The Great Divide: Hating, Hiding, and Fearing Text: Psalm 119:113-120
Introduction: No Neutral Ground
We live in an age that worships at the altar of the open mind. Our cultural high priests tell us that the greatest virtue is to be non-committal, to be perpetually undecided, to live in the gray. To draw a hard line, to make a sharp distinction, to say "this is true and that is false," is considered the great intellectual sin of our time. It is called bigotry, intolerance, and fundamentalism. The modern man prides himself on his nuanced indecision. He is, in the biblical sense, double-minded.
But the Word of God does not know this flabby god. The Scriptures are a book of sharp antitheses. There is light and there is darkness. There is the way of the wise and the way of the fool. There is the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. There is the kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world. There is the one who gathers with Christ and the one who scatters. In this great cosmic war, there is no Switzerland. There is no neutral territory. You are on one side or the other.
The psalmist here, in this fifteenth section of his magnificent hymn to the Word of God, understands this perfectly. This section, governed by the Hebrew letter Samekh, is about where a man takes his stand and finds his support. It is about the great spiritual divide. The man who loves God's law is a man who must necessarily hate what opposes it. His love for the truth forces him to despise the lie. His commitment to God requires a radical separation from the world's rebellion. And this firm stand does not lead to arrogance, but rather to a profound dependence on God and a holy fear of His righteous judgments. This is a bracing passage because it is a clarifying passage. It forces us to answer the question: on which side of the line are you standing?
The Text
I hate those who are double-minded, But I love Your law.
You are my hiding place and my shield; I wait for Your word.
Depart from me, evildoers, That I may observe the commandments of my God.
Sustain me according to Your word, that I may live; And do not put me to shame because of my hope.
Uphold me that I may be saved, That I may have regard for Your statutes continually.
You have rejected all those who stray from Your statutes, For their deceitfulness is a lie.
You remove all the wicked of the earth like dross; Therefore I love Your testimonies.
My flesh quakes for dread of You, And I am afraid of Your judgments.
(Psalm 119:113-120 LSB)
Holy Aversion and Holy Affection (v. 113)
The psalmist begins with a declaration that would get him kicked out of any modern faculty lounge.
"I hate those who are double-minded, But I love Your law." (Psalm 119:113)
Notice the sharp contrast. This is not complicated. The word for double-minded here refers to those who are divided, who are skeptics, who try to walk on both sides of the fence. They want a little bit of God and a little bit of Baal. They want the blessings of covenant faithfulness while keeping the idols in their side-chapel. James tells us that a double-minded man is "unstable in all his ways" (James 1:8). He is a spiritual wobble. He has no foundation, no anchor, because he is trying to anchor himself to two opposing shores at once.
The psalmist says, "I hate" this. This is not a petty personal dislike. This is a principled, theological hatred. He hates the spiritual indecisiveness, the intellectual dishonesty, the moral cowardice of trying to serve two masters. Why? Because he loves God's law. The two are inextricably linked. To love the clarity, righteousness, and goodness of God's law is to hate the muddled, murky, and rebellious state of the double-minded. You cannot love unity without hating division. You cannot love truth without hating lies. You cannot love righteousness without hating sin. Our soft-handed generation needs to recover this biblical reality of righteous hatred. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil, pride, and arrogance (Prov. 8:13). If you do not hate what God hates, you do not love what God loves, no matter how many praise songs you sing.
God as Our Only Refuge (v. 114)
This firm stand against double-mindedness is not rooted in self-confidence. It is rooted in God's all-sufficiency.
"You are my hiding place and my shield; I wait for Your word." (Psalm 119:114)
The man who has drawn a line in the sand knows that he has made himself a target. The world does not appreciate having its hypocrisy exposed. And so, where does he run for cover? Not to his own cleverness, not to a political party, but to God Himself. "You are my hiding place." God is his bomb shelter in the midst of the world's artillery fire. "You are... my shield." God is his personal defense against the flaming arrows of the evil one.
This is a position of total dependence. The security of the believer is not in the strength of his own convictions, but in the strength of the one to whom he is convicted. And what is the fuel for this confidence? "I wait for Your word." The word "wait" here is better translated as "hope." His hope is not a vague, sentimental wishing. It is a confident expectation based on the promises of God's Word. He has read the end of the book. He knows God wins. And so he hides in God, is shielded by God, and hopes in the unbreakable promises of God.
The Necessity of Separation (v. 115)
Because the psalmist has chosen his refuge, he must ensure that the door to that refuge is not left open for the enemy to waltz in.
