In the Shadow of Your Wings (Psalm 17)

Announcements

Superbowl Party on Sunday, February 13th, 2022 at 6:30pm—free wings, pizza, and drinks. Join us for fellowship as we watch the game.

As you know, we’ve been heavily emphasizing outreach over the past year—that emphasis is going to continue into this year as well. We do outreach in a number of different ways, but when winter comes along, it does become more difficult for us to do anything outdoors. However, since we’re starting to get into Spring, I do want you to be aware that we’ll have more opportunities to serve in outreach coming. I don’t think that we’ll be participating in the Farmer’s Market this year (because I don’t think they plan on doing the Farmer’s Market this year), but we’ll have many different opportunities for people to get involved and I’m asking everyone to pray for ways to help—whether that’ through door-to-door canvassing of neighborhoods or helping us pass out flyers during the parades this summer. There will be plenty of opportunity and we’ll announce them as they come up.

I also want everyone to be aware that we’ll be opening an online order form through Custom Ink to order new t-shirts for this year—the church doesn’t make any money from this, but it does provide a means for people to subtly advertise the church. I actually get a lot of comments about the shirts that we have from last year. This year’s shirt is going to be light green with a smaller logo for the church on the front with the church’s name under it. On the back, we’ll have our “Worship Jesus. Equip Believers. Make Disciples.” tagline along with the church’s website on it. I’ll have to get back to you concerning price, I think they’re about $18 with an added fee for larger sizes. You’ll pay for these shirts through Custom Ink this time around that way the money doesn’t have to go through the church. I’ll email the link for everyone in next week’s prayer list and I’ll post that link on Facebook as well.

Let me remind you to continue to worship the LORD through your giving—to help you give, we have three ways for you to do so: (1) in-person giving can be done at the offering box: checks written to Grace & Peace and if you’d like a receipt for your cash gifts, place it in an envelope with your name on it. Debit, Credit, and ACH transfers can be done either by (2) texting the number 84321 with your $[amount] and following the text prompt or by (3) visiting us online at gapb.church and selecting giving in the menu bar. Everything you give goes to the building up of our local church and the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Sermon

Introduction

This evening, we’re continuing our series in the book of Psalms with Psalm 17. Psalm 17 is written by David and it’s a little different than all the previous psalms that we’ve worked through thus far. With the exceptions of Psalms 1-2, which carry no superscription and are usually seen as introductory psalms to the rest of the psalms, every psalm since has carried a superscription. And up to this point, the superscriptions have been clear that the psalms prior to Psalm 17 were written primarily for the musical worship of the LORD.

Psalm 17 was also utilized for the musical of the LORD, but this is the first psalm in which we’re told that the first purpose of the psalm wasn’t just for music, but it was first, primarily a prayer. Psalm 17 was written originally as a prayer from David to God and though we don’t know the exact time-period for it, we can clearly see that it is during a time when his enemies surrounded him seeking to harm him. This is, of course, a reoccurring theme through many of the psalms that David wrote and as the king of Israel, that opposition from enemies surrounding the nation is to be expected.

David writes this psalm as a prayer in which he pleads to God for justice to be enacted and he does this by first starting with an appeal to the truth about himself. Let’s read Psalm 17 together:

Psalm 17 ESV

A Prayer of David. 1 Hear a just cause, O Lord; attend to my cry! Give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit! 2 From your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right! 3 You have tried my heart, you have visited me by night, you have tested me, and you will find nothing; I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress. 4 With regard to the works of man, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent. 5 My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped. 6 I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; incline your ear to me; hear my words. 7 Wondrously show your steadfast love, O Savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand. 8 Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings, 9 from the wicked who do me violence, my deadly enemies who surround me. 10 They close their hearts to pity; with their mouths they speak arrogantly. 11 They have now surrounded our steps; they set their eyes to cast us to the ground. 12 He is like a lion eager to tear, as a young lion lurking in ambush. 13 Arise, O Lord! Confront him, subdue him! Deliver my soul from the wicked by your sword, 14 from men by your hand, O Lord, from men of the world whose portion is in this life. You fill their womb with treasure; they are satisfied with children, and they leave their abundance to their infants. 15 As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.

