Thy statutes have been my songs
In the house of my pilgrimage (Psa 119.54).
This psalm-writing saint, as one devoted to the true and living God, has written this verse as a testimony in prayer, addressed to Him. It is personal without being private, for the Psalms were given for all believers to sing, especially in public worship. The sentiments of this godly heart are shared by all true saints, even if such a great degree of clarity and conviction is not enjoyed by all. We all know something of this ideal and we all must keep striving to excel spiritually.
This text is a saint’s testimony that he has a song away from home. It implies three simple truths.
SAINTS ARE AWAY FROM HOME
Pilgrimage is a great theme running throughout the whole Bible. Adam, whose name means “man” and who represented all mankind, was cast out of Paradise on account of his sin. Our whole life now should be a perpetual quest for reentry.
God called Abram away from his old home and promised him a new one (Gen 12.1). Later, he confessed that he was a “stranger and a sojourner,” even when he was in the land of Canaan (Gen 23.1-4). The NT describes his experience this way:
By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God (Heb 11.8-10).
The Bible makes clear that Father Abraham’s experience is paradigmatic for all his spiritual children, that is, those who have believed the gospel after him. Jacob viewed his own life this way (Gen 47.9), as well as later Jews in the land, led by King David (1 Chron 29.15).
The psalmist is a faithful son of Abraham and makes this confession. He wrote of “the house of my pilgrimage,” (lit., “in the house of my dwelling place”). Surely this is a reference to this temporary life, not just “the house where I live” (NET Bible), which, while grammatically allowable, unjustifiably impoverishes the sentiment. As this psalm was apparently written before Israel’s exile, this phrase must be “a way of speaking of life here on earth as a temporary abode.” This is the view taken by almost all English translations, and it is supported by a statement just a few verses earlier: “I am a stranger in the earth” (Psa 119.19).
Though many modern Christians may be surprised to discover this, even Old Testament saints knew there was something better awaiting them. They possessed a hope of life after death, bodily resurrection, and eternal blessedness. Many verses illustrate and prove this, but consider, for two striking examples, Job 19.25-27 and Isa 65.17-18. The classic biblical statement describing the OT believers’ hope is Heb 11.13, “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.”
The pilgrim mentality is clarified even further in the New Testament. We Christian believers are aliens in this world and citizens of heaven. Peter called his beloved fellow believers “strangers and pilgrims” (1 Pet 2.11) and exhorted them to “pass the time of your sojourning here in fear” (1 Pet 1.17). Paul said of Christians, “for our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil 3.20 ESV). As the old gospel hymn reminds us,
This world is not my home, / I’m just a-passin’ through. / My treasures are laid up / Somewhere beyond the blue. / The angels beckon me / From heaven’s open door / And I can’t feel at home / In this world anymore.
There is a certain sadness to be endured by those who are still away from home. The psalmist has just been expressing his misery over the derisive speech of the ungodly (119.51) and his righteous rage over their apostasy (119.53). Sincere Christians have experienced both these things. In this world we shall have tribulation, Jesus said (John 16.33). Add to that our confident expectation that the heaven to which we are surely destined will surpass our ability to comprehend in its glory, beauty, comfort, love, peace, and joy. We are strangely homesick for a place we’ve never been!
Thus we need comfort on our earthly pilgrimage to heaven, and God graciously provides it in many ways.
SAINTS HAVE A SONG AWAY FROM HOME
The psalmist testifies of having “songs” in the house of his pilgrimage, translating a Hebrew word that usually means “a song accompanied by music” in the context of worship.
When unbelievers hear of a spiritual Christian’s hard lot in this world, and of the delayed gratification which heaven will be to us, they imagine that we must be very miserable indeed, but they know nothing of the saint’s delight in this world while on pilgrimage. Matthew Henry wrote a masterful treatise on “The Pleasantness of a Religious Life,” in which his main point was that there is no better way to actually achieve true, delirious happiness, even in this life, than by becoming truly “religious” in the highest sense, that is, a godly Christian believing the gospel of Jesus Christ and following Him as Lord. In our own day, John Piper has helpfully sounded this theme again and again, calling us to seek our highest joy and greatest good in God Himself. If people persist in thinking that the Christian life is inherently and inevitably “a drag,” no wonder they have no interest in it! Sadly, too many professing Christians think the same thing and give others that impression.
But by the psalmist’s candid testimony, despite the grief of conflict with and disapproval of the ungodly, he has a song on his pilgrimage, while away from his heavenly home.
SAINTS DELIGHT IN GOD’S STATUTES
The psalmist’s “song” was not merely instrumental, without words. It had an intelligent and spiritual substance. “Thy statutes have been my songs.” This clearly refers to the Word of God which is Scripture.
By “songs,” (a metonymy of the effect for the cause, or the sign for the thing signified), such pleasure, joy, and contentment as other men had in songs, David had in the word of God. Travellers used to lighten and ease the tediousness of the way by songs; thy word doth comfort me wonderfully. Or you may take it literally, the themes and arguments of his singing. Profane spirits must have songs suitable to their mirth; as their mirth is carnal, so the songs of carnal men are obscene, filthy, and fleshy: but a holy man, his songs suit his mirth and joy: he rejoiceth in the Lord, and therefore his songs are divine, “thy statutes are my songs.”
Manton also helpfully pointed out that statutes are composed of promises and precepts. Promises focus on our destination—heaven, with all its desirable qualities. Precepts describe our journey there—genuine holiness of heart and life, evangelical obedience to God’s commandments, the straight and narrow way commended by Jesus (Matt 7.14). In all journeys to any desired destination, you must travel the way there in order to arrive where you want to end the journey. Every journey’s way determines its end. If I drive southwest for 800 miles from New Hampshire through Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, I cannot be surprised when I arrive in West Virginia.
That heart is false, and that person hypocritical, who claims a desire for the destination of heaven without any zeal for the way there. As one author put it in the title of his book, No Holiness, No Heaven! Now we do not imagine for a moment that the pursuit of practical holiness, that is, walking in obedience to God’s commandments, makes a pilgrim personally worthy in himself to be admitted to heaven. Our whole righteousness for justification is alone in Christ and His work. But the holy walk is the evidence that one is truly on the way to heaven. When whole tenor of one’s life is against God and His commandments, then he may know for certain that he is headed for hell. And in his case, his personal demerit does make him worthy of the eternal punishment awaiting him there.
How is it with you? Which direction are you headed? Do you truly feel spiritually out of place in this world, and are you yearning for heaven? Are you traveling the highway of holiness? Do you have a song in the night, a song of praise to God that comes from His Word? Do you have a song away from home, as we have described? Then let these evidences of faith in you preserve you in the way until your journey’s end. He who has begun a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ (Phil 1.6). Amen.
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