharisees.
This means, that rather than being the recipient of grace, you are more like a hardened and hard-hearted Pharisee when you merely give lip service to God. To have the word not just spoken on the lips but treasured in the heart is the true mark of the saint saved by God.
The heart is to be a storehouse for the word of the Lord. It is to be a great barn in which the servant of God stores his precious grain and wheat and barley. It is the place of storing. The place of treasure. To take the fruits of our labors and lock them deep inside so that when winter comes we might have food. The laboring man cuts his wood and stores his wood so that when the chilling winds and grey clouds and white snows come upon his home, he might have fuel for the fire, to keep himself warm, to cook his food, and to grant light to all within the home.
You say, “I don’t know how. I can’t. I don’t understand.” Then go to God and tell him. Ask him for help. But you also go to the word and get to work, reading and studying and meditating. It’s outside of you and it must get inside of you.
Listen to the Psalmist in verse 36: incline my heart to your testimonies. He is talking to the Lord. He is asking the Lord to incline his heart. He’s saying, “Lord, incline my heart to your word!” and then, guess what? He says in verse 112, “I incline my heart to perform your statutes.” You see.
He asks the Lord, “Lord incline my heart” and then he tells the Lord, “I incline my heart.” So ask and get to work. The farmer prays to the Lord for a harvest. And then he goes to sleep inside all day? No! He works. So too, you must ask and also labor. This is no contradiction.
So, we have seen the identity: the servant of the Lord.
We have seen the activity: storing up the word of God.
And we have seen the proximity: in my heart.
and now we come to…
The Propensity
What is the propensity? That I might not sin against you.
Here is the grand desire, the great purpose, the propensity of the servant of God: that I might not sin against you. This is driving everything that we’ve already discussed. This is everything. This is why he stores up the word in his heart—that he might not sin against the Lord. Do you see that?
“I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”
Now, we can ask the question: what is it to not sin against God?
Can we state this in a positive way?
Yes, and it would be: that I might love you.
Do you understand?
The grand desire to not sin against the Lord is just the same as to love him, to obey him, to do his will. Where do I get this? How am I arriving at this point? 1 John 3:4 says this: sin is lawlessness. But to love God and love neighbor is the fulfillment of the law. Therefore, to not sin against the Lord is the same as to love the Lord. Let me try a brief order.
1: that I might not sin against you
2: sin is lawlessness
3: to love God & neighbor is to fulfill the law (be lawful)
Therefore, to not sin against—to be lawful, or fulfill law—is to love God.
Question: do you care at all about sinning against the Lord? Is your conscience ever moved or disturbed? Do you ever feel the weight of your sin? Have you had even a glimpse of the great evil you have done against God? Or do you go around as light as a feather feeling well and good?
Don’t you know that God has made you? Don’t you know that he has given you life? Don’t you know that he has brought you here to this place to read these words? How kind, how gracious, how compassionate of this God to show such mercy to we worms and devils.
Do you realize, “I’m a sinner, I’m a sinner. God I have sinned against you. I have hated you. I have cast your word far from me. I have gone to the pig pens of perversion, swam in the sewage of sin, drunk the dregs of death. I have hated you.”
If that’s you, I call your mind back to the word. The word.
The Second Word
There are two words of God. There is the written word—the Scriptures, the Bible. This is the written word. But there is another word. Praise God there is another word.
The Apostle John spoke of this Word. John says “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” He says, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
This is the incarnate Word of God. He who was in the beginning, He who was with God, He Who is God. Christ. The Lord Jesus Himself.
This Word says to you sinners: Come. Come! Come to the waters of life and drink freely. Come and feast at the table. Come home to your Father. Stop wallowing in the pig pen of sin. Stop sucking the sewage of the world. Stop feeding on dirt and dead flesh. And come feast on the bread of life, come drink the living waters. Repent and believe, and come to Christ.
Then you will truly be a servant of God. Then you will understand what it is to store up the word of God in your heart. For Christ Himself, the Incarnate Word, will come in and dwell within you, in all glory and wonder. He will be your light. He will be your life. He will be your strength. He will be your hope.
You say, like Peter, “Away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man.” You tremble in his presence. You do well. And he says this: this is the one to whom I will look, says God, he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word. So if you tremble, come trembling. If you doubt, come doubting. If you fear come fearing. But come to Christ. God will receive you if you come to his Word, if you come to His Christ, if you come to His Son.
To you who have already come—keep coming. Paul said at the end of his life, “I am the chief of sinners.” If that great man can say such, surely you also are in need of continuing grace flowing from Immanuel’s veins. Keep coming. Keep believing. Keep repenting. And store up his word in your heart. Take such pains, that you might not sin against him, your Lord and God, who took such great pains to save you.