great Houdini<\/a> \u2014 no matter how they tied him up, he could escape. He had, of course, all kinds of secrets to his clever ways, but always he managed to get out of the bonds. The psalmist, too, is bound:
\n\u201cThough the bonds of the wicked are coiled around me, I have not neglected your teaching\u201d (119:61).
\nI wonder if it is not the next verse, though, that shows how the psalmist \u201cescaped\u201d from the ropes and bonds of his enemies:
\n\u201cAt midnight I rise to give you thanks
\nfor your righteous laws.\u201d (119:62)
\nWas his daily habit of rising at midnight \u2014 I\u2019m suggesting that it was a daily habit \u2013\u00c2 what we now call the \u201coffice of readings\u201d and \u201cnight prayer\u201d or even \u201ccompline\u201d \u2014 that gave him the joy and the confidence to escape?
\nAt midnight, he says, he arose to give thanks to God or to praise God. He arises at midnight \u2014 in the middle of the night \u2014 to give praise to God. \u201cThanksgiving,\u201d Charles Spurgeon once said, \u201cturns night into day.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Erik Weisz was the great Houdini \u2014 no matter how they tied him up, he could escape. He had, of course, all kinds of secrets to his clever ways, but always he managed to get out of the bonds. The psalmist, too, is bound:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1753],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-psalm-119"],"yoast_head":"\n
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