“Deal bountifully with Your servant, that I may live and keep Your word” (Ps 119:17).
This psalm is like a counted cross-stitch, with each 8-verse section headed by one of the 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet. Each verse in a section starts with a word that begins with that letter. Our verse at the head is under the third section and begins with the letter gimel. Woven into this section is an added surprise. The verb “to reward” is gamal, from which the first word in our verse, gemol, is constructed.
So notice the very practical nature of this request—unlike the often impractical prayers we too often send heavenward. David longs to see the beneficial outcome of obedience. If the Lord rewards the psalmist’s keeping of God’s Word, he feels this will be an incentive to continued holy living. We may paraphrase this petition, “Lord, show me today the practical results of honoring You in my life, so that I may be a living parable of the truth that the path of the just really is a shining light.”