Of old I have known from Your testimonies
That You have founded them forever.
—Psalm 119:152
How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in his excellent Word.
—John Rippon, 1787
It is the blessed privilege of all believers to rest in the knowledge of the promises God has given in his Word. His promises are everlasting promises that cannot fail.
“Concerning thy testimonies, I have known of old that thou hast founded them for ever.” David found of old that God had founded them of old, and that they would stand firm thorough all ages. It is a very blessed thing to be so early taught of God that we know substantial doctrines even from our youth. Those who think that David was a young man when he wrote this Psalm will find it rather difficult to reconcile this verse with the theory; it is much more probable that he was now grown grey, and was looking back upon what he had known long before. He knew at the very first that the doctrines of God’s Word were settled before earth world began, that they had never altered, and never could by any possibility be altered. He had begun by building on a rock, by seeing that God’s testimonies were “founded,” that is, grounded, laid as foundations, settled and established; and that with a view to all the ages that should come, during all the changes that should intervene. It was because David knew this that he had such confidence in prayer, and was so importunate it in. It is sweet to plead immutable promises with an immutable God. Is was because of this that David learned to hope: a confidence in a God who cannot change. It was because of this that he delighted in being near the Lord, for it is a most blessed thing to keep up close intercourse with a Friend who never varies. Let those who choose follow at the heels of the modern school and look for fresh light to break forth which well put the old light out of countenance; we are satisfied with the truth which is old as the hills and as fixed as the great mountains. Let “cultured intellects” invent another god, more gentle and effeminate that the God of Abraham; we are well content to worship Jehovah, who is eternally the same. Things everlastingly established are the joy of established saints. Bubbles please boys, but men prize those things which are solid and substantial, with a foundation and a bottom to them which will bear the test of ages. —Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David (Hendrickson, 1988), 3:403–404.
