Psalm 119:71 | “It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.”

The psalmist again acknowledges that his affliction worked for his good. In addition to law or commandment, the Hebrew word translated “statutes,” hoq, can mean portion or due. What God allots, even painful seasons, becomes the place where the psalmist learns to trust and obey. Spurgeon writes, “To be larded by prosperity is not good for the proud, but for the truth to be learned by adversity is good for the humble. Very little is to be learned without affliction. If we would be scholars we must be sufferers. As the Latins say, “Experientia docet,” experience teaches. There is no royal road to learning the royal statutes. God’s commands are best read by eyes wet with tears.” How often we want the gain without the pain! Ask the Lord to help you learn the lessons of his statutes. May every circumstance, every portion we are allotted, conform us into the likeness of his Son.