Psalm 40
To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.
1 I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry.
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.
David follows a psalm of anger and frustration with God with a song of testimony of God’s deliverance. “He waited patiently for the LORD” is a Hebrew construction that emphasizes the waiting aspect -- it’s essentially the same root word repeated twice for intensification. This is no easy waiting, like you’re reading a magazine in the doctor’s office longer than you’d like. This is an excruciating period of time that seems to have no end, and yet you stick with God against all hope. It’s morning after morning waking up in a funk because nothing has changed. It’s crying yourself to sleep every night because this day was no better than the one before it. It’s seeing no end in sight, yet still taking another step forward. David did this for some time and then the LORD inclined (lit. “stretched out”) to him and heard his cry. Of course the LORD heard every one of his cries from the first to the last, but the time that mattered was the time that God acted on David’s cries. Know that God hears our every cry, but he determines when and how to answer our prayers. If he did not, he would not be God and he would not be worthy of our worship. If God answered every prayer when and how we wanted, he would be a genie, not a God and we would exercise power and authority over him. In that case, he is no God at all -- we are. Here the LORD lifts David up from the pit of destruction -- a cistern that he cannot climb out of. He will die there without help. He cannot climb its walls and so his days are numbered unless he gets some assistance. The second metaphor is that of a miry bog, a muddy quicksand pit that is relentlessly pulling him under. One of the universal horrors that human beings fear is that of being buried alive, gasping for breath while you are being sucked beneath the surface of the earth with nothing firm to stand upon or grab onto to pull yourself out. These metaphors are David’s declaration of helplessness. He is unable to save himself. The third metaphor is that of a solid rock. Unlike the pit below ground level and the miry bog with no firm place to stand, the rock is a high place that gives David firm footing for control of his own destiny. He’s no longer at the mercy of his circumstances, pulled under by the power of sin and death. He’s no longer trapped in a pit with no way out. He is standing above it all, on a solid rock, now mobile and free. Such is the nature of sin and freedom. Sin is a trap that kills body and soul. Faith in the LORD sets us free. As the psalmist said, “I walk about in freedom for I have sought out your precepts.” (119:45)
3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the LORD.
4 Blessed is the man who makes the LORD his trust, who does not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after a lie!
Following David’s deliverance from the mess that he likely got himself into, his first response after declaring that deliverance is to sing a new song. He takes up his instrument and the tools of the lyricist and composes a novel song -- likely this very song that we are singing now. The theme of his psalm is “praise”, the same word that titles the entire collection of psalms -- Sepher Tehillim (Book of Praises). He glories in the miraculous salvation that comes from God alone, and furthermore he can see that his story will be an inspiration to others, a lesson for them to put their trust in the LORD as well. A wise person learns from the failure and success of others. David’s life is certainly instructive and one of the biggest takeaways has to be the importance of being faithful after you have been faithless. Many of David’s problems were of his own making, and the same is true of us as well. Look at David’s mistakes and his recovery -- see, fear, and put your trust in the LORD. If you do this, you will be blessed (one of the 26 makarisms in the Psalms). In classic wisdom form, the verse presents two opposing choices. The first and best choice is to make the LORD your confidence. Place your trust in the LORD and in his commands by obeying them. The other choice is to turn to the proud for guidance, to those who set themselves up as God, who claim to know more than you and God himself. Such pride is by necessity a lie because it does not correspond with the reality of God. David knew the consequences of believing lies and acting upon them. It was a series of lies that he believed that put him in a position of committing adultery and murder and then covering it up for months. He trusted in those lies and aligned his actions with them, only to have it all come crashing down in the form of the disintegration of his family and a crisis of leadership. We will knowingly believe lies if the purported outcome of the behavior is appealing in the short term. David’s experience teaches us to take the long view, the vantage point of wisdom that tells us to trust in the LORD and not the lies of the proud.
5 You have multiplied, O LORD my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you! I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told.
This verse may be the chorus of the “new song” that David speaks of in verse 3. It is one of the most superlative expressions of praise you’ll find in the psalms. The essence of this declaration of praise is that God’s deeds and thoughts toward us are both wonderful and beyond numbering. This truth places the LORD God in a category by himself. David vows to tell of God’s thoughts and deeds toward us, but they are more than he can tell in an entire lifetime. The term “multiply” suggests an exponential reckoning of God’s actions and thoughts as we might indicate in mathematical terms such as 10 to the 27th power or something -- a number so large that it might as well be imaginary, except that it is real. This verse is a strong connection to Psalm 139:18 (How many are your thoughts toward us! Were I to count them they would outnumber the grains of sand) and Psalm 71:5 (my mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge) -- both psalms of David. David is overwhelmed that the transcendent God would care for him (Psalm 8:4), or think about him, or even more amazing, act on his behalf. This is why YHWH is incomparably greater than all other gods. The gods of the ancient world were first and foremost all about themselves. Human beings existed to work for them, slaves of a cruel taskmaster. The idea that a god would care about a human being, think about him and act on his behalf is preposterous -- unless such thoughts and actions were in the god’s own self-interest. David reveals to us a God that is at his essence: love. Love is not just a feeling but thoughts and actions of good toward another. The New Testament (particularly 1 John) declares God to be “love incarnate”, and the gospels say the same, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son” (John 3:16). Whatever else you may believe about God, know that he is love. This was true when David penned these words 3,000 years ago and it is true today. Our responsibility is to pick up where David left off and proclaim and tell of this great God who multiplies wonderful deeds and thoughts toward us. We do this through song, through art, through speaking, and through living a life that points others to this wonderful, incomparable God. This will be the theme of our song through all of eternity. Practice singing it now.
