Book of Psalms - Psa. 5, Vs. 1-12 (09/11/2022)

Park Meadows Church

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Well good morning. Why don't we open with a word of prayer and we'll get started this morning.

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Heavenly Father, Lord, we just thank you so much for your word. We thank you that it is truth. We thank you for the

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Psalms and how incredibly awesome they are. They're just a really neat way to learn more about you and to learn more about how we're supposed to be in you.

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So Father, we just ask that you help us to learn those things this morning. Give us your

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Holy Spirit in a double portion so that we would understand what you want us to get out of these

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Psalms. We love you. It's in Jesus name we ask these things. Amen. So if you would turn to Psalm chapter five.

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I don't know if we're going to get through it all today but we're certainly going to try. Katie and I will be gone next week.

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We're on an anniversary trip and so I'd like to be able to end a chapter before we leave but we are starting it this morning.

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So we'll see if we can get through a whole chapter like we've done the last couple of weeks. Bear with me.

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I went to a cross -country meet yesterday and I can't not scream at those things so my voice is a little shaky today.

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Psalm chapter five starts off to the chief musician upon Psalm of David.

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Now if you'll remember last week we were reading, was it last week?

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I guess it was. Last week we were reading chapter four and that was instructed to be played upon Neganoth.

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This is something different. Neganoth were stringed instruments. No one really knows what

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Neoloth is but we have a pretty good idea of what kind of instrument it is.

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It's certainly a musician, a musical instrument of some sort and it's most likely a wind instrument because the word

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Neoloth is derived from the root word khalil which means to bore or perforate.

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The type of musical instruments that are bored out or perforated are usually wind instruments so most scholars agree that this is likely some type of wind instrument like a flute or a clarinet or something, right?

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Something that uses wind to make music. That would definitely make this psalm sound a little different from the last psalm.

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If you'll remember chapter four it was supposed to be played upon the strings. My pop pointed out last week after the lesson that Neganoth, the word used to denote stringed instruments, is also described as a taunting melody which

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I wish I'd have known. I wish I'd have pulled that out in last week's lesson because if you'll remember there was a little bit of a taunting that went on by David towards his enemies.

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There was no musical instrument assigned for chapter three. We saw David being lifted up from a low place of doubt into a high place of confidence and in chapter four we began to see him rise and face his enemies in that confidence and we said it was almost like the hero music started playing, right?

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The stringed instruments came in. Here we have what is likely an accompaniment of wind instruments and that has significance because wind instruments tend to stand out.

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If you hear an orchestra play you hear stringed instruments and it often brings fullness to the song.

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There's like a lot of stringed instruments in an orchestra but when the wind instruments start to play they break through the white noise of music and they begin to often carry the melody and it's it's just something that just stands out above and beyond the rest of music.

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The wind instruments often do and so they bring a clarity to the melody.

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Well in Psalm chapter five we'll see clarity brought to the structure of David's prayer life.

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So we're going to see a very simple structure here. It's going to be that David prays to the

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Lord for himself against his enemies and for God's people.

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That's just a very simple structure that can be applied to this psalm. So in chapter one

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David contrasted the righteous with the ungodly. In chapter two we we see the conflict between the righteous and the ungodly.

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In chapter three David is suddenly thrust into that conflict himself and he encourages himself in the

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Lord. In chapter four he begins to face his enemies and begins to stand back up like the hero.

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Hero music starts playing and he begins to warn his enemy like having a victorious speech right like you thought you could defeat me but God is on my side.

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He begins to have this victorious speech in chapter four about God's protection on him and he warns his enemies of that protection.

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If there is one major common theme throughout the first four chapters of Psalms it's that there is a contrast between the

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Lord's anointed and his heathen enemies. In chapter five we're about to see

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David again appealing to his creator and contrasting himself with the heathen and this in and of itself is a lesson.

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The world we live in pressures us to compare ourselves to other people. Look at John he has a new car.

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Isn't it time you get one too? Right? The cool kids wear Nike. Get yours today.

