So today, I’m reading the 17th Psalm. You may not be instantly familiar with this Psalm, but I’m sure your familiar with the basic thought and request. Like many other Psalms we have here David crying out to the righteous Judge for a just ruling. He wants God to uphold his cause in the face of the wicked who are on the attack. And as David gives this appeal to God, he recounts that as God has tried his heart, he has been found innocent and righteous, and because of God’s word, he has not walked according to the ways of the wicked. It really is a somewhat common prayer of David.

Psalms 17:1-5
1 Hear a just cause, O LORD, give heed to my cry;
Give ear to my prayer, which is not from deceitful lips.
2 Let my judgment come forth from Your presence;
Let Your eyes look with equity.
3 You have tried my heart;
You have visited me by night;
You have tested me and You find nothing;
I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress.
4 As for the deeds of men, by the word of Your lips
I have kept from the paths of the violent.
5 My steps have held fast to Your paths.
My feet have not slipped.

When you go on forward in the Psalm you hear David speak of the treacherous situation in which he finds himself. This righteous man is crying out to God because he is surrounded by godless men who have encircled him and who only want his destruction. In fact, David likens them to a lion in the sense that just as a hungry lion cannot be reasoned with, neither can these wicked men. Their only objective is to “despoil” David and to “cast [him] down to the ground”.

Psalms 17:6-12
6 I have called upon You, for You will answer me, O God;
Incline Your ear to me, hear my speech.
7 Wondrously show Your lovingkindness,
O Savior of those who take refuge at Your right hand
From those who rise up against them.
8 Keep me as the apple of the eye;
Hide me in the shadow of Your wings
9 From the wicked who despoil me,
My deadly enemies who surround me.
10 They have closed their unfeeling heart,
With their mouth they speak proudly.
11 They have now surrounded us in our steps;
They set their eyes to cast us down to the ground.
12 He is like a lion that is eager to tear,
And as a young lion lurking in hiding places.

And understanding the setting we see David’s request.

Psalms 17:13-15
13 Arise, O LORD, confront him, bring him low;
Deliver my soul from the wicked with Your sword,
14 From men with Your hand, O LORD,
From men of the world, whose portion is in this life,
And whose belly You fill with Your treasure;
They are satisfied with children,
And leave their abundance to their babes.
15 As for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness;
I will be satisfied with Your likeness when I awake.

Now here is where I realize that I have so often been reading these Psalms wrong. See, I live in America and while I cannot blame my culture for my sin (sin originates in the heart) I can see that the culture does play a factor in who we become. In a sense we are all brainwashed to think that the most important things in life are those things that make us comfortable. We have formulated an intense desire to live absolutely pain free. Certainly this includes physical pain, but also spiritual pain (guilt), emotional pain (lack of fulfillment), financial pain, and any other pain you can think of. Before long, it becomes God’s job to fill all my voids. God, I’m in pain, fix it! God, people make me feel bad, stop them! God, I’m discontent, give me more! In other words, we are a society that is driven by the desires of the flesh. Paul really nailed us when he wrote, “For many walk, of whom I have often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.” (Philippians 3:18-19) It’s us, whether we want to admit it or not.

And because this is so often our mentality, I am always tempted to read Psalms like this one like this. (Paraphrasing David here) “God, I know you are a righteous judge. Well, I have to tell you that I have been righteous and have done what You asked but people are attacking me and it’s not fair. So God I want you to stop these people from hurting me so that I can be happy and feel good again.” Now, there are some real problems with that approach. First, we know David better than that. It is certainly true that David loved God and wanted to please God but to claim that when God examines him He finds absolutely nothing is a bit far-fetched. I think we all recall the whole Bathsheba incident. My point is that David cannot be saying, “God I am perfectly righteous and deserve for you to destroy my enemies” because that just isn’t true. Another problem is that when David prays for God to deliver him from his enemy and begins to list what makes his enemy evil the big sin he lists is that their portion is in this life and that their satisfaction is found in earthly things like getting rich, having children, and leaving their wealth to those children. Now be honest, that doesn’t sound like some vile attacker. Point being, I’m not sure my “Americanized” way of reading this Psalm really fits. I’m going to have a tough time saying, “God, I’m righteous and I have wicked men who want to make my life hard, so stop them and let me feel good again.”

