Psalm 119:25 – In the Dust
My soul is down in the dust.
Give me life according to your word.
Psalm 119 is an interesting–and biblical–combination of human action and dependence on Divine action. Verse 25, the first verse of the third section, is on the dependence side of the scale.
If you’re trying to formulate theology, the variety here might be troubling. If you’re human, and having human struggles, they probably just sound realistic. I’ve had many days when I started out with determination, such as “I have kept” as in verse 22, and an hour or so later I’m at “I’m crawling around here in the dust, Lord!”
God can and will work with either one. God is not limited by the ups and downs of human emotions.
And the two Hebrew words of the second half of this verse are quite powerful: Give me life “according to your word.”
“By the word of YHWH were the heavens made; by the breath of his mouth, all their host!” (Psalm 33:6) It’s the same word by which God gives life that God also created the heavens. The same breath that God breathed into the nostrils of a man made of dust–not just down in it, made of it–was the source of all that exists.
When our determination to get everything done and to do it right falls afoul of our various weaknesses, interruptions, and weariness, we have all that to call upon.
Will we remember that next time the load seems too heavy?
(Featured image generated by Jetpack AI.)