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Look at this perfect couple on TV. This is how your love life should look like and we're just pressured to compare ourselves with other people.

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We're so conditioned to compare ourselves with other people that we begin to do the same thing in our prayer life or in our spiritual lives.

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I didn't read the Bible this week but neither did my brother. My marriage has its problems but compared to my neighbors it's pretty good.

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Yeah, I let a bad word slip out every now and then but nobody's perfect.

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Right? So what do we do? We compare ourselves and comparing ourselves to others will always result in a subpar spiritual life because everyone falls short of the glory of God.

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David chooses instead to contrast himself with others.

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He compares himself with God. It's why he always feels the need to pray. It's why he always seems to start with humility.

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It's why he asks the Lord to fight his battles because when he holds himself up to God he realizes

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God's the best shot he's got at being saved. So he will constantly contrast himself with the world.

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He won't compare himself, he'll contrast himself. He'll compare himself with the Lord. All right, so let's get into the psalm.

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Give ear to my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation. Spurgeon points out the use of words and thoughts.

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All right, he says, give ear to my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation.

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There's two things going on here. David is speaking words but he's also thinking thoughts.

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And sometimes we think our prayers and sometimes we say our prayers. We talked about that a couple of weeks ago.

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David uses both and he asks the Lord to listen to the audible words that he's speaking.

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But he's also asking the Lord to discern his inaudible thoughts that he's thinking. He says, hearken unto the voice of my cry.

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Pay attention to my crying. It's another way you can say this. Pay attention to my crying.

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I have to tell a story here. We took Maddy Grace to the doctor the other day.

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And while we were at the doctor, we were having discussions with the doctor about what to do with Maddy Grace.

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And Maddy, along with all the rest of my kids, their biggest fear when going to the doctor is shots.

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Oh man, they hate shots. Like it is the worst, right? Well, so Maddy, when she hears she's going to the doctor, she's like, no,

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I don't want shots. Well, we're thinking we're not going for shots. That's not why we're going to the doctor, okay?

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We're going for a checkup. Don't worry about shots. So we're like, don't even worry about that. But we get there.

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And what do you always forget about the doctor? They keep records. And the doctor looks at the records and says, there's this one particular shot that Maddy needs.

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And there are some shots that we don't do. Some vaccinations we just don't do. But this one was tetanus.

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And we are currently doing construction out on our house.

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And there are rusty nails everywhere. I recently kicked one. And it went right through my foot.

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And it hurt. And I have had my tetanus shot. Maddy has not.

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So she says she needs a tetanus shot. And we go, okay.

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Well, Katie's just sitting there talking with the doctor about, all right, we need to get the tetanus shot and stuff.

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I look up at Maddy, and she is silently just bawling. This is the worst nightmare.

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I'm getting shots, you know? And she's just very quiet. No one else even realizes it yet.

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She's just like, I don't want this shot, right? All I wanted to do is go hug her.

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I'm like, mommy, look. Maddy's not doing so great.

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And sure enough, as soon as the doctor said, yeah, we're going to do the shot, she walked out of the room.

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And mommy and daddy just loved on her a little bit. The point is that a child's cry, it does something to a loving father.

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It makes the loving father want to draw near to them. Scripture tells us very clearly that he will draw near to the brokenhearted.

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It's something about the cry of your kids. It wells up in emotions in a dad big time.

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If it's a hurt cry, one of the first emotions is anger. Like, why is my kid hurt?

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You know? What happened? Who did something wrong? But then it's like, oh, my poor baby.

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Come here. I'll hug you and I'll make it feel better. It's just a wealth of emotions will well up in a dad who loves his kids when his kid is crying.

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So when David says, hearken unto the voice of my cry, he's like, pay attention.

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I'm crying. And there are different ways to pray to the

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Lord. As we've already discussed, you can think your prayers, you can say your prayers. David's crying his prayer.

