Your Word Is a Lamp to My Feet – Psalm 119:105-112

A taste of some classic commentary on this passage:

Matthew Henry:  The word of God directs us in our work and way, and a dark place indeed the world would be without it. The commandment is a lamp kept burning with the oil of the Spirit, as a light to direct us in the choice of our way, and the steps we take in that way.

Barne’s Notes:  The Hebrew word means a light, lamp, candle. The idea is, that the word of God is like a torch or lamp to a man in a dark night. It shows him the way; it prevents his stumbling over obstacles, or falling down precipices, or wandering off into paths which would lead into danger, or would turn him away altogether from the path to life.

He who makes the word of God his guide, and marks its teachings, is in the right way. He will clearly see the path. He will be able to mark the road in which he ought to go, and to avoid all those by-paths which would lead him astray. He will see where those by-roads turn off from the main path – often at a very small angle, and so that there seems to be no divergence. He will see any obstruction which may lie in his path; any declivity or precipice which may be near, and down which, in a dark night, one might fall.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary:  The lamp of the Word is not the sun. He would blind our eyes in our present fallen state; but we may bless God for the light shining as in a dark place, to guide us until the Sun of Righteousness shall come, and we shall be made capable of seeing Him (2Pe 1:19; Re 22:4). The lamp is fed with the oil of the Spirit. The allusion is to the lamps and torches carried at night before an Eastern caravan.

Spurgeon’s Treasury of David:  Having no fixed lamps in eastern towns, in old time each passenger carried a lantern with him that he might not fall into the open sewer, or stumble over the heaps of ordure which defiled the road. This is a true picture of our path through this dark world, we should not know the way, or how to walk in it, if the Scripture, like a blazing flambeau, did not reveal it.

Nun   

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.  I have sworn an oath and confirmed it, to keep your righteous rules.  I am severely afflicted; give me life, O LORD, according to your word!  Accept my freewill offerings of praise, O LORD, and teach me your rules.  I hold my life in my hand continually, but I do not forget your law.  The wicked have laid a snare for me, but I do not stray from your precepts.  Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart.  I incline my heart to perform your statutes forever, to the end.  (Psalm 119:105-112 ESV)

When our enemy would lay a snare for our feet, something hidden from direct sight perhaps, we need a light for the path that will expose it.  That light is God’s word, so we ask God to teach it to us and we commit our hearts to it.  The trap of the evil one would be to make us depart from the truth, but we have inclined our hearts to God’s statutes.