Frolicking within the Confines of the Holy Sandbox
”Because I love your commands
more than gold, more than pure gold,
and because I consider all your precepts right,
I hate every wrong path.”
- Psalm 119:127-128
Though no author is listed, it’s not a stretch to imagine the writer of Psalm 119 being a seasoned saint, someone who has been around the church block a time or two, someone writing in the twilight of his or her life.
Such speculation is fueled by the experience of the average CRC kid growing up in the 60s or 70s or 80s, toiling under the Sunday regime of a devoted, yet somewhat Puritancial family rule with hard and fast strictures related to Sabbath observance in the form of limited bicycle riding, virtually no TV watching and few forms of acceptable diversion or really, much fun at all. Such a tyke who watches his non-churched buddies fly down the road on their Schwinns might have a hard time voicing these words of the Psalmist: “My flesh trembles in fear of you; I stand in awe of your laws.”
Rather, it’s likely that the author of this Psalm is a person acquainted with trial, with dashed hopes, with the earnest honest struggle to do good in the midst of evil. A lifetime of arduous trekking down the narrow road has left him celebrating the Lord’s decrees, statues and commands. The question is why? Why might someone etch out 170 verses of a poem celebrating the virtue of a life governed by the righteous rules of an unchanging God?
Because it’s the best way to live. Any seasoned saint, familiar with the life of faith, knows that a loving God - one who rejoices over his creatures with singing - doesn’t prescribe the specific guidelines for his people to follow out of desire to inhibit joy but rather to foster it. The metaphor of the sandbox is an apt one. Imagine the Lord’s decrees being the perimeter of a monstrous sandbox. He tells his children that they may not leave the sandbox, but within its boundaries, they may play and frolic and abound to their hearts’ content. The Psalmist echoes the realization that many in our church confess: the devoted life of faith is the one that provides the greatest level of joy and gladness and goodness and compassion and contentment as we travel the sod of this gently spinning planet.
The question that begs asking, when we get quiet and honest enough to ask it, is whether we can echo the Psalmist’s conviction in celebrating these royal decrees. Do we have a growing hunger for the things of God, for the ways of the Lord? Do we yearn to follow God’s decrees? Can we truthfully declare that we “love your commands more than gold, more than pure gold”? The path of a Christ follower and the process of sanctification should involve a growing appreciation and love for the Lord’s ways. As we age and mature, we should take more delight in the calling he’s given us to live as a people set apart, as inhabitants of the city on the hill. Do we embrace that calling?
If understand the Psalmist’s convictions and grasp the beauty of the life of faith, we will.
Maybe it’s worth recalling Jesus’ teachings about childlike faith, about how he beckoned his followers to become like little children because if there’s one thing we know about kids, it’s that they love jubilantly playing and frolicking in the center of the sandbox.
Maybe we need to learn to play there too.