Matters of the Heart

I will sing of steadfast love and justice; to you, O Lord, I will make music. I will ponder the way that is blameless. Oh when will you come to me? I will walk with integrity of heart within my house; I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless. I hate the work of those who fall away; it shall not cling to me. A perverse heart shall be far from me; I will know nothing of evil. Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart I will not endure. I will look with favor on the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me; he who walks in the way that is blameless shall minister to me. No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes. Morning by morning I will destroy all the wicked in the land, cutting off all the evildoers from the city of the Lord.

Seeing that this coming Thursday is Valentine’s day, I thought it might be interesting to look at a Psalm that speaks of the heart.

Of all the Psalms, Psalm 101 focuses on the heart the most. This is Psalm written by David and it expresses his desire to be a godly ruler of Israel. It is one of the Royal Psalms that were sung in the courts of the Kings of Israel and Judah. Perhaps you are thinking, “How does this apply to me?” I am not in a king of ancient Israel.”

First of all, we should never forget that the main application of these Royal Psalms is they point us to Christ. Even though David desired to be the type of godly ruler Psalm 101 speaks of, he fell short of this idea. The Bible is very honest about his sin and failings as a king. Those kings of Judah and Israel that came after David were even worse. As we learned last week from Psalm 2, the Royal Psalms point us in hope to the final Messiah, who is Jesus. Jesus is the ideal King. He is the only person we should put our hope in to make this world a better place.

Second to this application, is the Royal Psalms point us to those who are in Christ by faith. The New Testament is clear that those who place their faith in Christ have obtained royal status. We are children of God and fellow heirs with Christ (John 1:12, Romans 8:16-17), consequently we will someday reign with Christ (2 Timothy 2:12). In fact, Jesus himself uses Psalm 2 and applies it to believers.

Revelation 2:26–27 ESV

The one who conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father.

Therefore, Psalm 101 is very much a Psalm we need to look at very closely so we can begin preparing ourselves for that day when we will be kings and queens!

In this Psalm, there are three pairs of comparisons and contrasts. The first contrasts the godly heart with the perverse heart.

Strive for a Godly Heart / Avoid a Perverse Heart

David begins this Psalm by speaking of a godly or perhaps I should say Godward heart.

Psalm 101:1–2 ESV

All godliness begins with a love and delight in God’s character, “I will sing of steadfast love and justice.” David loves and delights in steadfast love and justice because God is a God of steadfast love and justice. As we read our Old Testament we see again and again that God is revealed to us as a God of steadfast love and justice.

Steadfast Love

Steadfast love is that special Hebrew word we should all know: hesed. Hesed is translated in various ways in our English bibles. Sometimes it is translated as “loving kindness,” other times as “mercies” or “faithfulness.” All these words are necessary because no one English word captures it meaning. Hesed is God’s covenantal love by which He remains faithful and shows kindness and mercy to His people, even when they are rebellious and sinful.

This idea of covenantal love was so ingrained in the Hebrew mind, that it is impossible to imagine the apostles having anything else in mind when they write of God’s love in the New Testament. Thus when we read of God’s love in the New Testament, we must not think of the sentimental, flimsy love of pop culture, but of the firm, committed love of the Hebrews. This is the type of love John writes of when he says, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son...”. (John 3:16)

This is the type of love that David strove for and this is the type of love we must strive for, especially in our homes! I am going to speak more about integrity of heart in a moment, but notice that David wanted to have integrity of heart within his household. It is within our households that we need hesed more than anywhere else. The best Valentine gift you can give your husband or wife is a heart filled with covenantal love—a steadfast love, a kind love, a merciful love, a faithful love.

Justice

The second characteristic David praises God for is His justice. This is not just the giving out of justice, but it means that God IS just—He is righteous. There is a standard of right and wrong and God meets that standard perfectly! This is a very controversial idea in our world today—modern, western society rejects the idea of moral absolutes. To believe that there is an absolute standard of righteous is to be counter-cultural.

The standard of justice by which we can judge is God Himself and His Word. This is why David writes, “I will ponder the way that is blameless.” (Psalm 101:2) We have already seen this truth in Psalm 1—the blessed person is the person that delights and meditates upon God’s Torah.

