Psalm 25

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Intro:

It is my hope that this will be our last Psalm. I am getting more familiar with Zechariah and feeling a little more ready to begin wading out into that book. 25 is 1/6th I believe through the book, give or take a couple of the other Psalms that Jake and I have chosen in the past and while this is a bit of a longer Psalm it really is an instructive Psalm for how we ought to approach God. In this Psalm we see so many core aspects of what ought to form the foundation of the believers relationship with and approach to God.
Now, this Psalm is a little difficult because, though you can see it in the English it really is an acrostic of the Hebrew alphabet as each verse begins with the next letter of that alphabet, with a couple of exceptions that aren't so grievous to assume that this was the general intent of the author. It would have taken care and thought to construct the Psalm this way and while we wont really consider the couple of lines that don't follow that pattern the pattern itself is so obvious that you cant really claim that this was not David’s intent. Now, what this does for the Psalm though is make it a little less progressive and developmental in its thought than a Psalm that might have been composed without these constraints and you can almost feel that as you read, that it doesn't necessarily flow as well as other Psalms do. This is because of the clear linguistic constraints of being limited in topic by the words available that started with the correct letter.
One commentator says:

The fetters of the acrostic structure forbid freedom and progress of thought, and almost compel repetition. It is fitted for meditative reiteration of favourite emotions or familiar axioms, and results in a loosely twined wreath rather than in a column with base, shaft, and capital.

At its heart this Psalm is a prayer, this is David drawing near to His God and in this way, even though we cant really appreciate all of the poetic structure we ought to be well able to appreciate seeing this psalmist, this man after God’s own heart, Israels dear shepherd King and giant slayer, a man who knew both times of deepest intimacy with His God and yet times of deep and almost unimaginable sin and wickedness and through it all David was a man who knew how to pray and so we will walk with the dear psalmist of Isreal today as he prays to his God.
I love what Spurgeon said about prayer as he introduced this Psalm in his commentary:

True prayer may be described as the soul rising from earth to have fellowship with heaven; it is taking a journey upon Jacob’s ladder, leaving our cares and fears at the foot, and meeting with a covenant God at the top. Very often the soul cannot rise, she has lost her wings, and is heavy and earth-bound; more like a burrowing mole than a soaring eagle. At such dull seasons we must not give over prayer, but must, by God’s assistance, exert all our power to lift up our hearts. Let faith be the lever and grace be the arm, and the dead lump will yet be stirred. But what a lift it has sometimes proved! With all our tugging and straining we have been utterly defeated, until the heavenly loadstone of our Saviour’s love has displayed its omnipotent attractions, and then our hearts have gone up to our Beloved like mounting flames of fire.

We have all likely experienced times where prayer seems hard or ineffective, where we don't have the words and feel, as Spurgeon said, more like a mole than an eagle. But we must not give up on prayer, we must persist and spending time in the prayers of the Bible is a great way to find our hearts lifted and our spirits enabled to rise in prayer once again.
With that in mind lets turn to the Lord in prayer and then walk with David through his.

PRAY & Read

As we start into this psalm it is good to note that structure beyond the acrostic of the Hebrew alphabet is almost impossible to determine. Nearly every commentator breaks this psalm down differently, some look to the types of prayers, some look at the switched between second and third person in relation to God and on and on. I think that it is best to perhaps not pursue a structure and see this more as the wide ranging prayer of a penitent lover of God.