As we study this passage together this evening, we’re going to break it into three parts: (1) Vss. 1-5, David’s Character, in the first five verses, David starts his prayer to God by asking God to hear his plea—in doing so, he explains essentially why he thinks God should hear his plea. (2) Vss. 6—12 is David’s Prayer for protection. He utilizes striking and quite beautiful imagery to describe those who he needed protection from and the protection that he’s seeking itself. (3) Vss. 13-15, The Hope for the Future, then ends the psalm by looking forward to what God will do and praising him for doing it. This psalm ought to help us in two ways in particular—it should remind us to look at our hearts when we do face times of danger and then is should cause us to run to God through Jesus for help in those times.

Prayer for Illumination

David’s Character (1-5)

David starts this psalm by reflecting on his own character.

I do want to be abundantly clear that what David is doing here is not telling God to look at his own character or his own works, but rather, he’s making the statement that if he was someone reveling in his own sin, then he would expect God to act justly against his own sin as well as the sins that he asks God to respond justly to in the latter half of the psalm.

Or in other words, before asking God to handle the wickedness of his enemies, he looks at himself and he contemplates his own heart.

By the time he comes to pray this prayer, he’s contemplated his own state, which is why he starts his prayer by saying to God, “Hear a just cause, O LORD; attend to my cry! Give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit! From your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right!”

After checking his own heart he comes to the realization that he is righteous in his own behavior and in his own thoughts, only then does he decide that he can make such a bold claim:

That his cause is just; that his lips are free from deceit; and that he is righteous in the sight of God.

This claim is a claim that unless he’s certain of his righteousness is foolish to make—it’s always foolish to claim righteousness if you don’t know for sure that you are righteous (cf., Ananias and Sapphira who claimed to be righteous in their giving, but were found to be liars or the Pharisees who regularly claimed that they were righteous according to the Law, but were regularly proven to be unrighteous by Jesus).

In the case of David, he’s certain that he is in the right and he’s so certain of this, that he pleads his innocence through the first section of the psalm.

David makes the claim that his cause is just, his lips are free from deceit, and then he asks God to attend to his cry—to essentially hear him because his cause is just and he isn’t lying.

In vs. 2, when David says “from your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right!” he essentially calls on God to act in his justness, to vindicate David.

Again, I do want to clarify that as David makes these statements, he isn’t telling God to look at all the good that he has done as reasons for God to act.

If we aren’t careful with how we read this text, we can get that idea, but David isn’t trying to convince God to do something on his own merit.

David isn’t saying, “God, I’m such a great believer; I do such amazing things. Please do these things for me.” No, what David is doing is he’s checking his own heart before asking God to handle the unrighteousness of someone else.

He’s checking to be sure that his own heart isn’t filled with sin before asking God to deal with someone else’s sin against him.

That’s amplified in vss. 3-5. David continues in vs. 3, still talking to God in prayer about his own character, “You [meaning God] have tried my heart, you have visited me by night, you have tested me, and you will find nothing; I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress.”

David is sure that he is in the right and that he isn’t acting in sin to the extent that he’s willing for God himself to examine him.

That’s the idea behind God “trying [his] heart” and “testing [him].” And quite frankly, considering those handful of examples that I mentioned before about those that claimed to be righteous when they weren’t, what David is doing here is only smart if he knows for sure that he is genuinely righteous.

Otherwise, it would be completely foolish for him to ask God to examine or inspect him—David is sure that he is righteous and he bases that on two things.

First, he bases this on his faith in God. This basis is implied by the simple fact that he’s taking the time to pray to God. In other words, he knows he’s righteous because of the righteousness of God that’s given to him as a believer, thus, he can commune with God and speak with God.

Second, he bases this on his own personal lifestyle and character. This basis is apparent in the very words that he speaks: try my heart and test me, vs. 3, “and you will find nothing; I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress.”

And he continues to look at his personal lifestyle and character through vss. 4-5, “With regard to the works of man, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent. My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped.”

David claims that whereas those around him are working or living a certain way, he has avoided living the same way that they live—the phrase, “by the word of your lips,” speak of God’s Word itself. What David is claiming is that whereas those around him live according to their own desire, David has sought to live according to God’s Word.

In doing so, he has avoided the ways of the violent and he has walked according to God’s paths.

David has kept himself separate from the ways of those who are violent and destroy. He has endeavored to follow God’s Word and he has followed the way God wants him to live.

And he has done this intentionally and he has done this consistently—David has sought to follow God and God’s Word.

