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Turn with me to Psalm 4. The last psalm we looked at was Psalm 3 where we saw David fleeing from Jerusalem as his son Absalom, led a coup against him.
David cried out to God trusting God to hear and answer him.
Psalm 4 has some similar characteristics to the previous one as this psalm.
As a result, some believe it to have been written during Absalom’s revolt as well.
However, the problems are different.
In Psalm 3 David is concerned about a physical attack.
Thousands of soldiers had aligned themselves with Absalom against David.
David needed God to be a shield against his enemies.
In Psalm 4 the problem is verbal.
His enemies were spreading malicious slander and lies about David.
Now it’s his reputation that is at stake instead of his physical body.
As a result, David doesn’t need God’s physical deliverance, but a sense of God’s presence and approval.
This psalm also starts with an inscription.
While we don’t count it as part of the psalm (verse 1 doesn’t start until after the inscription) it is in Hebrew.
For the director of music.
With stringed instruments.
A psalm of David.
This should remind us that the psalms were the songbook for the Jews.
That this psalm was to be accompanied by stringed instruments perhaps tells us that others were accompanied by non-stringed instruments and perhaps by no instruments.
The Bible begins in Genesis 1 with the words:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
(Genesis 1:1)
This verse, as does the rest of the Bible, doesn’t argue for the existence of God but instead assumes God’s existence.
What the Bible does is argue for the character of God.
The glory of the Bible is that it reveals to us that God is personal and desires to enter into a relationship with us.
Throughout the Bible, God is in constant communication with his people as they are with him.
This is true for Psalm 4 as well.
The psalm begins with David calling out to God for help, pleading with God to answer him and bring him help.
The psalm then ends with David’s confidence in being heard and answered.
Because it is a very personal prayer we see changes in subject matter and mood, but in the psalm, we see the living relationship between God and his servant David.
First, we see David’s confidence in God.
1 Answer me when I call to you, my righteous God.
Give me relief from my distress; have mercy on me and hear my prayer.
(Psalm 4:1)
David is confident that God hears his prayer.
Three times he refers to that confident assurance.
Answer me when I call to you
Hear my prayer
The Lord hears when I call to him
David is certain that God will hear and answer his prayer.
God can be depended on even when people cannot.
So he identifies God as being righteous.
To be righteous is to do that which is right.
God keeps his covenant with his people, upholds his moral law, and fulfills his promises.
God will always do what is right.
God knows the truth and makes sure that justice will triumph.
David then appeals to God’s past actions.
In the past, God has helped him by giving David relief from his distress.
That’s the situation David found himself in when Absalom leads in a revolt.
That was stressful.
Since God had given him relief in that situation, David was confident God would do so in this situation too.
That’s the way our faith in God works.
As we trust God he comes through for us.
The next time we face a difficult situation it becomes even easier to trust God because we’ve trusted him before.
Satan wants to make us forget how God has answered our prayers in the past.
But because we remember how God comes through before we can know he will do so again.
In verse 2 we find the problem David was facing as he addresses those causing his distress.
2 How long will you people turn my glory into shame?
How long will you love delusions and seek false gods?
(Psalm 4:2)
In verse 1 David speaks to God, but beginning with verse 2 he speaks to his enemies.
They ignored the good things David had done and exaggerated the bad things.
No one is perfect and David wasn’t.
But they were ruining his reputation with groundless accusations.
David then asks, “How long are you going to keep this up?”
Then, in verse 3 David reminds them that he belongs to God.
3 Know that the Lord has set apart his faithful servant for himself; the Lord hears when I call to him.
(Psalm 4:3)
Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what they say about him or do to him.
It doesn’t matter because he belongs to God and David knew that it was God who put him on the throne.
If God wanted another king God would easily replace him.
It wouldn’t matter how hard he fought or how many soldiers he might muster to help protect him.
David’s reign would end as soon as God wanted it to.
As Paul wrote to the Romans:
Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established.
The authorities that exist have been established by God.
(Romans 13:1)
This has sometimes been a difficult lesson for me.
When I graduated from seminary I was ready to find a church and start preaching.
I started sending our resumes two months before I finished school so I’d have a job after graduation.
But that’s not what happened.
Since I didn’t have a job we moved in with my mother.
As I continued sending out resumes and waiting for replies I got a job at Chick-fil-A.
It was almost a year before we moved to Elizabethton.
As hard as it was to wait I knew that God would open the right door in his timing.
David had learned that as well.
As a young man still in his teens, Samuel had anointed him to become the next king of Israel.
But it was years before he took the throne.
If I were David I would have preferred God to wait and tell until it was time to become king.
You’ll remember David’s story of how he went to Saul as a musician, and then he killed Goliath.
David became an officer in Saul’s army before Saul started trying to kill him.
In all of that David was learning to trust God.
So when these yahoos started spreading lies David didn’t like it, but his position on the throne was secure.
He didn’t worry about it because he trusted God.
And then he tells his enemies what he already knew, God listened to his prayers.
It is God who put me here not you and God will answer when I cry out to him for help.
Second, we see David makes a call to trust God
After reminding his enemies that God takes care of his own, David encourages them to consider their relationship with God.
He is encouraging his enemies to put their trust in God even as he does.
4 Tremble and do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.
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