Psalm 13

⁰⁵          But I have trusted in Your unfailing love;

                        my heart rejoices in Your salvation.

⁰⁶             I will sing to the LORD,

for He has dealt bountifully with me.

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Yet I will Praise You

For the Lord’s Day:  the 9^th of November 2003

Introduction:  The questing spirit within David is fulfilled,  the longing and lesting are past and in the closing lines of this wonderful psalm David affirms his childlike trust in the love, mercy and grace of our Father God.  Spurgeon notes the change in attitude in a poetic imagery better understood by those closer to nature.  “What a change is here!  Lo, the rain is over and gone, and the time of the singing of birds is come.  The mercy-seat has so refreshed the poor weeper, that he clears his throat for a song.”

 

I am reminded of the frequent summer storms that arise almost out of clear sky and drench the landscape for a minute or so and then pass away as quickly as they blew in.  Once, I was at the back of the farm with my father.  We were bringing the hay wagon towards the old bridge across the ditch.  The horses were leisurely plodding along with their heavy load.  Suddenly, one of those freak storms blew in and the horses quickened their pace towards the bridge.  Dad only slowed them at the edge.  It poured upon us all for no more than half a minute, and then we were across the bridge and back in the sunlight.  Suddenly, the breeze whipped up a fresh wind which blew the dust and clouds away.  I still remember the refreshing smell of a storm just passed, mingled with the nostalgic note of fresh harvested hay.

 

The horses of course slowed their gate from the trot, but still pranced in celebration of the sublimity of the moment.  And as Spurgeon noted, the birds too celebrated the moment with us as well.

 

Have you not come out of a difficult prayer in a similar mood, having given you whole heart in some quiet desperation only to be suddenly, spiritually refreshed?  This is the sublime joy of the moment here in this Psalm.  And in celebration of that moment, David gives a ringing witness to His joy in the Lord that sounds down through the long ages since!

 

Development:  Calvin notes how David has shielded himself from those temptations and terror with which he had been formerly distressed.  And from the heart of David – we hear the essential testimony of every member of Christ’s true church:  “But I have trusted in Your unfailing love.”  Hear Calvin’s comments:  “Although, therefore, he is severely afflicted, and a multiplicity of cares urges him to despair, he, notwithstanding, declares it to be his resolution to continue firm in his reliance upon the grace of God, and in the hope of salvation.”

 

At long last, after the bout with doubt and the struggles of the day’s troubles and trials – “still will I trust”, David affirms: in the unfailing love of our Triune Creator God!  After all, what can the enemies of God do to any one of us, once our purpose here on earth is completed?  Late in life, after Solomon was enthroned, we read of David’s last days.  His weak and frail body was cold and discomfited and his advisers and physicians attempt folk remedies to keep him alive.  But, even the apparent quietness is bothered by another attempted coup and David must rally for one final desperate decision to acclaim Solomon as the rightful heir.  Once the future of the kingdom is well established, then David is released from this life to go to his fathers His purpose in life had been achieved and his poetic papers were preserved for all time.

 

Here was the man who was known to be “after God’s own heart” and for his whole life – we know that even in the midst of sin, temptations and trials, again and again David returned to the water of life:  the One God who promised by oath to protect David’s house until the promised Messiah should come.

 

The second thing we read about David is this testimony:  “my heart rejoices in Your salvation.”  In that quiet witness we see where the confidence of David lay.  Like the character Stonewall Jackson declared in last spring’s wonderful movie, our lives are held in the gracious hand of the Lord, every moment and we live – even in the midst of battle and turmoil within the hand of His ultimate kindness.  Like Stonewall, Patton and other military heroes have also realized their own God of battles is above and beyond the fray, and just as no sparrow falls to the ground with the Father’s allowance, so too are the lives of soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines all within His kind and providential hand.  Even the lives of our enemies lay within His sovereign control.  No one dies outside the providential grasp of the King of glory, heaven and earth!

 

Even further, David’s wisdom has learned the special election of God’s Spirit – so that not only is his life within the frame of the Almighty’s direction, so too is his own spirit that shall return to the Lord once the body rests at long last.

 

And so David joyously declares that: ”I will sing to the LORD.”  Remember those birds in the mental notes of Spurgeon and in my descriptive imagery earlier?  What sweet singing is there that the Lord God loves the most: but the praises, honor and thanks of His own elect people?  Calvin translates this phrase “into the future tense.  David, it is true,” he says, “had not yet obtained what he earnestly desired, but being fully convinced that God was already at hand to grant him deliverance, he pledges himself to give thanks to him for it.  And surely it becomes us to engage in prayer in such a frame of mind as at the same time to be ready to sing the praises of God; a thing which is impossible, unless we are fully persuaded that our prayers will not be ineffectual.”

 

Delitzsch declares:  “In the storm-tossed soul of the suppliant all has now become calm.  Though it rage without as much now as ever – peace reigns in the depth of his heart.”

 

Application:  And for why has David placed his uttermost confidence in the Lord of all the earth?  Hear the quiet confidence of his ongoing experience in the last line in this Psalm:  “for He has dealt bountifully with me.”

 

Like little children raised in good and reputable families, David knows the love of his Father God down through the years.  It always pained me to have to deal with students whose father was known not and sometimes even their mothers had little to do with them.  It is extremely hard to teach such people that some adults can indeed be trusted!  And I would suppose that is one reason for the interesting times that we live in.  The Liberals demand that everyone should trust in the school counselors appointed by government and they throw those positions open to any and all that have come out of bad experiences, thinking that thereby the counselors will have some compassion for their appointed progeny.  And yet, what little good can be accomplished by persons who know not the love of a Father God or the parental models molded in His greater image.

 

Vain and cold comfort is sadly the normative experience of the day.  Little warmth and even less charitable love is available for those who are hurting.  And sadly, the crass appeal to feeling good about every forlorn and impossible situation is not enough to feed the hungry souls of our day and age.

 

What is needed instead is a greater knowledge of the love and kind care of the Creator.  Time was, when only the pastor’s of the community gave counsel, and that more often than not sixty years ago was at least moral if not even better biblical advice.  Ministers too had an interest in limiting the amount of counseling because of their busy schedules.  Professional counselors however, have a strong economic urge to fill the time as well as their bank accounts with extended repetitious listening sessions and precious little advice to better their patients.

 

In the last year or so I have run across a dependent patient of that whole God forsaken industry.  I talked with the patient three times and encouraged them to give up the expensive habit and listen carefully to their spouse and local session.  However, I learned from other sources that the patient changes advisers as often as shoes and hastens to leave behind anyone who might offend the self perceptions that feed the nervous tension to which they have become accustomed.

 

Once I mentioned this ongoing problem, I never heard from them again.  So little confidence in spiritual advisers of any kind and type, it is no wonder that whole family is so dysfunctional?  There is no sense of solid ground or any real knowledge of the One who gives stability to the soul:  God Himself!

 

Here in David’s prayer book:  the Psalms – we can all find the necessary recipes for dealing with life’s problems as well as our own sins.  And, oh how it helps to start with a ready confidence in the Lord of life as we see so amply illustrated in the heart songs of David the king.  Yes, even as this Psalm displays the emotional moments and despair in David’s life, how quickly does he come to sense the greater blessing of knowing the Creator and counting on Him for every situation.  May we learn the same confidence and prayer life in our time.  Amen.

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PREACHING RESOURCES

Calvin, John:  Commentary on Book of Psalms.

Delitzsch, F:  Commentary on the Old Testament – Psalms.

Spurgeon, C.H:  Treasury of David.

The Westminster Confession & Catechisms.

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