And again, let me stress that David is not saying these things in an effort to pridefully tell God of all the good things that he has done with a demand that God obey him because of all the good that he’s done. What David is doing here is reflecting on his own heart condition before asking God to act in his justice and goodness. It’s with this in mind that David then prays in vss. 6-12:

David’s Prayer (6-12)

Psalm 17:6–12 ESV

6 I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; incline your ear to me; hear my words. 7 Wondrously show your steadfast love, O Savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand. 8 Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings, 9 from the wicked who do me violence, my deadly enemies who surround me. 10 They close their hearts to pity; with their mouths they speak arrogantly. 11 They have now surrounded our steps; they set their eyes to cast us to the ground. 12 He is like a lion eager to tear, as a young lion lurking in ambush.

David starts his prayer by calling on the person that he’s speaking to—David says that he is calling on God because God will “answer [him].”

Because he knows that God will answer him, he’s not only expresses confidence in this assertion, but he asks God to “incline [his] ear” and “hear [his] words.”

Now, you might hear this confident assertion from David and think that this is based on his previous statements concerning his own character, but remember that he didn’t speak of his own character as reasonings for God to work on his behalf—he spoke of his own character to check his own heart before praying.

David doesn’t rely or depend on himself for God to answer his prayer, in fact, David doesn’t base the answer to his prayer on himself whatsover, but on God himself.

We see that in vss. 7-9, “Wondrously show your steadfast love, O Savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand. Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings, from the wicked who do me violence, my deadly enemies who surround me.”

In these verses we see that the reason for David’s confidence in God’s answering of his prayer isn’t predicated on himself whatsoever; it’s based on God’s character. And David utilizes a series of anthropomorphic illustrations to show how this works.

Why does David think that God will answer him? Vs. 7 Because God is epitomized by hesed, his steadfast love or his loyal covenant-keeping love. Thus, because of God’s steadfast love, David knows that God will do something.

Why does David think that God will answer him? Vs. 7 Because God is the Savior of those who seek refuge in him. Particularly, God will be the refuge for those who are running from adversaries that not only oppose the person, but opposes God.

Why does David think that God will answer him? Vs. 8 Because as a genuine believer in God, David knows that God keeps his people safe and secure, God protects his own under “the shadow of [his] wings.” This image comes fro the animal world, comparing God’s protection to that of a bird with its young.

David is confident in God’s acting and in his prayer for God to act, not because of who David is, but because of who God is—God is hesed and he acts only in his steadfast love; God is the refuge; and God is the protector of those who love him.

Because God acts within the bounds of his own character, David can trust God to protect him from those who are described as “the wicked who do [him] violence, [his] deadly enemies who surround [him]” in vs. 9.

The reason for David’s prayer is the immanency of the wicked—he’s praying this prayer because his enemies are near and they seek to destroy him.

He’s praying this prayer because he knows God will protect him (based on God’s character); and he’s praying this prayer because he knows the wicked seek to destroy him (based on their character).

And we see a description of who they are in vss. 10-12, “They close their hearts to pity; with their mouths they speak arrogantly. They have now surrounded our steps; they set their eyes to cast us to the ground. He is like a lion eager to tear, as a young lion lurking in ambush.”

David describes these people by referring to them as wicked enemies who have closed their heart to pity.

These are people who have rejected God (as seen by the description of wicked); these are people who oppose David (as seen by the word enemy); and these are people who have no pity.

They’ve tried to destroy David and they’re continuing to try and destroy David, they are calloused and indifferent towards the plight of David. They are acting completely in hatred of David and of wicked intent.

David says that these people are speaking arrogantly and that they’ve surrounded their steps and they’ve “set their eyes to cast [them] to the ground,”

They are wicked people who oppose David with no pity. They’ve been completely calloused and indifferent and they completely hate David. They’ve been filled with the intents of the wicked and they speak in pride.

That idea, that they’re speaking arrogantly combined with the fact that they’ve “set their eyes to cast [David] to the ground” give the impression that they’re doing this while talking trash about David—they think they’ve already won the war and we could probably assume that they’re trash talking David and they’re probably trash talking God himself.

“Where’s your God David?” “I thought you were the chosen king.” “If God loved you, wouldn’t he do something to save you?”

This could be the taunting that David hear as his enemies surround him with intent to kill him.

David says in vs. 12, that they are “like [lions] eager to tear, as a young lion lurking in ambush.”

Several years ago there was an American dentist who went to the African safari to shoot and kill a lion. The American did this as a sport, he wanted a trophy lion.

When American in the United States heard that he had done this, there was an uproar amongst people and organizations like PETA. They accused him of animal cruelty and they tried to state that he had no right to go to Africa and do something like this—what would the locals think?