This brings us to the next contrast:

Strive for Integrity of Heart / Avoid an Arrogant Heart

With this second comparison and contrast, I am going to begin the negative. By doing so you will appreciate the positive all the more. In verse 5, David writes:

Psalm 101:5 ESV

Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart I will not endure.

The Arrogant Heart

The Hebrew idiom that most of our English bibles translates as “an arrogant heart” or “a proud heart,” literally means “a broad mind.” As 21st century Americans, we don’t equate having a broad mind with arrogance and pride, but the Hebrews viewed life as a covenantal relationship between God and man. To have a broad mind was to depart from the narrow way God as King had defined for us to live. This is what Jesus was speaking of when He speaks of the narrow gate that leads to eternal life and the broad gate that leads to destruction. (Mt 7:13-14) It is the proud, arrogant person who thinks they know a better way than God.

A Heart of Integrity

Now that we understand what an arrogant heart is, we can better appreciate the importance of a heart of integrity. In verse 2, David writes:

Psalm 101:2 ESV

I will ponder the way that is blameless. Oh when will you come to me? I will walk with integrity of heart within my house;

As a king, David understood that in order to have integrity of heart in his public life, he needed to have integrity of heart in his private life. We don’t know if David wrote this Psalm before or after his sin with Bathsheba, but that incident powerfully illustrates the importance of maintaining integrity of heart in our private lives. We like to think that what happens in private will remain in private, but that is a lie. Sooner or later our private sins will have very public repercussions.

Perhaps this is why David wrote, “Oh when will you come to me?” David of course knew as we know, God is present everywhere, but on an experiential level we are not always aware of God’s presence. We need that experience of God’s presence in our battle for integrity of heart.

We often do things in private, which we will not do in public, because we think no one will see, but someone does see! God IS with you. He is with you wherever you go. He is even with you in your thoughts and emotions! Pray like David that you are always aware of this.

Remembering the power of God’s presence, led David to remember the power of the presence of other people. This brings us to the third comparison and contrast.

Strive for Kindred Hearts / Avoid Deceitful Hearts

Kindred Hearts

In verse 6, David writes:

Psalm 101:6 ESV

I will look with favor on the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me; he who walks in the way that is blameless shall minister to me.

Notice how David is describing the godly, he calls them “the faithful in the land.” This brings us back to that all-important Hebrew word: Hesed. These are the people who had steadfast covenantal love and loyalty towards God and God’s people. These are the people who “Love the Lord their God with all their heart and love their neighbors as themselves.”

This are the type of people we need to surround ourselves with. This is why Scripture in both testaments stresses the importance of marrying another believer, raising our children in the fear of the Lord and having as our friends other believers.

For the same reasons, we need to avoid deceitful hearts.

Deceitful Hearts

In verses 7-8, David writes:

Psalm 101:7–8 ESV

No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes. Morning by morning I will destroy all the wicked in the land, cutting off all the evildoers from the city of the Lord.

The problem with emotionally attaching ourselves with unbelievers is we get sucked into their lives of sin and deceit. This is the reason Scripture gives for why we are not to marry unbelievers. David’s son Solomon is a tragic example of what happens when we become emotionally attracted to unbelievers.

1 Kings 11:1–2 ESV

Now King Solomon loved many foreign women, along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the people of Israel, “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love.

Don’t miss understand me, this does not mean we don’t reach out to unbelievers. No one reached out to unbelievers more than Jesus, but He never compromised His standards. He called them to follow HIS ways; he never joined them in THEIR way. It is true, He was called a “friend of sinners”, but what sinners were His friends? It was those who repented and believed in Him.

Everyone Jesus met was a sinner and most of the people He met (such as the Pharisees) hated Him and in the end killed Him. Why did they kill Him? Because He would not join Himself to them and follow THEIR ways.

This point is a condemnation of the way most American churches imagine evangelism is to be done. Why are so many Christians and churches compromising the standards of Scripture? It is all in the name of love and reaching out to others, but as we have learned today, we cannot truly love others unless we are in a covenant relationship with God first. We are called to make disciples, not “decisions.” A disciple is a person who commits themselves to God in steadfast love and follows His ways of justice.

The Heart of the Matter has been and always will be steadfast love and justice. This is where David began this Psalm and it is where I will end this sermon.