Psalm 119:18 — Eyes Opened to the Law

Many believers read a Psalm each morning for encouragement, and whole devotional books are built on that habit. The Psalms chosen are the comforting ones. Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in Scripture, and nearly every one of its 176 verses praises the law, statutes, commandments, testimonies, and judgments of Yahuah. In the middle of it stands a prayer that is almost never preached: “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law” (Psalm 119:18).

The word for law is torah (H8451), the same Torah the modern pulpit says was nailed to the cross. The word for wondrous things is the word Yahuah used for His wonders in Egypt: “I will stretch out my hand, and smite Egypt with all my wonders” (Exodus 3:20). The psalmist asks to see wonders in the Law on the level of the exodus itself.

The rest of the Psalter agrees. The blessed man’s “delight is in the law of Yahuah; and in his law doth he meditate day and night” (Psalm 1:2). “The law of Yahuah is perfect, converting the soul” (Psalm 19:7). “O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day” (Psalm 119:97). The book kept for comfort is a book in love with the Torah.

Yahushua read it the same way. After the resurrection He named “the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms” together as one witness concerning Himself, and then “opened he their understanding” (Luke 24:44–45). The comfort of the Psalms is kept and the Law in them is thrown away. Psalm 119:18 is a prayer for opened eyes, and the pulpit has taught generations to keep theirs shut to the very Law that prayer asks to see.