Quite frankly, when the locals were asked this question, they were thankful that the lion was killed. Why? Because lions are absurdly dangerous. We sometimes think of lions in terms of the ones that are housed in zoos—and we think of them almost as large cats with sharp teeth and claws.

But the reality is when lions are in the wild, they are dangerous killers who stalk their prey. Very few people who get up close and personal with a real lion escape alive.

This is the idea of a lion that David is utilizing to compare his enemies to—they’re stalking him, they’re lurking in the bushes just waiting for their opportunity to attack, to ambush, and to kill him.

The imagery that David gives is one of great fear and terror. David thinks that this could very well be the end of his life; David feels that he has no where to run; he’s desperate.

And in his desperation, he checks his heart to be sure that he is acting justly and righteously and then he prays—he calls out to God.

Which seems like the most obvious thing to do, but let’s be honest, when we find ourselves in desperation, what do we tend to do? We tend to turn every except towards God—we look inward for inner strength, we look towards our family and our friends, we turn to substances and objects to make us feel better. We do everything except turn to God. David, on the other hand, because he knows who God is and knows the character of God, turns to him alone and he is so confident in God’s action based on God’s character, that he closes this psalm by expressing great hope for the future. Read with me vss. 13-15 again.

The Hope for the Future (13-15)

Psalm 17:13–15 ESV

13 Arise, O Lord! Confront him, subdue him! Deliver my soul from the wicked by your sword, 14 from men by your hand, O Lord, from men of the world whose portion is in this life. You fill their womb with treasure; they are satisfied with children, and they leave their abundance to their infants. 15 As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.

What David says in vss. 13-15 stands in stark contrast to the persecution that his enemies present him with in vss. 6-12. David is looking at the future with the confident expectation that God will do something.

Vs. 13 starts this section by again appealing to the LORD for action, “Arise, O LORD! Confront him, subdue him! Deliver my soul from the wicked by your sword.” This appeal continues into vs. 14, “from men by your hand, O LORD, from men of the world whose portion is in this life.

David’s request to God is for God to act quickly. To confront the wicked and subdue the wicked. The word translated as subdue comes from the idea of forcing the person to submit. David wants God to intervene in such a way that the wicked can’t help, but to submit—but it’s not to David that David wants the submission; David wants the wicked to submit to God himself.

David in vs. 13, prays for God to “deliver [his] soul from the wicked by [God’s] sword.” This call for God to punish the wicked may refer to the fact that God at times utilized human armies to judge and punish people—God utilized the Babylonians to punish the Israelites, the Israelites were utilized to punish the Canaanites. David is praying for God to use some means to punish the wicked even if that means utilizing the swords of men.

David prays at the start of vs. 14 for his soul to be delivered “from men by [God’s] hand.” Regardless of whether God utilizes man to fulfill the judgment, David still prays for God to enact punishment of the wicked.

The next phrase of Psalm 17 then gives us another description of the wicked, “whose portion is in this life.”

This one phrase provides a pretty profound idea of what has caused the wicked to become so wicked. Of course, we all believe in the doctrine of original sin, that because of Adam and Eve’s sin, we’re all born in sin, but what David is emphasizing in Psalm 17:14 is that these people didn’t respond to that original sin in repentance.

These people rather than responding to general and special revelation with repentance chose to continue in their sin because “their portion is in this life.”

What this means is that they’ve chosen to continue living as if this world is the only world—they’ve decided to continue in sin, to seek their own pleasure, and to delight in the things of the world rather than the things of God.

David is calling on God to destroy those who look at the world for satisfaction and thus are wicked and sinful.

But for those who are seeking after God, David says: Vs. 14b, “You fill their womb with treasure; they are satisfied with children, and they leave their abundance to their infants.”

For those that follow God and reject the world—it’s sin and it’s desires, there are blessings. This stands in contrast to what David says about those “whose portion is in this life.”

Those that seek God will be satisfied, will have treasure, and will have wealth for their children. The idea being that those who seek God anticipate a far greater blessing than the momentary satisfaction of the world.

Whereas those who seek the things of the world seemingly experience blessings, what they experience is only temporary.

Those who seek God will experience genuine blessings that are eternal.

David ends this psalm in such a way that it’s clear that whatever does happen to him, he has confidence in God and the relationship that he has with God. Vs. 15, "As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.”

This psalm ends with a note of great assurance that God is who he says he is and that David is righteous in his plea. David ends the psalm with resolve that regardless of what happens, he will behold God’s face and he will be be satisfied with God’s likeness.