Themes

In this light it is probably best to simply note the major themes of the prayer and then see how those themes are expressed throughout.
The first theme that we will come across is one that is very familiar to the Psalms and that is the theme of protection and deliverance from enemies.
The next theme that we will see and the theme that is central to the psalm is repentance. Now if you are familiar at all with the Biblical narrative you would have to understand that any righteous prayer is going to have a focus on repentance. While David goes first to a plea for deliverance He just as quickly moves on to focus on the internal workings of His own soul and spends much time in this prayer before God’s throne of grace seeking forgiveness and repentance.
This must be a mark of the true believer. A true believer is one who has been given new eyes that have the capacity to see reality as it truly is. The true believer has been supernaturally delivered from the hardness of heart and foolish darkening that we read about in Romans 1. The true believer has the capacity to see not only themselves as they truly are but also to see God as He truly is and as we grow in this sight and our knowledge of God increases we continue to grow in our marveling that this Great God could condescend to love wicked and sinful creatures such as us. David well knew the reality of his own soul and this psalm was likely written in his older years after many mistakes and sinful failings as a king and more than that simply as a man who knew who God is and yet has to continually wrestle with the sin that still clung to his flesh.
Yes, when we see God for who He is and ourselves for who we are we ought often be moved to prayers of repentance and seeing the mercy and grace of God.
Now this is not all that we see though. we also see in this Psalm meditations on who God is. Prayer does not just involve conversing directly with God about needs and wants though this is an important aspect of any time of prayer, bit prayer also exults in truths about God lifting up before Him what we know to be true about Him and as we call those precious truths to mind we give God glory for who He is. Within this context we will specifically see David’s calling to mind and meditating on the covenant faithfulness and love that God has for His people.
And finally we see a strong focus in this Psalm on walking in God’s ways. This is naturally coupled with the prayers for repentance showing that repentance is not just a confession of and a turning away from sin but also a turning to God and learning to walk in His ways.
And so lets take a look at these themes as David expresses them in this Psalm:

Prayer for Deliverance

We see the first theme of the prayer for protection and deliverance right off the bat:

1  To you, O LORD, I lift up my soul.

2  O my God, in you I trust;

let me not be put to shame;

let not my enemies exult over me.

3  Indeed, none who wait for you shall be put to shame;

they shall be ashamed who are wantonly treacherous.

As we jump in here it is important to note first the expression of trust and confidence in God even as David moves to pray for protection from his enemies.
David directs his prayer to the LORD, to Yahweh the covenant God of Israel and then he uses a intensely person expression “O my God, in you I trust.”
Now we are used to hearing people say that phrase, well at least the first part of it all the time and typically it is a sinful taking of the Lord’s name in vain but that is certainly not the case here! This is a way of David expressing his intimate connection to God, yes, David’s God is Yahweh , the covenant God of Israel but this God is also deeply and personally David’s God. This is the God on whom David has learned to trust his whole life. David’s deep and personal love for God is expresses in so many ways across the Psalms that he wrote. This trust and confidence was formed in him as a young man, likely even as a child. We see David’s expression of trust in God in one of his most well known moments. In 1 Samuel 17 as David is talking to Saul about facing the giant Goliath he says:

34 But David said to Saul, “Your servant used to keep sheep for his father. And when there came a lion, or a bear, and took a lamb from the flock, 35 I went after him and struck him and delivered it out of his mouth. And if he arose against me, I caught him by his beard and struck him and killed him. 36 Your servant has struck down both lions and bears, and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, for he has defied the armies of the living God.” 37 And David said, “The LORD who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine.”

Do we trust God? I mean really trust him?
I was talking to Grace this past week after an incident when she was upset with one of her brothers for taking a toy from her during play. I told her that I was not excusing what her brother had done but that she also needed to learn to trust in God’s providential love for her that even in the moments when we are wronged, whether small moments like that with the toy or larger moments we can know that God is not absent in those things but rather we can trust that He is at work and using those things to train our hearts in this trust of Him and in the walking of His paths that we will see in a moment and I pray that Grace is able to learn that just as we all out to seek to learn that lesson and express at all times the trust and confidence in God that David expresses here.
Now we don't know what moment of trouble David is referencing here. He certainly faced plenty of them in His life but he is facing this moment with the confidence that he faced those bears, lions, and the giant.

let me not be put to shame;

let not my enemies exult over me.

This prayer does not really need an answer, the trust expressed assumes that the answer will be in the affirmative. And we can see this in Davids immediate assessment that follows:

3  Indeed, none who wait for you shall be put to shame;

they shall be ashamed who are wantonly treacherous.

