Psalm 13 teaches that waiting is really hard. There is nothing worse than being in a tough space and pleading with God and nothing happens! We saw this in Psalm 10 as well when David cried: “Why do you stand so far away?”
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David feels like God must have forgotten him in his trial. Even more, David feels God has purposefully decided not to answer him in that God has hidden His face from him.
It’s like David has prayed and prayed with no answer. He says “will You continually forget Me?” like he’s reminded God of his trouble but receives no answer.
This reminds me of what Jesus said: (Matthew 7:7-9) "Keep asking, and it will be given to you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who searches finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
We want the door to open like in a supermarket when we approach. God wants persistence in prayer, not because He is deaf or wants us to pray louder or more eloquently or use just the right words or Scriptures—He does it to make us reliant on Him, trust in Him, and let His purposes be accomplished in His timing.
Mary, in John 11:32, complained that the Lord had come too late to save Lazarus. But if Jesus had merely healed him, it wouldn’t have had the same effect as raising him from the dead! Sometimes God has to let us die (or think we are about to die), so to speak, in order to do something really miraculous we wouldn’t have thought of!
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Two things seem to be on David’s mind here: the effect of the trial in his mind, and the effect of God not answering on David’s enemies. The trouble he faces is causing anxiety. Have you ever experienced anxiety? It can be felt in the body—shortness of breath, adrenaline, lack of sleep, even tremors. In the mind it becomes a cycle of distressing thoughts that seems to feed on itself. You start worrying about realities that might not even come about. Agony is a good word for the effect on mind and body. The Hebrew word means “affliction.”
The second thing is David’s concern that his enemy was “dominating” him. The word used here means basically “to rise up.” I think the word picture here is of a person rearing themselves up to a higher place above David, thus the idea of domination. Sometimes our troubles fill our lives so completely that it is all we can see and sometimes it even feels like Satan is winning the day and God is nowhere to be found.
If you have ever found yourself in that position you are not alone.
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Here David cries for God to look intently at him and see his plight then answer. Sometimes we are brutally honest with God but we never come to the point of asking Him for anything. This helps us to begin to understand what God wants. The idea of “restore brightness to my eyes” seems to be a strengthening of moral character and having the patience to withstand the trial. Strength to make it through is sometimes the best prayer we can pray!
David worries that if something isn’t done by God David will die and his enemy will see it as a victory. Notice that it is the witness of David that is in view. Often it is not just getting out of the jam but loving God through it that really matters.
5 – 6
Verses 5 and 6 show us David’s true heart. Yes he is upset and worried and anxious and wonders why God isn’t answering, but he has put his feet firmly down in the Lord. He also acknowledges that God’s character is loving towards Him. “Faithful love” suggests God’s covenant love to His people. Because of the covenant won by Jesus Christ, God’s love is always towards those who belong to Jesus.
He also will rejoice and sing—this is probably best read in the future tense: it looks forward to what the Lord is going to do and bountifully so.
I’m reminded of this verse:
(Ephesians 3:20-21) Now to Him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think—according to the power that works in you— 21 to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
God hears, considers, and answers, but according to His will and His glory.
Often what He gives us isn’t immediate relief, but peace.
(Philippians 4:6-7) Don't worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses every thought, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Conclusions
One of the reasons why anxiety plagues us so badly is that we “store up” our “anxious concerns” instead of bringing them before the Lord. The peace He offers is beyond our ability to understand with our human minds, but it is real. You might not instantly be free of anxiety, but when Jesus says He will never leave us or forsake us, He means it. Know you are in His hands and under His control—trust in His unfailing love and rejoice in the coming deliverance!
Psalm 14
Psalm 14 is one of the strongest statements we have in the Scriptures about the prevalent attitude among people about the existence of God and the result of that attitude as they live their lives.
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To say “God does not exist” is to be a fool kind of like denying that the laws of gravity exist. You can jump out of a building denying its existence but I guarantee you will be a believer in it before you hit the ground.
The problem is that we can experience gravity, though we can’t see it. But it is not so easy to experience the existence of God. For that we must use other senses—mainly by believing in what someone else has witnessed about God, what God Himself has done in the world, and finally the voice of our own soul telling us that what God says is true.
But millions in the world today live as if there is no God—no one to whom they must give account for their actions. Because the human heart is depraved by nature, a mind that rejects the existence of God will not move towards good but towards that which is not like God: evil and corruption.
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On our own we will not seek God but will hide from Him just as Adam and Eve hid from the presence of the Lord in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3). The only ones who are wise are those who know they belong to the Lord by His covenants.
(2 Chronicles 16:9) For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to show Himself strong for those whose hearts are completely His.
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The result of God’s search is that all of humanity has turned its back on God and have become corrupt. The word repeated in verse 1 means “ruin, devastate, corrupt.” It is used of the complete corruption of the human race prior to the flood (Genesis 6:11-12), and of the Lord’s destroying Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 13:10). Here it is both moral and spiritual corruption.
On our own, humanity then is completely unable to be good (that is, be like God). This reminds me of Jesus’ conversation with the rich young ruler: (Luke 18:19) "Why do you call Me good?" Jesus asked him. "No one is good but One—God.”