This concept of beholding God’s face and being satisfied with his likeness goes all the way back to Moses in Deuteronomy 34:10 and Numbers 12:8.

And it’s the idea that it is a great privilege to be in the presence of God himself. In Deuteronomy 34 and Numbers 12, we’re told in both places that Moses was privileged to physically see God face to face. Jesus in Matthew 5:8 makes the statement that the pure in heart are blessed because they shall see God face to face.

What David is saying as he closes off this psalm is that regardless of what happens with his enemies in Psalm 17, he will awaken to see God’s face and to be in his presence.

This is in contrast with those who live for this life and desires the world over God.

This is in contrast to those who have rejected God.

This is in contrast to those who seek after unrighteous things.

David closes this psalm with a beautiful description of how he will enjoy the presence of God through the spiritual blessings given to those who genuinely seek after him.

And David can only revel in the presence of God because he has been made righteous, he has been cleansed, and he has sought after God.

Despite the character of his enemies and their desire to kill him, he has confidence in God and that confidence causes him to rejoice in the future hope of seeing God face to face.

I think that you can see how this passage can be applied to our lives today and quite frankly, in many ways, the application is similar to previous psalms that we’ve studied. Nevertheless, let’s take the last few minutes to look at some specific application and much like last week’s sermon, I do want us to look at this application in two ways. I want us to look at the psalm for its general application and then I want us to look at this as a psalm that we can pray together.

Application

So, starting with the general application—Psalm 17 is a psalm that’s specifically listed as a prayer of David. And in this prayer, we see David do three things, which form an outline for his prayer: (1) we see him contemplate his own spiritual state and reflect on his own lifestyle to be sure that he isn’t in sin; (2) we see him describe his enemies and what they’ve done against him, and we see him pray for the deliverance of God; and (3) we see him rejoice in the hope that he has for the future. I think that our application is actually fairly simple from this passage. When we find ourselves when we’re surrounded by enemies, we ought to respond in the same way that David does.

Now, mind you, you might hear that and think, “when will I ever be surrounded by people who want to kill me?” So, we might need to contextualize this passage just a bit for an application that is suitable for us today.

We might not ever face a legitimate situation in which our lives are in actual danger and we’ll probably never face a scenario in which people actually want to kill us, but we do face scenarios on a regular basis in which people oppose us.

And it might not be that they want to legitimately kill us; it could just be that they want to hurt us emotionally or mentally, it could be that they want to tear us down and make our lives more difficult. It could be that they simply dislike or even hate us to the extent that they just want to push us down and do as much harm that they possibly can.

In these situations, we can feel as if our enemies surround us and that they seek to destroy us. And when you find yourself in scenarios like this, you might ask yourself, “how do I deal with something like this?”

Many well-meaning Christians will just tell you that you should kill them with kindness, turn the other cheek, or just ignore them. They’ll remind you that Jesus says that you are to love your enemies and that is a true statement.

But let’s be honest, it doesn’t help much when you’re going through something when you’re being opposed by people to just hear someone say to just love them.

Loving them doesn’t stop them from hurting you, tearing you down, and hating you.

And while it’s true that we must still love our enemies, just saying “love them” doesn’t help.

What Psalm 17 provides for us is some additional help in these situations—yes, love your enemies, but while you’re facing this opposition, do this as well:

Starting in vss. 1-5, check your own heart and be aware of your own sinful behavior.

Whenever there is opposition in your life, it provides the perfect opportunity for you to take a moment, quiet your heart, soul, and mind and determine if you yourself are living in sin.

In many ways, what we do during the Lord’s Supper, when we take time to examine ourselves to be sure that we are taking the Lord’s Supper worthily is something that we ought to do every day.

At the very least, it’s something that we ought to do whenever we face opposition, pain, suffering, or hurt in general.

Anytime in life in which there is suffering, is an opportunity to stop, take a deep breath, and consider our own spiritual well-being.

In the case of David, he’s found himself to be righteous—free from deceit and pure in heart. Often in our own lives, when we do this, we’ll find something that we ought to repent for.

Occasionally, that sin that we ought to repent for has caused the suffering that we’re presently facing—our suffering is a manifestation or consequence of our sin. And thus, our suffering ought to draw us to repentance.

Other times, we’re suffering because people hate us and are oppressing us and hurting us. Or we’re suffering because of the simple truth that we live in a sin-cursed world.