There is a contrast here that leads into the next of our themes.
The shame that David speaks of is parallel in those last two lines of verse 2 with the enemies exalting over him. So to be put to shame is to have ones enemies triumph over you. There is a natural shame in losing you might say but that is magnified when the source of your defeat is the very thing you trusted in.
When we trust in something to save and deliver and it fails to do so there is a shame that comes from trusting in the wrong thing. But the point made by David is similar to the point made by Paul in Romans 5 where he says:

Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame,

All hopes that are grounded in the Lord are hopes that will not leave the one doing the hoping covered in shame. The Lord will prevail on behalf of His people!

Indeed, none who wait for you shall be put to shame;

But this is contrasted here by David with those who are wantonly treacherous. These are David’s enemies. There are only two groups of people in this world. There are those who hope and trust in God and there are those who do not and those who do not can be described in this way, they are wicked, they are wantonly treacherous, meaning that they not only do wickedness but they consider their wickedness a light thing, nothing of any great concern. This is reflective of the fact that as we have noted earlier, they do not see, they do not see the utter holiness of God and the depravity of their own actions, they are wanton in their wickedness because they have so refused to acknowledge God that their hearts have become darkened and hardened in their foolishness.
This is not just the Hitlers of the world either!
David comes back to this theme of deliverance at the end of the Psalm and again expresses his trust in his God:

19  Consider how many are my foes,

and with what violent hatred they hate me.

20  Oh, guard my soul, and deliver me!

Let me not be put to shame, for I take refuge in you.

21  May integrity and uprightness preserve me,

for I wait for you.

Walk in His Ways

This then leads us to the next theme and this along with the following theme of repentance really make up the heart of this Psalm.
Before we get to repentance though we see David express several times in this Psalm the desire to be lead by the Lord and to walk in His ways:

4  Make me to know your ways, O LORD;

teach me your paths.

5  Lead me in your truth and teach me,

for you are the God of my salvation;

for you I wait all the day long.

8  Good and upright is the LORD;

therefore he instructs sinners in the way.

9  He leads the humble in what is right,

and teaches the humble his way.

10  All the paths of the LORD are steadfast love and faithfulness,

for those who keep his covenant and his testimonies.

There is a strong connection between walking in God’s ways and the trust expressed in the first verse! We have already seen that the wicked are to have no expectation of hope or deliverance, they WILL David says, be put to shame! Well a definition you might say for wickedness is to walk in ways that are not the Lords! The child of God will desire to walk in God’s ways, to follow His law, to live a life that is pleasing and honoring to Him! Those who are walking outside of the will of the Lord are to have no expectation of any sort of deliverance! Therefore the prayer of the upright must always be that God would lead us in the ways that are right.
Now as David speaks of these things we ought to remember that this is the Psalmist who penned Psalm 23:

2  He makes me lie down in green pastures.

He leads me beside still waters.

3  He restores my soul.

He leads me in paths of righteousness

for his name’s sake.

David was well aware that he had no natural ability to walk in right ways. Just as the sheep were unable to find the safe path or the green pastures or the still waters apart from the shepherds guidance so the saint has no ability to walk in paths of righteousness apart from the Great Shepherd’s leading.
We see this especially in verses 8&9 and the verbs used there:

therefore he instructs sinners in the way.

9  He leads the humble in what is right,

and teaches the humble his way.

God instructs, leads, and teaches. Note also that God instructs sinners, what a great mercy we see in God as He is willing to provide instruction to those who we have already seen are in that group of being wantonly treacherous, before a sinful and wicked world God still provides the light of the revelation of His word and the light of the gospel of salvation that sinners might walk again in His paths. But we also see that this leading and guiding and teaching are for the sinners who are humble! He leads the humble, he teaches the humble His ways! Following God is for the humble! We can not follow God if we do not let go of our own natural pride and arrogance that says I know what is best for me and I will make my own path and live my own life!
Natural men think they are pretty good at figuring out the best ways to walk. They have much confidence in their natural skill or ability. I was just lamenting to Jake this week a bit about seeing individuals pressing on in certain ways and knowing from scripture that what is called for is a totally different course and yet knowing that they have no desire to do the right and godly thing because they live in this state of darkened foolishness. We see this everywhere! May we be committed to walking the Lord’s path and may we embrace lives oh humility that we may be able to do so!