What is David praying here? David isn’t upholding his righteousness as though he is perfect and therefore deserving of deliverance. David is merely telling God that being righteous is his goal, his truest heart’s desire. When God examines his heart God will find a man who really just wants to be righteous. So what is the problem? David lives in a world filled with men who don’t want that. David lives in a culture filled with people who want the world and these people would love nothing more than to bring David down to their level. David’s prayer is that God would deliver him from such temptation. It is not a prayer about physical protection or worldly blessing. It is a prayer that God would deliver him from the defiling enemy who seeks to despoil him and turn his gaze away from satisfaction in the presence of God alone.

If we try to read this Psalm like I deserve God to do all these earthly good things for me and therefore we pray that He will stop anyone who wants to harm my physically or financially or emotionally then we are reading this wrong (see the prosperity gospel). David’s prayer is about those who would cause him to stumble into sin. David’s prayer is about those who would cause him to seek the things of the world instead of the presence of God. I’ve been reading it wrong for years!

What is worse…I could be the wicked man David is talking about. That man who gets too consumed with the things of the world and the comforts that they provide. Far too often I am that man who can say that I am satisfied with God alone, but if God were to examine my heart as He did David’s, I’m not sure that is what He’d find. David might have been praying that God would protect him from me!

My prayer then becomes obvious. God, please cleanse me from an idolatrous heart that continually seeks the things of this world even though You have made it abundantly clear that this is not what You want for Your people. Please help me to be a man who is satisfied in You alone and not what this world can offer, and protect me from those who would tempt me to seek this world instead of You.

That is what David is praying about. He wants to be righteous despite those who would seek to pull him into sin. Don’t read the Psalms like a citizen of America, read them like a citizen of heaven! “For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.” (Philippians 3:20-21)

“For as many as are the promises of God, in Him they are yes; therefore also through Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us.” (2 Corinthians 1:20)

Ever read the Psalms? It’s easy to see that continually in the Psalms we are confronted with two very distinct groups of people. We have the enemies and we have the sons. We have the adversaries and we have the afflicted. We have the godless and we have the righteous. And all throughout the Psalms we read about those magnificent promises that regardless of what the current situation looks like we know that God is going to crush the wicked and deliver the righteous. God is going to silence the adversary and save His sons. God will vindicate the afflicted and God will punish the enemy. Some Psalms are written to request that victory, some Psalms are written to rejoice in the victory. You’ve probably seen what I’m talking about.

The great temptation for each of us (especially in our day of self-love and high self-esteem) is to always read those Psalms as though I am the good person who God loves and anyone who disagrees with me or who sets themselves as my enemy is the bad person whom God will destroy.

Take Psalms 14 for example.
Psalms 14
1 The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds;
There is no one who does good.
2 The LORD has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men
To see if there are any who understand,
Who seek after God.
3 They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt;
There is no one who does good, not even one.
4 Do all the workers of wickedness not know,
Who eat up my people as they eat bread,
And do not call upon the Lord?
5 There they are in great dread,
For God is with the righteous generation.
6 You would put to shame the counsel of the afflicted,
But the LORD is his refuge.
7 Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion!
When the LORD restores His captive people,
Jacob will rejoice, Israel will be glad.

The temptation is intense isn’t it? We have the “fool” who rejects God, who is called the worker of wickedness and who consequently eats up God’s people as though they were bread and who does not call on the Lord. And we have Zion or Jacob or Israel who although they are currently afflicted wait expectantly for God to deliver salvation and crush the enemy and allow them to rejoice.

How do you read that Psalm? Well I certainly don’t want to be on the side of the “fool” so I’m going to say that in that Psalm I want to be Israel and all of my opponents can be the fool and I’m going to sing about how God is going to crush my enemies and restore me to salvation. That’s the temptation isn’t it?