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And he's wanting God to come near to him. Next, he says, my king and my

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God, hearken unto the voice of my cry, my king and my God, for unto thee will

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I pray. What we see here is David is using, he so fully depends on who

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God is that he invokes God's titles to obligate God to him.

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He says, my king. Well, kings are expected to listen to the appeals of their people.

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The king of a country has a duty to God and to the country, right?

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And the country is made up of people. And so he invokes the fact that this is his king.

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You are my king. So you got to listen to my petition. And then he says, my

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God. Spurgeon notes that this is a relationship that's by covenant, by promise, by oath, and by blood.

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You don't get much more obligated than that. He is our God. And he is the only

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God who ever obligated himself to his people. Let that sink in for a minute. He made a covenant with us.

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He obligated himself to us. No other

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God has ever done that for his people. No other God condescends to his people in such a way that he serves in a way his people.

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When Jesus came to earth, what did he do? He came as a servant. That's why the

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Jews missed it. They were all expecting a conquering king. Jesus threw a curve ball at him and said, no,

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I'm a humble servant. And then he asks us to be like him and be humble servants as well.

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We serve a very unusual God. He is our God. And he is our

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God by obligation, which he created. He made himself obligated to us.

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And David understands this and calls out to his king and his

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God. God said of them, I will lose nothing. He has to save us.

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I will uphold you with my right hand. He has to preserve us. Then will I hear from heaven, forgive their sins and heal their lands.

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He has to hear us. He has to forgive us. And he has to heal us. He's obligated to us.

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And David's invoking this obligation by using these two titles, my king and my God. Unto thee will

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I pray. It's interesting. This is that first part of the structure, right?

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He, this is David praying to God, but it's interesting that he says,

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I'm going to pray to you because it, it denotes some kind of exclusivity. It's like,

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I pray to you. You're the one I'm praying to, but you're the only one I'm praying to.

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I don't pray to anybody else. No one else gets my worship. No one else gets my sacrifice.

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No one else gets my praise. No one else gets my prayers. You do. And only you.

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I really like this next part. The next part says, my voice shalt thou hear in the morning.

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That's an interesting way to put it because it kind of tells us a couple of things.

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How, let me ask you a question. How often do we end our day in prayer? A lot of us do, right?

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A lot of us, right before we go to bed, we pray with kids. We ask the Lord to give them no bad dreams, right?

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Put angels of protection around us. Keep us safe. We, we, we thank the

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Lord for the day and all the things he gave to us in the day and all the blessings he's given us. And we ask him to help us have a good day tomorrow.

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And that's how our prayer usually goes at night. But how many of us say,

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I'm going to continue this prayer in the morning? Like to be continued,

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God, there's my movie reference. I got to have one in there somewhere, right? It's like he, he throws in a to be continued.

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You're going to hear me in the morning too. Now, often we may wake up and we may pray to the

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Lord in the morning, but I don't know if I ever tell God I'm going to do that. He obligates himself to the

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Lord in that way, saying, hey, I'm expect to hear from me in the morning because you're going to hear from me.

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My voice shout out here in the morning. Oh Lord, in the morning, will I direct my prayer unto thee and we'll look up.

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Seems redundant, but it's not, there's something extra here. He says,

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I will direct my prayer unto thee. And I, I wrestled with how to say what this direct my prayer unto thee really means, but I couldn't come up with anything half as good as what

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Spurgeon came up with. So I'm literally just going to pop in a long Spurgeon quote here. Listen to this.

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If we merely read our English version and want an explanation of these two sentences, we find it in the figure of an archer.

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I will direct my prayer unto thee. I will put my prayer upon the bow. I will direct it towards heaven.

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And then when I have shot up my arrow, I will look up to see where it has gone. But the

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Hebrew has a still fuller meaning than this. I will direct my prayer. It is the word that is used for the laying in order of the wood and the pieces of the victim upon the altar.

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And it is used also for the putting of the showbread upon the table.

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It means just this, I will arrange my prayer before thee. I will lay it out upon the altar in the morning, just as the priest lays out the morning sacrifice.