But we won’t know for sure until we take a moment to pause, consider our hearts, and repent if we need to.

Whenever you find yourself in a place filled with opposition or suffering, take time to check your own heart and repent if necessary.

After you check your own heart and you either recognize that you’ve done nothing wrong or you’ve repented from your own wrongdoing, we then need to do what David does in vss. 6-12. You need to simply pray.

We need to pray to God, knowing that he hears the prayers of his people and we need to focus our prayers on the character of God himself. If we’re acting in righteousness, then we can say the same prayer that David does, but regardless, we can focus in on God’s steadfast love, his protection of us, and his relationship with us.

We can ask God to intervene on our behalf, he already does so in more ways than we realize, but we can ask for him to protect us, to help us, and to continue to grow us.

We can pray for God to handle those that reject him and hurt us—we can pray for God to get their attention, to draw them to repentance, and to cause them to grow in faith as well.

I think if we’re honest with ourselves, we find that we don’t pray nearly as much as we think we ought to, let alone as much as we know we should.

When we find ourselves in situations in which we do feel that we’re being oppressed or harmed or hurt, we tend to look everyone except God, when the reality is, the only place that we can and should go is to God.

That starts with prayer—intentionally speaking to God through prayer and asking for his help and relying on him.

Whenever you find yourself in a place filled with opposition or suffering, intentionally seek God through prayer.

And from vss. 13-15, be assured that God has a plan and that there is hope even when you find yourself in suffering or opposition.

When we suffer, our tendency is to wallow in despair and we find ourselves in a situation in which we feel as if there is no hope.

In John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, the main character, Christian, finds himself a prisoner of Giant Despair. For multiple days, despair tormented him—Bunyan, utilizing the image of a giant says that Giant Despair beat him all day, but knowing that he’s speaking figuratively, it’s despair the emotional state that’s tormenting him.

Until Sunday morning, when Christian makes the realization that the way out of despair is a key called Promise that he had within from the King—Bunyan writes this, “What a fool . . . am I, thus to lie in a stinking Dungeon, when I may as well walk at liberty. I have a key in my bosom called Promise, that will, I am persuaded, open any lock in Doubting Castle.”

The way out of despair is the hope of what is to come.

When faced with great suffering and opposition, the way out of wallowing the discouragement, depression, and despair that follows is to refocus our hearts and minds on the promises of God and to have hope in them.

God has a plan and there is hope even when it feels like all is lost and there is no hope.

Be assured that God has a plan and that there is hope.

And lastly, as we wrap up this evening, let’s look at how we can pray this psalm in our own lives.

David can pray this psalm because he himself knows that he is righteous in the sight of God. We know that righteousness is given by Jesus to all who believes in him—thus, if you are a believe in Jesus, you are righteous because Jesus has made you righteous.

And if you’re not choosing to live in sin, but rather have repented from sin and continue to walk in the ways that God has commanded us to walk, then you can actually pray this prayer with a clear conscience.

So, if you take our general application and apply it to yourself today, starting with the first application: check your heart and repent of sin.

And you do that, then you can sit down and pray a prayer just like this. Here’s an example of what that would sound like:

Heavenly Father, I’m experiencing great suffering and people are opposing and oppressing me. If there is sin that’s causing any of my suffering and if I have transgressed in any way, please reveal my sin to me so that I can repent. If I have sinned, convict me so that I can repent from my sins. Father God, I pray for those that are hurting me, that you convict them of their sins and draw them to repentance—that we hopefully can reconcile and seek to worship you together. Nevertheless, I know that you are a good God and I thank you for all the wondrous deeds that you have done. I’m thankful for the hope that I can heave in you through your Son. I love you, Amen.

Put simply, Psalm 17 shows us how we can handle suffering, pain, and hurt from those who seek to harm us—(1) we need to check our own hearts and repent of our own sins; (2) we need to pray fervently and consistently; and (3) we need to have hope in God’s plan.

Opposition from those who seek pleasure in the world is promised—Jesus says “if the world hates you, it’s because it has hated him first.” But even in oppression, suffering, pain, and hurt, we can find rest and hope in God alone.

Prayer Requests

Caleb Miller - Medical Issues

Alan Wisor - Medical Issues

Deane Herbst is home from the hospital. He’s still recovering from the affects of COVID, so please continue to pray for him. (This is also a praise because Deane was able to join us for church this past Sunday)

Pray for the remaining renovation work—we’re currently $4,800 short of completing all the projects. Continue praying for the LORD’s provision for these projects.