But have you read Romans 3? In Romans 3:9-18 Paul quotes from about 6 Old Testament passages as he reveals the human condition. (Not just the condition of some, but the condition of all humans) In that passage Paul actually quotes Psalms 14:1-3. Only Paul does not apply those verses to our enemies, Paul applies those verses to God’s enemies. What is even more difficult to grasp is that Paul says that is exactly who we are. We are those fools! We are those godless thugs who never understand, never seek for God, and never do good. According to Paul I was reading Psalms 14 incorrectly. I was trying to apply those promises of blessing to myself when in reality God was talking about me in the first 3 verses. In fact, God was talking about all humans in those first 3 verses.

Well that poses and interesting question. If all humans were spoken of in those first 3 verses then who are those who are receiving all those promises and blessings? The answer: Christ. He is the beloved recipient of all of the promises and blessings of God. When the Psalmist spoke of God’s favor and God’s blessing and God’s promises being on someone, he was referring to Christ and Christ alone because only Christ was ever truly righteous.

Listen to Paul speak even of the Abrahamic covenant. “Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. He does not say, “And to seeds,” as referring to many, but rather to one, “And to your seed,” that is, Christ.” (Galatians 3:16) Christ is the One who is the recipient of all those promises of blessing. That means that the only way we partake in those promises and blessings is through Christ! “For as many as are the promises of God, in Him they are yes; therefore also through Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us.” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

When you read about all those blessings in the Psalms that are on the righteous; when you read about all of that faithfulness that the righteous expect from God; when you read about the salvation that God promises to His beloved children you should know that those promises are NOT for you unless you are in Christ. It is He who “rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,” (Colossians 1:13) Apart from Christ we are always the adversary in those Psalms regardless of how good we think we are. In Christ we are always the righteous in those verses, regardless of how much we fail.

“But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name,” (John 1:12)

“For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.” (Romans 5:6-11)

Today, thank God for Jesus and His righteousness and the fact that by grace through faith Jesus imputes His righteousness to us and thus allows all of those promises and blessings to be applied to our account. He is the One who transfers us from the position of God’s enemy to the position of God’s son. It is only when we are clothed in the very righteousness of Christ that we can read those Psalms and claim the blessings for ourselves. Apart from Him we are all nothing more than adversaries!

“LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION, BUT DELIVER US FROM THE EVIL ONE”

It’s a common statement. As part of the concluding passages of what is commonly called “The Lord’s Prayer” this statement is taught, memorized, and often times recited. Ever wonder what it means? In Psalm 12 David is lamenting the struggle of seeking to maintain righteousness in a culture that loves and celebrates wickedness.

“Help, LORD, for the godly man ceases to be, For the faithful disappear from among the sons of men. They speak falsehood to one another; With flattering lips and with a double heart they speak.” (12:1-2)

David saw a culture that had become totally corrupt. Godliness was no longer of value, faithfulness was a forgotten attribute. It seemed you couldn’t trust anyone around you because they were all liars. They loved flattery, but they all spoke with a double tongue (i.e. said one thing to your face and another behind your back). It was a culture absolutely devoid of integrity. You may wonder what the root source of this broken culture was…

“The wicked strut about on every side When vileness is exalted among the sons of men.” (12:8)

It was a compounding problem. The more the society participated in wickedness, the more society came to accept wickedness. The more they accepted wickedness, the more emboldened the wicked became, and therefore wickedness became even more acceptable. It was spreading like the plague. It was a culture that had grown to accept, and even to exalt the vilest and most disgusting behavior imaginable. Could you imagine such a culture? A culture that celebrated falsehood and deception? A culture that loved drunkenness and carousing? A culture that celebrated sexual immorality? A culture that applauded pride and arrogance and boasting? A culture that lived for the sensual desires of the flesh? A culture that was literally choking out the godly and corrupting them at every turn?

