34. Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law. This is the same prayer enlarged, or rather it is a supplement which intensifies it. He not only needs teachings, but the power to learn: he requires not only to understand, but to obtain an understanding. How low has sin brought us, for we even lack the faculty to understand spiritual things. Will God in very deed give us understanding? This is a miracle of grace. It will, however, never be wrought upon us till we know our need of it; and we shall not even discover that need till God gives us a measure of understanding to perceive it. We are in a state of complicated ruin, from which nothing but manifold grace can deliver us. We are not to seek this blessing that we may be famous for wisdom, but that we may be abundant in our love to the law of God. The Gospel gives us grace to keep the law; there is no way of reaching to holiness but by accepting the gift of God. If God gives, we keep; but we never keep the law in order to obtain grace. The sure result of regeneration, or the bestowal of understanding, is a devout reverence for the law and a resolute keeping of it in the heart. The Spirit of God makes us to know the Lord and to understand somewhat of his love, wisdom, holiness, and majesty; and the result is that we honor the law and yield our hearts to the obedience of the faith.
Yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart. The understanding operates upon the affections; it convinces the heart of the beauty of the law, so that the soul loves it with all its powers; and then it reveals the majesty of the Law-giver, and the whole nature bows before his supreme will. An enlightened judgment heals the divisions of the heart, and bends the united affections to a strict and watchful observance of the one rule of life. He alone obeys God who can say, “My Lord, I would serve thee, and do it with all my heart”; and none can truly say this till they have received as a free grant the inward illumination of the Holy Spirit.
Observe the parallel of verses 2 and 10 where the whole heart is spoken of in reference to seeking, and in verse 58 in pleading for mercy; these are all second verses in their octaves. The frequent repetition of this phrase shows the importance of undivided love. The heart is never one with God till it is one within itself.
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