Praying the Psalms: Psalm 17

As I said on Sunday, each week we pray through a Psalm – apart and together. We read it as the church scattered through the week and we all get on the same page as the church gathered to read it on Sunday morning. It might seem a little strange that we’re ‘praying the Psalms’. After all, surely we’re reading them…and seeing what we think.

Yet these 150 psalms that have been preserved for us in the centre of the 66 books that form our Old and New Testaments have a rich history as prayers. They were written as prayers. Originally they were either from the personal prayer book of David and others, or they were written as corporate prayers for the regular times of worship that the people of Israel had to celebrate and thank God for his love, provision, protection and mercy.

The richer legacy of the Psalms is that they are applied theology. They take what we know of God through who He has revealed himself to be to us and to others, yet they find their life and outworking through the stuff of the everyday. As David faces trials, temptations, death, peril, shame and abuse – sometimes of his own making, sometimes of others making – we see him face these with God at the front and centre. It’s not always David’s default. Like us, he has to remind himself again and again in these moments that God is sovereign, God’s love is steady, unfailing and constant, God’s mercy is fresh, God’s Word is perfect and revives the soul. And we get to see much of this through the psalter that we’ve been left with.

If you’re up against it or in danger, open up the psalms to one of David’s laments. If you feel others are up against you, open up the psalms. If you reckon it’s a beautiful morning, open up the psalms to a psalm of thanksgiving. If you feel you need to remind yourself that God has your world in His hands, open up the Psalms to one of David’s psalms of remembrance. They’re all in there because these Psalms are, quite simply, the truth about God applied to everyday life and times.

And so to Psalm 17. What’s the back story here? Somebody wanted to kill David. It was probably King Saul. He was like a hungry lion. (verse 2) Here are some words from 1 Samuel 23:25-26. ‘Saul chased David in the wild country near Maon. David ran away. David was afraid of Saul. Saul and his soldiers were all round David. They were ready to kill him’. What happened next? A message came to Saul. It said, ‘We need you to fight the Philistines. Come and give us help’. So Saul left David and went away. God answered the words that David prayed. They are probably in Psalm 17.

And what’s a prayer about someone being hunted for the purpose of being murdered got to do with us? Hopefully, not much. Yet, like many situations we find ourselves in, we can feel on the run. On the run from piling debt, or the words that roll around our head, or the stuff that has been spoken to us, or stuff that’s happen to us, or dysfunctional relationships. It may not be death, but it can be a slow death of the soul that needs new life.

What hope does David give us? It’s certainly not help from him, but help from his father and creator, God.

It begins with transparency. Verses 1 – 5: David asks God to look at the secrets of his heart. These are things that people cannot see. Only God can see them. David says, “test me” at night. Our ability to receive truth from God requires a willing and receptive heart. While God can break in our worlds, it’s more often a case of ‘you gotta wanna’. James 4:8 tells us ‘draw near to God and he will draw near to you’. The one who knows our hearts is keen, but we’ve got to acknowledge our need of him and be transparent.

Verses 6-8: Perhaps we can’t say it enough, but God loves you. Passionately loves you. “Great love” is “chesed” in Hebrew. It has nothing to do with diary products…it means that God loves us and is kind to us. We are the “apple of God’s eye”. This means that people that hurt us also hurt God. We are special to God. As a bird hides baby birds under its wing, so God hides us! We hide under his wings, like baby birds. The right hand of God here means what God does on earth.

Verses 9 – 12: David now tells God about his enemies. Uh huh – flat out. Kill ‘em. Really, they are the enemies of God as well. They want to knock David to the ground. Then they want to kill him. Psalm 17:10 says, “Their hearts have become hard”. They have become opposed to God and to God’s man, David.

It’s fair to say, that praying for God to kill your enemies probably isn’t the thing. We’re clearly called to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. And we’re called to love one another is the same way that we’ve been loved by Jesus. But the underlying nugget here is this: don’t cloak your prayers in terms and with words that you think God wants to hear, spit it out. Also pray that he will reveal his will for you at the same time. If we’re praying for God’s will to be done in our lives as it is in heaven we may just find that what we’re praying needs some revision in our hearts. God might give us the grace to love and shape our stated prayer into something far more transformational. But you’ve got to throw it out there in first place.

So, where does this all leave us? The last verse tell us that, in righteousness, in will leave us in the presence of God for eternity. Because of Jesus, our sin does not separate us from his love. Jesus worthy sacrifice on our behalf gives us salvation that will, one day, present us faultless before our Father in heaven. That’s the gospel (or part of it at least). God is good. So good that he gave us Jesus as the way back to him. He invites us into this new life. Our decision is whether or not we yield to a gracious God who has already accomplished our salvation through Jesus.

Yep, it’s a good day to be a follower of Jesus.