Last time in part one of our Psalm 6 devotional, we asked whether or not the reality of sin really troubles us—not necessarily the sin we see in society, but sin in and of itself: the interruption, perversion, and warping of the natural order of the world that comes through man’s disobedience to the law of God.
Or is sin, more often than not, something which is assumed? Do we have a nonchalant, resigned view that accepts sin as simply a fact of life and not something that disturbs us to our core? If so, Psalm 6 provides the Scriptural remedy for us. In Psalm 6, David is under the chastening hand of God because of his sin. Sin has had an effect on David’s life. He is reaping the fruit of it, and he feels it so acutely that he describes it as wearying, even down to his very bones.
This is a psalm about the nauseating effects sin has on the soul of a believer. This is a psalm about the fatherly and loving discipline that the children of God sometimes receive. And this is a psalm about the restoration of the soul that comes through the grace of repentance.
As noted in part one, Psalm 6 follows an A, B, A, C structure, and Alec Motyer has gone on to suggest that it bears a chiastic structure of A1 (verses 1–3), B1 (verses 4–5), C (verses 6–7), B2 (verses 8–9), A2 (verse 10).1
- Verses 1–3: The Believer’s Distress
- Verses 4–5: The Believer’s Prayer
- Verses 6–7: The Believer’s Distress (repeated)
- Verses 8–10: The Believer’s New Resolve
In our previous article we considered what Psalm 6 teaches us about the believer’s distress, and in this part we will consider the believer’s prayer and the believer’s new resolve.
The Believer’s Prayer
In the face of the insurmountably dark thoughts that we encounter in verses 1–3 and 6–7, how does David respond? His prayer and resolve model how the believer ought to respond in the face of similarly dark spiritual situations. David’s prayer deals with two things: issues of priorities, and issues of pursuit.
David’s enemies are near him and they threaten him. His life is in danger. Surely, given a similar scenario, protection from bloodthirsty enemies would be at the top of our list of prayer concerns! But that is not where David goes. David’s first concern is his soul and relationship with God.
By the time we arrive at verse 4, David is essentially saying, “I have these problems, and maybe you are behind these problems or this chastening that I am enduring, O Lord, but you are also the answer to these problems!”
The verb in Hebrew translated as “turn” (שׁוּבָ֣ה) can also be translated “return.” Thus, one could legitimately translate the beginning of verse 4 as “Return, O LORD . . .” as if to say, “My first priority is nearness to you, Lord. Above all else, I need you to turn toward me with your saving grace and favor. All these other things will fall into place, but it is my relation to you that is my utmost concern.”
Readers, the greatest need that you or I ever have is the nearness of God. We need God to be near to us, in his grace, with his tender mercy, and with his sustaining power. There is a reason Psalm 34:18 says what it does as it states, “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” Conversely, the sorest trial we will ever endure is when God seems to withdraw that nearness and stand at a distance.
David is preaching to himself and to us to get our priorities straight, because it does not matter how near your troubles or enemies are at any given moment. Far surpassing the proximity of earthly troubles, the greatest need our soul has is the nearness of God. I recall the words of one pastor, “Greater than your desire for your troubles to go, should be your desire for God to come.” Sometimes, God allows his children to go through great trials in order to learn that lesson.
In God’s Word, the Christian life is often likened to a pilgrimage: a group of people traveling in camps and dwelling in tents. That imagery gives off a very temporary connotation. While I cannot speak for others, I know that when it comes to my own life and mindset, I too often like to set my tent pegs down in concrete, as it were. I can look around at my little plot of metaphorical land, my plans, and the way I have structured my life, and almost delude myself into believing, “This is mine; this is my little kingdom, and the way I have set all this up is under my rule and it shall be so in perpetuity.” Sometimes the Lord, in his kindness, comes along and through the earthquakes of trials breaks apart and shatters that concrete in order for me to see that these things are not my foremost concern.
Did you notice that in his prayer, David hardly gives his earthly trials a mention? David has learned the lesson that he needs the nearness of God more than anything. In his prayer, David gets his priorities straight. And then in a way, David pursues the God that seems distant. Do you get that sense of “hot pursuit” as you read along in the text of Psalm 6? Eight times David calls upon God by his personal, covenant name. When David says “O LORD,” it is the traditional English gloss of “YHWH” or “Jehovah.” David invokes that name in this prayer in verse 1, twice in verse 2, once in verse 3, verse 4, and verse 8, and twice in verse 9.
I cannot recall if it was in the context of a sermon on Psalm 6 or another psalm, but I have a distinct memory of a preacher speaking on the pattern and model of prayer we find in the psalter and how so often the lesson that we learn is: The greatest of all perils yields the simplest of all answers. In other words, when God seems to be distant and withdrawn, what ought we to do? We go to him. Go to him, Christian, and go hard in faith and repentance and trust.
In Psalm 6, we find a prayer for when we are keenly aware of the effects of our own sin and when God feels distant. Here is a prayer for those times when God, in his fatherly love toward you, has removed your perception of his nearness in order to draw you back to himself. In those moments, it is precisely then that you cry out, “O God, turn back!” It is very easy to pray when you feel his nearness; but what about when you feel the distance? Well, friends, that is when you need to pray the most. Consider the theological truth expressed in Westminster Confession of Faith 11.5:
God doth continue to forgive the sins of those that are justified; and, although they can never fall from the state of justification, yet they may, by their sins, fall under God’s fatherly displeasure, and not have the light of his countenance restored unto them, until they humble themselves, confess their sins, beg pardon, and renew their faith and repentance.
