The Pulpit Commentary on Psalms 19:14

The Pulpit Commentary · Joseph S. Exell and contributors · Public domain

A sacrifice and a prayer.

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my Strength and my Redeemer." Let us look at this language—

I. AS OFFERING A SACRIFICE. The thoughts and feelings of the soul uttered and unuttered.

1. The sacrifice is spiritual. Words and meditations. Man's heart is the most precious thing God has created—the jewel of the universe. The thoughts that come out of the heart and the words that utter them—these are the precious treasures the psalmist offers before God.

2. The sacrifice is complete. The words of the mouth and the meditation of the heart indicate the whole man. This is the Christian view of man's priestly work—the presenting of body and soul as living sacrifices. Not a partial offering of one part of our lives, nor of the outward apart from the inward life, but the total consecration of our whole being.

3. This offering is not acceptable to God on its own account. It is acceptable to God on account of the great expiatory sacrifice, and because that has brought us into a new and peculiar relation with God. Intrinsically, the offering is not acceptable. For all man's words taken together, what are they? Our words when they utter our most religious thoughts, our truest deepest faith, our most rapturous love, our triumphant hope and praise, are unworthy of being thus offered. But when you add the words of every day and every employment, these are vain, proud, irreligious, sometimes blasphemous. And then our thoughts! But God in Christ is pleased with our offering. A child's letter is pleasing to its father because it is his child's.

II. AS CONTAINING A PRAYER. Then what do they imply?

1. That God alone can deliver him from the sins he prays against. From secret and presumptuous sin. A faith is implied that God would so deliver him. They may have a wider meaning.

2. That God is the Inspirer of right words and right thoughts. "Make my words and thoughts such as shall be acceptable in thy sight."

III. THE WARRANT FOR OFFERING BOTH SACRIFICE AND PRAYER. The psalmist felt that God was his Rock and his Salvation. Stability and deliverance are the principal thoughts here.—S.

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