A Prayer For Healing Series

We continue our series entitled God Talk: A Conversation through the Psalms. This is the third part of our series as we have been examining selected Psalms that have been recorded and persevered for us by God. Today, we investigate a prayer of Israel’s famous King David. It is a prayer for healing. As we have noted in our study in both Psalm 1 and Psalm 73, the Psalms are poetry often set to music in ancient times. These poems are written for your happiness. They are written for your joy. If you are in Christ, God is for you. If you are outside of Christ, God is against you. Two small prepositions, in and outside, yet the difference is eternity. Yet, even when God is for us and even though the believer’s future is brilliant as God has filled our futures with mind-blowing activities of joy and delight throughout eternity… Nevertheless, followers of Jesus Christ have struggled with depression throughout all of time. Christians are not alone in their bouts with depressions. Whether in ancient times or in our day, our desire for healing, both physical and mental, has always been high priority for us. And the medical community has taken notice. Whether you are discussing pharmaceutical care, nursing home, physicians, or hospitals, American people are putting their money where their mouth is by demonstrating a desire to be healed.

Just how important is our health care today? This industry has spent nearly forty million in television advertising by the end of July alone. The money you paid last year to pharmacies, for medical devices, diagnostic laboratories, nursing homes, doctors, and hospitals represent around $2.15 trillion or around fifteen percent of America’s Gross Domestic Product (GNP). We really care about our health. Yet in Psalm six, David’s frustrations are not simply to keep fit as he gets older and wider! David’s pain is as much medical as it is mental. He is suffering from both physical pain and emotional distress. He also has people who lack sympathy for his plight surround him; indeed, David calls them his “foes” in verse seven.

In our present day, many of you, like King David, are suffering from mental depression in our day as well. Sales of antidepressants in 2007 totaled $11.9 million dollars as the health care industry has attempted to make us synthetically happy. Earlier this decade, antidepressants were the second largest class of prescription drugs sold in America as they were only exceeded by prescriptions for heart problems. Researchers say approximately nineteen million Americans suffer from clinical depression in 2008. More than 27 million Americans have been prescribed an antidepressant in 2005 as the use of these drugs have more than doubled since 1996. This represents nearly ten billion dollars in sales. When it comes to health concerns, Arkansas, in particular was one of America’s most medicated states as we rank 5th most medicated among the nation’s fifty states. We are preoccupied with getting well.

The ancient King David, Israel’s best leader, felt such pain as well. In Psalm 6, he speaks of a personal suffering that is so intense that he may very well collapse. David is in deep personal anguish when he writes Psalm 6. He expresses a deep perplexity as to where is God when he is experiencing such anguish.

“O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing; heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.?3 My soul also is greatly troubled. But you, O Lord—how long? Turn, O Lord, deliver my life; save me for the sake of your steadfast love.?For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who will give you praise? I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping.?My eye wastes away because of grief; it grows weak because of all my foes. Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.?9 The Lord has heard my plea; the Lord accepts my prayer.?All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled; they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment” (Psalm 6:1-10).

1. A Plea for Help: God Save Me

David is in deep distress. His whole person – body and soul – is in anguish. David’s starting point is his sense of God’s disapproval. Candidly, he feels God is angry with him. “O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath” (Psalm 6:1).

In verse one, he asks that God not rebuke him in anger. He asks that God not discipline Him in wrath. We’re not sure if David’s pain was brought on by some sinful act that he committed or it was simply the result of living in a sinful world. David doesn’t make it clear for us whether God is judging him because of some sinful action… …or…God is simply bringing him through some difficult aspect of his life as a means of discipline. No matter, the sense of abandonment is the same.