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Introduction
David is well known for the Psalms he has written.
Most Psalms are songs or hymns, tonight we come to a Psalm that is explicitly listed as a prayer.
Many read the exploits of David’s life and desire the victories he experienced throughout his life.
Those victories however were born out of a devotional life to the Lord a life of prayer.
Prayer that comes from the heart.
This Psalm is a model prayer for us.
It teaches us what it means to pray from the heart to God.
It is a prayer that calls upon God to act and makes arguments in its appeal to the Lord.
It is not simply a rote recitation of needs and wants.
David shows us that his focus is on why God should answer.
It displays a knowledge of God a closeness with God.
The arguments in prayer are not to persuade an unwilling God to come act, but rather the arguments cause the one praying to thoughtfully think through what they are asking that they might sharpen their requests.
This Psalm of David shows a rather remarkable trust in God, a lack of confidence in himself, as well as a look towards his glorious heavenly hope.
Spurgeon said this of David “David would not have been a man after God’s own heart if he had not been a man of prayer.
He was a master in the sacred art of supplication.”
As master in the privilege of prayer, we can look to David and this model prayer and glean what it means to pray from the heart.
A Heart Set On God
This psalm is strophic which means it is separated into thoughts like paragraphs.
Alongside that David wrote this psalm using parallelism to communicate his heart.
This first strophic thought communicates that David is praying from the heart to God because heart is set on God.
To pray from the heart to God our heart like David’s must first be set on God.
The first verse is using synthetic parallelism which develops a meaning from one line to the next.
LORD Yahweh hear a just cause, pay attention to my cry, listen to my prayer: three times David calls out to God.
David has a cause, there is something troubling his heart to cause him to cry out and in this David’s is set on the Lord and turns to Him in prayer.
Prayer for David was as natural to him as breathing.
This one was particularly urgent and fervently crying out.
What builds upon these calls from David is that David calls on God to come hear pay attention and listen to him - because what he is speaking and sharing is not corrupt or deceitful.
This thing you need to hear Lord comes from lips that are free from deceit.
As parent I know the howl of a child who is upset with another child and comes in the room with their case and their indignation.
After sharing and getting the attention of either I or their mother and we go to handle things, then we come face to face with the other side and soon learn that what we were told is not how it played out.
Those calls to us would be calls from deceitful lips - David is calling to God and declaring his lips free from deceit.
Unlike my wife and I though God knows whats true and not.
This would be a rather audacious claim from David knowing that God is all-knowing and all-seeing - omniscient God.
The second verse is another parallel where David expands this thought of his heart being set on God.
This parallel is synonymous now.
This omniscience of God is precisely why David is set on God and coming to Him.
David wants the Lord to judge and decide this matter.
In fact I see David coming and basically laying it all down before God and saying You handle this all.
David says let my vindication come from You LORD, for You SEE what is RIGHT.
A heart that is set on God trusts their problem to the Lord’s judgement.
Saying God I do not want to take matters into my own hands but rather trust You and will wait for Your presence to vindicate me.
This heart set on God desires to know that it is God and their own self.
A Clean Heart Before God
The next strophe or paragraph/thought in David’s prayer is verse 3 all by itself.
This expresses how David can boldly come before God it is because his heart was clean before the Lord.
Again using synthetic parallelism David develops this idea of a clean heart with each statement.
You have tested my heart, you have examined me at night and you have tried me… You have tested my heart David says.
Speaking of God having put David’s heart to the test in order to ascertain the nature.
To reveal the imperfections and faults or other qualities.
David says Lord you have already uncovered the nature of my heart.
David also says to the Lord - You Lord have examined me at night.
Examined - looked, inspected and spent some time with.
Much like a doctor examining a patient - you cannot get a proper examination without spending time with someone.
David is saying Lord you have visited me for a brief and unspecified amount of time at night.
Night is when one’s heart is especially open to be scrutinized.
David finally adds that the Lord has tried him as well.
To try something is to test by refining.
This is in reference to a refiner who tries metal to test the quality or purity of it.
In all these - the testing, examining and the trying David says God has found nothing evil.
At each step nothing was found that was evil.
Not in the intentions or the motives of the heart and not in the desires not anywhere in the heart was anything evil found.
David was able to come through under such scrutiny because he determined that his mouth will not sin.
David was resolved not to sin - even with his mouth.
Does this mean David was free from sin?
No we know David sinned - Bathsheba for one (Adultery), Uriah (Murder) and Abimelech (lying - causing much death).
Ray Comfort would say something to David along these lines - “By your own admission you are a lying murdering adulteress at heart and based on the law of God are destined for hell.”
It would be true - so how is it David has passed the examination of God?
The same way anyone does - you must confess and repent and deal with your sin before God.
When you have dealt with your sin before God then you can come before God with a clean heart.
A heart clean before God does not hide from but invites God to test and probe.
A Heart For God’s Word
David continues on in his prayer before God with 3 more synthetic (building upon the idea) parallelisms.
Each of the next three verses is its own parallel.
David says in concerning what people do, concerning the doings of people, the workings of men.
In other words David says that when considering the deeds of men - the evil deeds of men.
The norm for people is to have deeds that are evil and sinful.
David says he has avoided the ways of the violent - other translations say the ways of the destroyer - referring to the wicked or the wicked one.
David is looking around and seeing that in terms of the wicked one and the wicked deeds going on around him that he was treading on enemy territory.
There is an old adage that says when in Rome… … but David says I have avoided and I have been kept from the ways - the lifestyle, the practices of the destroyer.
How?
I am sure we all would like to know
David gives us the answer - it is by the words from God’s lips.
His word - scripture as we know is the very word of God and it is through the word of God David says he has kept off the pathways of the violent, wicked and evil.
David continues on and says because of your word my steps are not on the path of the violent, but they are on your paths Lord.
David says my steps, my footsteps, my life steps, my decisions are on your paths.
Then David also acknowledges the firm footing he has in the pathway of the Lord.
He says my feet have not slipped.
The word paths could be translated wagon tracks - the divets in the ground, walking in those could keep your feet from slipping around.
David says in your well worn paths led by your word I am not wavering nor am I being shaken off the path.
David then says I call on you God because you will answer me - therefore listen closely to me and hear what I have to say.
David had God’s word and lived by it - knowing God’s word meant David knew God’s character and that is how he could boldly call out to God because he knew from God’s word that God would answer.
One who has a heart for God’s word knows if they call on the Lord He WILL answer them
A Heart That Knows God’s Love
After declaring that because he knows Gods word and knows from it that He will answer David brings his request.
David calls on the Lord to display the wonders of His faithful love.
David calls God to display His love in such a way as to inspire wonder for all who receive, or see it the display.
Faithful love speaks to covenantal loyal and unfailing love.
In history and experience and also in Scripture God has shown Himself to be a God who shows love fro those who seek Him.
Being Savior is a wondrous demonstration of God’s love.
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