6 In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted, but you have given me an open ear. [ears you have dug for me] Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required.
7 Then I said, “Behold, I have come; in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
8 I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”
Worship is more than just testifying to God’s goodness and incomparable greatness, it is living an obedient life. This is the meaning of the next metaphor. The psalmist reminds us that God doesn’t delight in our sacrifice and offering. He doesn’t require burnt offerings and sin offerings (although the law would say otherwise). What is of greatest importance to Him is that we offer ourselves in obedience to his revelation. There is an intentional play on the word “delight” in verses 6 and 8. God does not delight in our offerings, instead, we are to delight in doing his will. This then is the inferred delight of God -- our obedience to his law. He desires that we internalize the law, that it comes to life within our hearts. This is actually not the typical word for “heart”, but rather the word for “belly” or “gut”. Internalizing the word of God means not only knowing it but practicing it to the extent that obedience becomes the natural default response to every external stimuli. Knowing the connection between verses 6 and 8 helps us interpret the metaphor in verse 6 -- “ears you have dug for me”. The straightforward reading suggests that God has opened his servant’s ears to hear his word. The precursor to obedience is listening to the command. David has been in a death pit, he’s been sinking in the mud of his own making and then God opens his ears to receive his word, the life-saving, creatively powerful word of God, and it quickens him, bringing him back to life. Now his delight is to obey the word of God, not just in ritual sacrifice but in actual sacrifice -- his time, his talent, his treasure devoted completely to the honoring of God. Hence the secondary metaphor that may be implied here -- that of the ritual whereby a servant pledges lifetime fidelity to his master even though it is the year of jubilee and slaves are freed. David the king understands his relationship to God as that of a willing servant to his master -- one who has been set free by his master, and yet is compelled to remain and serve him all the days of his life. This meaning may be more of what the writer of Hebrew had in mind when he quotes this verse and interprets the phrase as “a body you have prepared”. Jesus is the willing servant who surrendered his body to the master to do his will in accomplishing salvation, the very salvation that his ancestor David is experiencing here. David delighted in surrendering to YHWH, yet even he did so imperfectly. Jesus became our perfect savior because he perfectly obeyed and as God he perfectly experienced all that it means to be human. Such a God who comes down to us, serves us, and dies for us is the perfect picture of the God described in verse 5 as exponentially great in his thoughts and deeds toward us. Can we serve him in return and take pleasure in doing his will?
9 I have told the glad news of deliverance [righteousness] in the great congregation; behold, I have not restrained my lips, as you know, O LORD.
10 I have not hidden your deliverance [righteousness] within my heart; I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation; I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness from the great congregation.
David states his personal response to God’s exceptional deliverance of him in four statements -- the first stated in the positive, the remaining three in the negative. These two verses begin and end in the “great assembly” so he is speaking of public worship, the corporate gathering. First, David tells the glad news of God’s deliverance [lit. “righteousness”] to the gathered worshipers. God acting from his nature of justice/righteousness resulted in David’s deliverance from his death sentence. David is talking about his testimony here, suggesting that there is a place in corporate worship for personal testimony, and indeed there is a long tradition of that in many churches. Everyone has a testimony so we are all without excuse. What is your story? When was the last time you told it? If you can’t tell your story before the supportive congregation, how do you expect to tell it before hostile unbelievers? The following four statements suggest that the natural temptation is going to be for us to hold back in telling our story. David states three of these in the negative and one in the positive. “I have not restrained my lips. I have not hidden your deliverance in my heart. I have spoken of your faithfulness and salvation. I have not concealed your love and faithfulness.” This suggests perhaps that our tendency is to hold back and restrain ourselves from testifying for various reasons. We may feel that such a witness is not in vogue. It may come across as self-righteous. The implications of our story on others may be demanding. Our story may make it seem that God demands exclusive worship (He does!). Our experience may be called into question by doubters. We may even begin to doubt our own experience by subsequent failures. The goal of the enemy is to silence us through peer and cultural pressure. People are not saved by our good deeds, they are saved by our good words that explain those good deeds. It’s one thing to sing God’s praises in the assembly, another to do it in the public square. This is what king David is speaking of. He no doubt felt the same pressures to remain silent or he wouldn’t have stated it this way. If verses 6-8 are the summons to obey, verses 9-10 are the summons to witness. Today our witness is not limited to in person meetings, but through the internet and social media, our testimony can spread far and wide. It can be liked and shared, or it can be ridiculed and discarded. Like seeds scattered in the wind, may the words of our testimony spread far and wide with God taking those gospel seeds and planting them in human hearts. This may start in the gathered worshiping community, but clearly we are meant to be public in our testimony of our incomparable God.