This psalm gives words to us when we scarcely have the words to pray. One day, you may find yourself scraping by spiritually, barely awake, unable to even muster the words to send up to God for help. This is why we have the Songbook of the Bible. Here are the prayers of God’s people, especially when they have no prayers to give.
We have seen the believer’s distress, and in light of that distress, here we see the believer’s prayer, which brings us to our third broad point to consider in this psalm.
The Believer’s New Resolve
As David is pouring out his soul to the Lord, suddenly, the tables have turned. David’s prayers have been answered. The burden and the turmoil that has been weighing David down have been lifted:
The Lord has heard my plea; the Lord accepts my prayer.
All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled. (v. 9, 10)
Maybe he is speaking to the henchmen of his son, Absalom; maybe others. But his point is: “I realize now that the anger of God is not against me, but against my enemies—the enemies of God. I am the King of Israel.” David says, “God has sworn in his covenant, Those who curse Israel shall be cursed” (cf. Gen 12:3; 27:29, emphasis added).
But on what basis does David find this newfound resolve, this fresh zeal? Look back to verse 4, the pivot point and crux of the whole prayer: “For the sake of your steadfast love.”
Here is the beautiful thing: David was sick in his soul and needed repentance and restoration. And yet, even his act of repentance and his desire to repent was an act of God’s grace. Did David repent and seek relief because he was a morally upright man who had his act together, or because the Spirit of God was already in him and at work in David’s heart? And why was the Spirit already at work in David’s heart? Because God had set his love on David from eternity past.
The phrase, “steadfast love,” is language of the covenant—it is God’s oath-bound, eternal, blood-bought favor toward his people that David speaks of here. The Hebrew word that stands behind “steadfast love” is hesed (חֶ֫סֶד). I love one man’s description of hesed, “God’s stubborn determination to be true to his covenant and to be kind to your soul, no matter how long it takes him, no matter how much it costs him, and no matter what you deserve.”2 This reality is, of course, nowhere more supremely expressed than in the disposition of Christ toward his people. Andrew Bonar comments,
David may well have been led by the Holy Ghost to write [this psalm] when in anguish of soul, as well as in suffering of body; through such a bruised reed the Spirit of God may have breathed. But surely he meant to tell of One greater than David—“the Man of Sorrows.” Perhaps David had some seasons of anguish . . . that furnished a shadow of the grief of Him who was to come, “bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows.” . . . Come, and see here what a price was paid for the soul’s redemption; and if you have felt anguish of spirit under a sense of deserved wrath, let it cease when you find the Man of sorrows presenting all his anguish as the atonement for your soul.3
What marvelous language Psalm 6:4 has, for even through David’s prayer and action, and the healing restoration that comes through repentance, this psalm teaches us that God’s favor is never deserved. God’s heart is big and bursting with mercy; he does not deal with us as our sins deserve because he dealt with Christ as our sins deserved. Christ took the blow; he bore the crushing penalty so that we are never cast off. Therefore, any trouble of soul we endure in this life will only serve to draw us closer to our Father’s breast. Here is the gospel hinge upon which this whole prayer turns.
Psalm 6 teaches us that God’s heart is never hard toward his beloved people. We see this supremely in Christ. In the famous feeding of the five thousand, Christ’s heart was moved with compassion when he looked upon the beleaguered, hapless, and harassed crowds. Jesus looked upon them and loved them; that’s the kind of heart he has. David says, in effect, “Lord, that is your heart. I know you cannot look upon my misery and feel nothing [if we might be permitted to reverently employ an anthropopathism without denying a “God without passions”]. Lord, your heart is not hard but tender.”
Psalm 6 teaches us that God’s faithfulness never ends and that he never changes. A God of covenant love means a God who keeps his promises forever, faithfully, determinedly, and doggedly.
Is this not a God to whom you want to run, over and over and over, for all time? Friends, may it be that as we read Psalm 6, and as we see the Spirit-wrought despair, change, and determination in David, we will see the soul-refreshment, the healing ointment for the sin-sick soul that is ours in the grace of repentance and in Christ.
Having given this text a brief exegetical, expositional, and pastoral survey, we will return one last time for a third installment wherein we will consider further implications and applications from this marvelous psalm.
Notes
- Alec Motyer, Psalms by the Day: A New Devotional Translation, Revised edition (Christian Focus, 2016), 19–20.
- Neil C. Stewart, “Experience God on Sunday,” Reformation Worship Conference, Midway Presbyterian Church, 2014.
- Andrew Bonar, Christ and His Church in the Book of Psalms (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1978), 21–22.
©Sean Morris. All Rights Reserved.
You can find the whole series here.
RESOURCES
- Subscribe To The Heidelblog!
- The Heidelblog Resource Page
- Heidelmedia Resources
- The Ecumenical Creeds
- The Reformed Confessions
- The Heidelberg Catechism
- Recovering the Reformed Confession (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2008)
- Why I Am A Christian
- What Must A Christian Believe?
- Heidelblog Contributors
- Saturday Psalm Series
- Support Heidelmedia: use the donate button or send a check to:
Heidelberg Reformation Association
1637 E. Valley Parkway #391
Escondido CA 92027
USA
The HRA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization
Sean Morris
Sean was educated at Grove City College, Reformed Theological Seminary (Jackson, MS), and the University of Glasgow (Scotland). He is an ordained teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America, and serves as a minister at the Covenant Presbyterian Church in Oak Ridge, TN. He also serves as the Academic Dean of the Blue Ridge Institute for Theological Education. He is currently pursuing his PhD in Historical Theology at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Sean lives in Oak Ridge with his wife, Sarah, along with their children and useless beagle.
More by Sean Morris ›