No wonder David prayed, “Help, LORD, for the godly man ceases to be”. David literally wanted God to “cut off all flattering lips” (12:3) and to silence the wicked who so easily spread their depravity upon the unsuspecting. David was in effect praying what Jesus taught us to pray: “Do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”

What was God’s answer?

(12:5) “Because of the devastation of the afflicted, because of the groaning of the needy, Now I will arise,” says the LORD; “I will set him in the safety for which he longs.”

God promised to deliver the afflicted from the wicked. And to make sure that they were set in safety. This is not a safety from persecution or tribulation or even trials. It is however a safety from the degrading influence of the wicked. It is an answer to the request that we not be led into temptation but that we be delivered from the evil one. God said He would do just that.

And this answer from God was more than enough for David because David knew the words of God to be true.
“The words of the LORD are pure words; As silver tried in a furnace on the earth, refined seven times. You, O LORD, will keep them; You will preserve him from this generation forever.” (12:6-7)

There we see the promise to keep those who desire godliness FROM this generation. It is a promise to deliver him from temptation.

TAKE HEART OH RIGHTEOUS MAN!!! I have to tell you that I get as frustrated as anyone. In fact let me just call it “righteous indignation”! I fully understand those imprecatory Psalms. I get it when David prays things like “smite all my enemies on the cheek…shatter the teeth of the wicked” (3:7); “Hold them guilty O God; by their own devices let them fall!” (5:10); “Arise, O LORD, in Your anger; Lift up Yourself against the rage of my adversaries” (7:6); “Break the arm of the wicked and the evildoer, Seek out his wickedness until You find none.” (10:15). I understand that frustration. I understand the groaning when you live in a society where it is no longer acceptable to rebuke the wicked. I am often filled with indignation at the way the wicked prey upon our children and seek to defile them with their evil influence and temptation, and I know what it is to say, “Help, LORD, for the godly man ceases to be, for the faithful disappear from among the sons of men.” There are some of you who know that frustration too. You know what it is to pray, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”

Well rise up with joy and faith, for God promises to rescue those who call upon Him. We see it in Psalm 12, but not just there. Listen to Psalm 10, “O, LORD, You have heard the desire of the humble; You will strengthen their heart, You will incline Your ear To vindicate the orphan and the oppressed, So that man who is of the earth will no longer cause terror.” (10:17-18) Listen to David’s faith in Psalm 11, “The LORD is in His holy temple; the LORD’S throne is in heaven; His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked, And the one who loves violence His soul hates. Upon the wicked He will rain snares; Fire and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup. For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; The upright will behold His face.” (11:4-7) In Psalm 9 David remembers: “the LORD abides forever; He has established His throne for judgment, And He will judge the world in righteousness; He will execute judgment for the peoples with equity. The LORD also will be a stronghold for the oppressed, A stronghold in times of trouble;” (9:7-9) In Psalm 7 David said, “My shield is with God, who saves the upright in heart.” (7:10)

We see it! God delivers the righteous man and does not allow the wicked to flourish forever. When we cry to Him He does in fact deliver us from the evil one. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Eph. 6:12) And God promises to deliver His children from His defiling influence.

We live in a world that loves sin. We live in a society that celebrates sin. We live in a society that defends sin. It is no surprise to us that the wicked strut about on every side. Why wouldn’t they when vileness is exalted? But they are men and not God. God reigns supreme and He delivers His children who call to Him from this evil temptation and degrading influence. Join me in prayer that God would “lead us not into temptation, but delivers us from the evil one.” Join me in prayer that God would break the teeth of the wicked (Satan) who lie in wait to attack the weak among us (Ps 10:5-11). This is not a prayer for physical safety, this is not a prayer for financial prosperity, this is not a prayer for worldly comfort. We’ve got plenty of that already. This is a prayer for holiness. This is a prayer for righteousness. “For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; The upright will behold His face.” (Ps 11:7). This is a prayer for myself and this is a prayer for my family and this a prayer for my brothers and sisters in Christ. “Lead US not into temptation, but deliver US from the evil one.”

Join me…