11 As for you, O LORD, you will not restrain your mercy from me; your steadfast love and your faithfulness will ever preserve me!
12 For evils have encompassed me beyond number; my iniquities have overtaken me, and I cannot see; they are more than the hairs of my head; my heart fails me.
David has pledged unrestrained worship and public testimony to God’s faithfulness and salvation and here he declares that God will not restrain his mercy from him. Withholding mercy is something that a judge must do at times. The crime is so heinous and the suffering of the innocent so great, that justice demands punishment. But David is confident that even through his iniquities are more than the hairs of his head, God’s mercy will prevail. David believes that God’s steadfast love and faithfulness will preserve him. Evils have surrounded him beyond counting and his own iniquities have caught up with him and he sees no way out. The hairs of his head surely number fewer than his sins. (FYI, there are about 100,000 hair follicles on the average head). This is a metaphor to communicate the overwhelming number of times David has willfully disregarded the covenant and the commands of God. This gives me comfort because I have done the same. I’ve gotten in so deep at times that it feels like I can never get ahead, I can never outrun my sins, and at some point they will catch up to me and I will pay a horrible price. When I think of the consequences that my iniquity deserves, my heart fails as well. I have no excuse, no justification, all seems insincere and futile before the reality of a God who loved me enough to make his ways known to me only to have me spurn them again and again. I never want to be in the position where I willfully sin because I know that God will forgive me, to “sin all the more that grace may abound.” When you’re in this place, the only thing you can do is follow David’s example and plead for God’s unrestrained mercy and his preserving love and faithfulness.
13 Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me! O LORD, make haste to help me!
14 Let those be put to shame and disappointed altogether who seek to snatch away my life; let those be turned back and brought to dishonor who delight in my hurt!
15 Let those be appalled because of their shame who say to me, “Aha, Aha!”
Following his confession of his own culpability for his sin, David calls upon the LORD for deliverance, and soon! When we have no other place to go, when we can’t get out of the hole we have dug for ourselves, when we can’t pull ourselves out of the mud that we’ve got ourselves stuck in, the best and only thing we can do is call for help. Wisdom begins with humility, and this is why many people never reach a point where they cry out to God for help. They cannot admit that they need help. Pride is the worst of human sins, and this is one of the reasons: it prevents us from asking God for help. David asks first for his own deliverance in general terms then he describes what this will look like from the perspective of others, namely his enemies. In a series of three curses (mild by comparison to other imprecations in the psalms), David prays that his enemies would be put to shame. They have sought to steal his life (nephesh), they have taken pleasure in his pain, and they have gloated over him, mocking him with “aha’s” and “gotcha’s”. David is asking for justice -- that his enemies might receive the very thing that they were dishing out to him. This would seem to contradict the New Testament admonition to love one’s enemies and pray for those that persecute you. Paul even went so far as to offer to trade his own salvation for that of his enemies (Romans 9:1-4). However, David is writing 1,000 years before the time of Christ, his teaching and his example. David is revealing to us the justice of God, that He is a defender of the weak and he turns the tables on the oppressors. He is illuminating the moral fabric of the universe -- justice is woven into it. Reality wins in the end. Truth wins ultimately and justice will be done. I apply these curses today to our true enemy - the Accuser, the Father of Lies, the Prince of Darkness. He is in the one who has already been put to shame. Jesus said, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy (Luke 10:18,19). Satan’s glory was turned to shame in one weekend 2,000 years ago. This is the triumph that we share when we place our trust in Him. The one who comes to “snatch my life away” (steal), who “delights in my hurt” (kill) and kicks me while I’m down with an “aha” (destroy) has had all three of those things done to him on a Sunday morning long ago. Know that God will deliver you because He has already delivered you. He came down from heaven and did it himself with his bare hands.
16 But may all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you; may those who love your salvation say continually, “Great is the LORD!”
17 As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God.
After praying for his own deliverance (v. 13) and for the utter failure and disgrace of his enemies (vv. 14,15), David prays for everyone who is watching. He’s really wishing that others will join him in worshiping the LORD. Specifically he refers to those who seek the LORD and rejoice in his salvation. The faithful are to rejoice and be glad in the LORD while saying continually, “Great is the LORD!” We take joy in many things and rightfully so because there are many great things in life. But here we are told to rejoice and be glad in the LORD himself. Following Jesus’ teaching related to the previous verse in Luke 10:18,19, Jesus says, “do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20). Our joy is not in the failure of our enemies but in the victory of our God. We delight in his unrestrained mercy toward us, his steadfast love and his faithfulness. He is our pleasure and our reward. David concludes his prayer with gratitude for God’s concern for him. In these two verses, David uses all three primary names for God: YHWH, Adonai, and Elohim. He is amazed that although he is poor and needy, the Lord takes thought of him (Psalm 8:4). We should never cease to be amazed that the all-powerful infinite Creator of the Universe engages with each of us in a personal way, that his thoughts are towards us and they are beyond number (Psalm 139:18). It should compel us to join the saints through the ages who continually say, “Great is the LORD!”