The Psalms Challenge

[Jayne]

DAY 62 - PSALM 51 [Book 2]

Create in Me a Clean Heart, O God

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet went to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.

Have mercy on me, O God,
    according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
    blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
    and cleanse me from my sin!

3 For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
    and blameless in your judgment.
5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
    and in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
    and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.

7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
    wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
    let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins,
    and blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
    and renew a right spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from your presence,
    and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
    and uphold me with a willing spirit.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
    and sinners will return to you.
14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,
    O God of my salvation,
    and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
    and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;
    you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
    a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

18 Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
    build up the walls of Jerusalem;
19 then will you delight in right sacrifices,
    in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;
    then bulls will be offered on your altar.

[Jayne]

Such a rich and beautiful song!!!

This, folks, is what real repentance looks like.  Not just a quick and glib, "Forgive me, God" that lasts half of a second and is said out of habit.

You CAN say a mere, "Forgive me, God" if as David says, the "heart is contrite".  If the heart is not contrite - no amount of words said to God will do.

[In Him]

Psalm 50

Offer thanksgiving as your sacrifice to God,
pay your vows to the Most High,
and call on me when you are in trouble;
I will deliver you, and you will honor me.

“Whoever offers thanksgiving
as his sacrifice honors me
and to him who goes the right way
I will show the salvation of God.”

Psalm 51

For you don’t want sacrifices, or I would give them;
you don’t take pleasure in burnt offerings.
My sacrifice to God is a broken spirit;
God, you won’t spurn a broken, chastened heart.
In your good pleasure, make Tziyon prosper;
rebuild the walls of Yerushalayim.
Then you will delight in righteous sacrifices,
in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;
then they will offer bulls on your altar.

 

Edited September 21, 2019 by In Him

[Jayne]

DAY 63 - PSALM 52 [Book 2]

The Steadfast Love of God Endures

To the choirmaster. A Maskil of David, when Doeg, the Edomite, came and told Saul, “David has come to the house of Ahimelech.”

Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?
    The steadfast love of God endures all the day.
2 Your tongue plots destruction,
    like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.
3 You love evil more than good,
    and lying more than speaking what is right. Selah
4 You love all words that devour,
    O deceitful tongue.

5 But God will break you down forever;
    he will snatch and tear you from your tent;
    he will uproot you from the land of the living. Selah
6 The righteous shall see and fear,
    and shall laugh at him, saying,
7 “See the man who would not make
    God his refuge,
but trusted in the abundance of his riches
    and sought refuge in his own destruction!”

8 But I am like a green olive tree
    in the house of God.
I trust in the steadfast love of God
    forever and ever.
9 I will thank you forever,
    because you have done it.
I will wait for your name, for it is good,
    in the presence of the godly.

[Jayne]

Quote

To the choirmaster. A Maskil of David, when Doeg, the Edomite, came and told Saul, “David has come to the house of Ahimelech.”

Doeg, the Edomite was a horrible man.  He was not a Hebrew, yet he was a chief official for King Saul.

He knew Saul was after David and Doeg saw David one day in the tabernacle on the run from Saul.  The priest had given David and his men food and had given David Goliath's sword.

Doeg, the Edomite, the tattle-tale told Saul.  Saul asked for the priest to be killed.  Saul's guards wouldn't do it.  But Doeg the Edomite quickly volunteered.

He killed:

•  Over 80 priests
•  Their families, including babies
•  All their livestock

This psalm is about that situation and how David perceived the evil of Doeg the Edomite and God's steadfastness.

 

[In Him]

But I am like a leafy olive tree
in the house of God;
 

I put my trust in the grace of God
forever and ever.

I will praise you forever for what you have done,
and I will put my hope in your name;

 

for this is what is good
in the presence of your faithful.

 

 

 

(Multiply them in constancy.)

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 22, 2019 by In Him

[Jayne]

Day 64 - Psalm 53 [Book 2]

There Is None Who Does Good

To the choirmaster: according to Mahalath. A Maskil of David.

 The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
    They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity;
    there is none who does good.

2 God looks down from heaven
    on the children of man
to see if there are any who understand,
    who seek after God.

3 They have all fallen away;
    together they have become corrupt;
there is none who does good,
    not even one.

4 Have those who work evil no knowledge,
    who eat up my people as they eat bread,
    and do not call upon God?

5 There they are, in great terror,
    where there is no terror!
For God scatters the bones of him who encamps against you;
    you put them to shame, for God has rejected them.

6 Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion!
    When God restores the fortunes of his people,
    let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad.

[Jayne]

Day 65 - PSALM 54

The Lord Upholds My Life

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. A Maskil of David, when the Ziphites went and told Saul, “Is not David hiding among us?”

54 O God, save me by your name,
    and vindicate me by your might.
2 O God, hear my prayer;
    give ear to the words of my mouth.

3 For strangers have risen against me;
    ruthless men seek my life;
    they do not set God before themselves. Selah

4 Behold, God is my helper;
    the Lord is the upholder of my life.
5 He will return the evil to my enemies;
    in your faithfulness put an end to them.

6 With a freewill offering I will sacrifice to you;
    I will give thanks to your name, O Lord, for it is good.
7 For he has delivered me from every trouble,
    and my eye has looked in triumph on my enemies.

[Jayne]

David, running from Saul, had just saved a town of people.  He asked God about it first and God said yes, do that.  Then David learned those very people were going to betray him to Saul.

So David left for the wilderness of Ziph.  THOSE people do turn him over to Saul - telling Saul where David was.  But David also met Jonathan there for the last time.  The Bible says that Jonathan was a great encouragement to David, assuring him that he would be the next king.

Life is full of encouraging moments and discouraging ones.  We should be like David here.  He tells his problems to God, but then spends the majority of the song telling God how great he is and how he has rescued him [David] many times before.

[Jayne]

DAY 66 - PSALM 55:1-15 [Book 2]

Cast Your Burden on the Lord

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. A Maskil of David.

Give ear to my prayer, O God,
    and hide not yourself from my plea for mercy!
2 Attend to me, and answer me;
    I am restless in my complaint and I moan,
3 because of the noise of the enemy,
    because of the oppression of the wicked.
For they drop trouble upon me,
    and in anger they bear a grudge against me.

4 My heart is in anguish within me;
    the terrors of death have fallen upon me.
5 Fear and trembling come upon me,
    and horror overwhelms me.
6 And I say, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove!
    I would fly away and be at rest;
7 yes, I would wander far away;
    I would lodge in the wilderness; Selah
8 I would hurry to find a shelter
    from the raging wind and tempest.”

9 Destroy, O Lord, divide their tongues;
    for I see violence and strife in the city.
10 Day and night they go around it
    on its walls,
and iniquity and trouble are within it;
11     ruin is in its midst;
oppression and fraud
    do not depart from its marketplace.

12 For it is not an enemy who taunts me—
    then I could bear it;
it is not an adversary who deals insolently with me—
    then I could hide from him.
13 But it is you, a man, my equal,
    my companion, my familiar friend.
14 We used to take sweet counsel together;
    within God's house we walked in the throng.
15 Let death steal over them;
    let them go down to Sheol alive;
    for evil is in their dwelling place and in their heart.