Jesus came, God in the flesh, good in the flesh, and gave His life and experienced death so we could have goodness and life.
But those who reject this gift are going to continue in their ignorance to be and do that which is not good.
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The result of rejecting God is three-fold: they lack understanding of what’s real. Ephesians 4:18 talks about this and about the person who has chosen to believe:
(Ephesians 4:17-24) Therefore, I say this and testify in the Lord: You should no longer walk as the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their thoughts. 18 They are darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them and because of the hardness of their hearts. 19 They became callous and gave themselves over to promiscuity for the practice of every kind of impurity with a desire for more and more.
20 But that is not how you learned about the Messiah, 21 assuming you heard Him and were taught by Him, because the truth is in Jesus: 22 you took off your former way of life, the old man that is corrupted by deceitful desires; 23 you are being renewed in the spirit of your minds; 24 you put on the new man, the one created according to God's likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth.
Secondly, David here says those that reject God do evil as easy as eating bread; it’s no big deal anymore. We surely see this in our culture today. Thirdly the rejection of God leads to further rejection. The wording here suggests rejection corporately of any knowledge of God as a society, which we too see all around us today.
So what is the result?
5 – 6
As we’ve talked about several times there will come a day when we are able to experience God as easily as gravity for He will be among us, executing judgment on those who reject His Son Jesus. That will be a day of terror because God is only with “the righteous” which would mean those that love Yahweh and His Son the Messiah: Jeshua. Those that reject God may think they are winning the day but those that trust in God will find a refuge from His judgment forever!
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Eventually those of us who trust Jesus will rejoice because God will deliver us from all evil doers!
The evidence for the existence of God is all around us: in the creation, in the eye-witness testimony of those who walked with Jesus, and even in your own heart, if you will really examine yourself. Don’t be a fool, but be wise! God exists, and He is loving and forgiving.
Isaiah 55: 6 -7 Seek the Lord while He may be found; call to Him while He is near. 7 Let the wicked one abandon his way and the sinful one his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, so He may have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will freely forgive.
Psalm 15
Sometimes we get a little smug with ourselves and over self-confident. Not that we should be constantly self-flagellating, but a healthy introspection is a good thing, and this psalm reminds us that it is no small thing to be able to fellowship with God. We cannot just waltz in with a cavalier attitude. This psalm may have been written as a way of focusing the Israelis who wanted to come to the Tabernacle or Temple and bring a sacrifice on just what it means to approach a holy God.
There are ten things listed here to consider when approaching God, perhaps mirroring the Ten Commandments, though they go much deeper.
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David here is thinking of the Tent of Meeting, the Tabernacle. The mountain was the place in Jerusalem where the Ark of the Covenant lay. The idea of “dwell” and “live” both have to do with permission. How do you get permission to be near the place where God touches earth?
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The point of all these is that to be with God you must be perfect. That, as we saw in the last psalm, is impossible for humanity. That’s why a sacrifice was needed to atone for the sins of the worshipper, and why the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus makes it possible to come to God—but the standard has not changed—perfection.
“Lives honestly” can also be translated “walks blamelessly.” Wow, that’s a pretty high standard! But even Jesus said “You, therefore must be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48).
So point 1: Don’t do anything wrong. Point 2: Do everything right. We sometimes talk about the sins of commission and those of omission. It’s not enough to keep from feeling hatred towards someone else—it is quite another to overlook the plight of the downtrodden, in other words, not responding to the prompting of the Holy Spirit when He tells you to do something.
“Acknowledge the truth in his heart” can also read “one who speaks truth from the heart.” The idea is of integrity from all the way inside your intentions and motivations, out into the character and thoughts, words, and deeds of a person.
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Part of that integrity is that we never speak or do things that will harm another. Ephesians 4:29-30 “Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.” NKJV, and also: James 3:10-12 “Out of the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things should not be this way. 11 Does a spring pour out sweet and bitter water from the same opening? 12 Can a fig tree produce olives, my brothers, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a saltwater spring yield fresh water.”
So we are not to speak anything harmful or do anything harmful. “Love your neighbor as yourself” and Philippians 2:3-5 “Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” ESV
“Discredit” can also be “reproach” and I think the idea is that we should do, say, or allow anything that will harm others. Sometimes our worst offense is not stopping a gossiping tongue.
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I think verse four is about spiritual discernment. We need to appreciate the things of God and fellowship with the family of God and not focus our adulation and attention on those things and people that reject God and His Word. Our culture today makes heroes out of those who do things very contrary to the character of God. We should not do so.
Secondly we need to be people of our word. If you make a commitment, keep it.
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Basically the first part of this verse means we should never provide help to someone in a crisis in a way that takes advantage of their position and puts them into a dependent role to us.
The last characteristic is that of being unable to be bribed. This can refer to any perversion of justice for unjust gain.
David finishes by saying that if we do these things, not only will we present with the Lord but we will be secure in that presence.
As I said at the beginning—this standard is way higher than any human can hope to achieve. We need then to cling to Jesus who gives us the cleansing and the new life so that as we grow in Him we grow in these things. If you inspect your life and see deficiencies, don’t beat yourself up or stop coming into God’s presence, but repent and throw yourself on God’s mercy which is greater than anything bad you have ever done!