"Depart from me, evildoers, That I may observe the commandments of my God." (Psalm 119:115)
This is the practical application of hating double-mindedness. You cannot say you hate indecision and then invite the undecided to camp out in your living room. You cannot claim God as your hiding place and then give the enemy the key. There must be a separation. "Bad company corrupts good morals" (1 Cor. 15:33). The psalmist understands that fellowship with evildoers is a direct impediment to obedience. Their worldview, their vocabulary, their priorities are all poison to a soul that wants to follow God.
He is not being anti-social; he is being pro-holiness. He wants to clear the decks for action. He wants to remove the hindrances and distractions so that he can give his full attention to observing God's commands. This is a lesson we desperately need to learn. We cannot flirt with the world all week and then expect to worship God in spirit and in truth on Sunday. We cannot immerse ourselves in the sewer of modern entertainment and expect to come out smelling like a rose. At some point, for the sake of your own soul, you have to tell the evildoers, "Depart from me."
A Prayer for Divine Support (v. 116-117)
Having declared his allegiance and separated himself from the wicked, the psalmist now throws himself entirely upon God for the strength to persevere.
"Sustain me according to Your word, that I may live; And do not put me to shame because of my hope. Uphold me that I may be saved, That I may have regard for Your statutes continually." (Psalm 119:116-117)
Notice the cascade of dependent verbs: "Sustain me... Uphold me." The Hebrew word for uphold here is the root of the letter for this section, Samekh. It means to prop up, to support, to lean upon. The psalmist knows that his resolution to obey is not enough. He needs divine power to carry it out. He is leaning his entire weight on God.
And on what basis does he ask for this? "According to Your word." He is praying God's promises back to Him. God has promised to be with His people, to strengthen them, to uphold them. The psalmist is simply saying, "Do as You have said." His desire is "that I may live" a true life, a life of obedience, not just biological existence. His fear is being "put to shame because of my hope." If his hope is in God and God fails him, then his entire life is a joke. But he knows God cannot fail. To be upheld by God is to be saved, to be kept safe. And the result of this divine preservation is not a life of ease, but a life of continual regard for God's statutes. God saves us and sustains us for obedience, not from it.
The Fate of the Wicked (v. 118-119)
The psalmist's love for God's law is strengthened as he considers the ultimate end of those who reject it.
"You have rejected all those who stray from Your statutes, For their deceitfulness is a lie. You remove all the wicked of the earth like dross; Therefore I love Your testimonies." (Psalm 119:118-119)
Here is the reality of divine judgment. God is not neutral. He "rejected" those who stray. The word means to spurn, to treat with contempt. Their clever schemes, their self-justifying arguments, their deceitfulness, is ultimately a "lie." It is vanity, emptiness, a fraud that cannot stand before the God of truth. God's judgment is a purifying fire. He removes the wicked "like dross." Dross is the worthless scum that is skimmed off during the process of refining metal. This is God's assessment of the proud, rebellious heart. In the grand scheme of things, they are metallurgical refuse.
And what is the psalmist's reaction to this terrifying reality? "Therefore I love Your testimonies." This is crucial. He does not love God's testimonies in spite of the doctrine of judgment; he loves them because of it. A god who never judged evil, who treated righteousness and wickedness as equals, would be a moral monster unworthy of worship. The fact that God will one day cleanse His creation of all sin and rebellion is a glorious truth. It means that justice will prevail. It means that righteousness is not a fool's errand. God's judgments are part of the beauty of His character, and so the psalmist loves the Word that reveals them.
The Proper Response: Holy Fear (v. 120)
This meditation on God's law, His promises, and His judgments culminates not in smug self-satisfaction, but in a profound and trembling awe.
"My flesh quakes for dread of You, And I am afraid of Your judgments." (Psalm 119:120)
This is the fear of the Lord that is the beginning of wisdom. This is not the craven, servile fear of a slave before a tyrant. This is the awe-filled, reverential fear of a son before a holy and powerful Father. The psalmist has just reflected on God's judgment of the wicked, and his response is not "Thank God I'm not like them," but rather a holy terror. He knows that the same fire that purifies the gold also consumes the dross. He knows that he stands only by grace. His flesh, his creatureliness, quakes before the uncreated majesty of God.
This is the great paradox of the Christian life. We are told to "fear not," and yet we are commanded to "work out your salvation with fear and trembling" (Phil. 2:12). How do we reconcile this? We fear God, and because we fear God, we need not fear anyone or anything else. The man who trembles before God's judgments will stand firm before the judgments of men. This healthy, righteous fear is the antidote to all unhealthy, sinful fears. It is the fear that drives out all other fears. It is the fear that keeps us from double-mindedness, that drives us into our hiding place, that makes us cry out for God to uphold us, and that ultimately secures our salvation.