Repentance

This then leads us directly to the central theme of this Psalm. We see it in verse 11 which many commentators say is the center of this Psalm:

11  For your name’s sake, O LORD,

pardon my guilt, for it is great.

“Pardon my guilt for it is great” Repentance! This is a theme that arises from the natural tension that develops between David’s meditation on trusting God for deliverance and the truth that those who are to expect deliverance are those who are walking in the Lord’s ways.
What are we to do then about all of the ways that we ourselves have walked apart from the Lord, what are we to do with our own wanton transgressions?

6  Remember your mercy, O LORD, and your steadfast love,

for they have been from of old.

7  Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions;

according to your steadfast love remember me,

for the sake of your goodness, O LORD!

16  Turn to me and be gracious to me,

for I am lonely and afflicted.

17  The troubles of my heart are enlarged;

bring me out of my distresses.

18  Consider my affliction and my trouble,

and forgive all my sins.

May we all be as well versed in repentance as David is here. Remember this is David, likely as an older man, he has done a lot of great things in service to and enabled by His LORD and yet he has also had times of great sin and failings! We see the broad spectrum of David’s assessment of his sin in the words used. He looks back to the transgressions of his youth, and yet he also speaks in the present in verse 11 as he asks that God might pardon his guilt for it is great and in verse 18 where we see the comprehensive “forgive all my sins.”
It would be a mistake to assume that because David says His guilt is great that this is a prayer after something like the situation with Bathsheba. It could be but it is more likely that David is expressing what is so common amongst the aged saints, those who have walked long years with the Lord, they have spent much time before Him, beholding as we saw earlier the glories of His holiness and as they do so their sin become even more clear and even more vile and reprehensible to them. Sins that a younger believer might be tempted to trifle with and see as no big deal become sources of great sorrow for one who has long lived before His lord!
May we often in our prayers humbly pray with David:

For your name’s sake, O LORD,

pardon my guilt, for it is great.

Meditation on Who God is:

The last feature of this prayer psalm that we are going to look at this morning and just briefly is that prayer ought to also contain meditations on who God is. This is really a way of worshiping God as we come before Him in prayer.
Now if you view prayer as simply coming before God and asking for things and then going away and waiting to see God’s response this may seem a bit out of place.

Remember your mercy, O LORD, and your steadfast love,

for they have been from of old.

14  The friendship of the LORD is for those who fear him,

and he makes known to them his covenant.

15  My eyes are ever toward the LORD,

As we pray we ought to rehearse before God those things that we know to be true of Him. David’s prayer is laden with covenant language, remembering God’s mercy and love from of old. This isn't that David is expressing just the mercy and love he has experienced, this statement “from of old” is representative of all of the love and mercy that God has shown his people throughout time, David is reflecting on the covenant mercy and steadfast love, that is the hesed the covenant faithful love of God that He shows to His people as a result of who He is.
We see the language of covenant again there in 14 and the idea tied to it that God shows friendship to those who fear Him and that it is for these, His people, that His covenant is for.
“My eyes are ever toward the Lord” David says there in 15! When we pray there is likely a tendency to turn our eyes to the things that we seek in prayer! David knew better, David sees his enemies, he sees the dangers surrounding him, he sees his own guilt and sin and transgression and each time as he prays He turns his eyes from these things and toward the Lord and meditates on who He knows the Lord to be as He brings his penitent requests to the mercy seat of God.

Closing:

So as we close this morning it is my prayer that we would learn to pray like David. It is so important that when we think of prayer that our ideas and how we pray are formed and fashioned by time in God’s word! May believers likely only think of the Lord’s prayer when they think of how to pray and that is indeed a great starting point and I would direct you to Martin Luther’s “A Simple Way to Pray” as a great work on how to actually use the Lord’s prayer as a template for your praying. However, the Bible is rich with other prayers and we can learn much from spending time with these godly men like David as they come before their Lord in prayer.
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