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I will arrange my prayer or as old master trap has it, I will marshal up my prayers.

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I will put them in order, call upon all my powers and bid them stand in their proper places that I may pray with all my might and pray acceptably.

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See, when David promises the Lord that he'll hear from him in the morning, this isn't just a, hey

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God, I'll drop you a line. This is a planned morning of an intense focused prayer.

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What would our prayer lives look like if we began doing this? If we began to prepare our prayers, not just pray on a whim, you know, whatever comes to our mind, whatever is in our thoughts.

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What if we began to order our prayers like David does and say, you're going to hear from me.

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Already you see planning right there. I plan to spend time with you in the morning, but I'm also going to direct my prayers.

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So it's not just a, I'm going to aim them at you. It's like directing an orchestra. Like I'm going to make sure that everything is in its proper place and that I ask the right things and I say the right things and that I think the right things

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I'm going to direct or order my prayer life. Never even thought to do something like that.

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If I'm honest, it's never even occurred to me that I should structure my prayer life other than to follow the

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Lord's prayer. You know, the model prayer that Jesus lays out. And it is interesting that Jesus lays out an order or a structure.

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So David makes a concentrated effort to bring structure to his prayer life.

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Next he says, and we'll look up. This is like when you direct a question to someone and then you look to them for the answer.

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Have you ever done that? Right? Like you ask a question and if you don't get an immediate response, you kind of look over like I'm waiting, you know,

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I'm expecting an answer. That's what David's doing here with the Lord. He's like,

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I'm going to direct my prayers. I'm going to order all of my prayers and get them in, in the proper place.

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And I'm going to have this big ask, but then I'm going to look at you like, come on, where's my answer.

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It's an expectation. Let me ask you this question. How many of us have ever been surprised that the

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Lord answered our prayer? I mean, I think we all have, right?

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I have certainly come had times where I was like, wow, God answered that prayer.

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And if I'm honest, a lot of times I'm like, wow, he answered it. And it's surprising to me.

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Shame on me. Shame on us for being surprised. Like the

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Lord has promised us he will answer our prayers. When we are in a certain state, when we are, when we are righteous, when we are praying within his will, we can expect to receive the answer.

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And that's what David's doing. He's saying, I'm going to, I'm going to put everything in the right place. And so, because you've told me this, if I do it, all right, if I'm, if I am following your methodologies and I'm doing what you tell me to do, and I am seeking you first, then

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I am definitely going to get my prayer answered. So I'm going to look at you like, hey, where's the answer?

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Isn't that interesting? So he'll look up. An effective prayer life should start with preparation and end with expectation.

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Next, we're going to begin seeing David contrasting. All right. He starts with the character of God.

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And I want you to notice how this comes into play with the ask towards God.

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All right. For thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with thee.

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All right. So he starts telling God, you're one of those gods that doesn't like bad.

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And really that's the only, the only God there is, right? You are a God who only loves good.

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You hate wickedness. There's no pleasure in it for you.

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And evil won't dwell with you. But what is David wanting? He's wanting God to eliminate the evildoers in his life.

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So notice what he's doing. He is, he is beginning to say who

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God is. And it's almost like when a kid comes up to their parent and says, my brother, he disobeyed you, you know, like, like you don't like what he did.

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And maybe I don't like what he did, but you don't like what he did. You say, so he's, he's going to appeal to God and start setting.

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He's going to start setting up this whole, he's definitely directing his prayer. He's, he is putting everything in its right place.

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He's it's planned out. I'm not just going to go to God and say, Hey, come fix this for me. I'm going to say, this is a big problem, even for you too.

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And that's what he's, that's what he's doing. Um, for thou art not a

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God that hath pleasure in wickedness. So if you don't have pleasure in wickedness, you're obviously going to want to destroy it.

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Evil can't dwell with you. So you're probably going to get rid of it. The foolish shall not stand in thy sight.

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Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. All right.

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So there's something kind of big here and I'm going to try to share it as best

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I can. He says, uh, for thou art not a God. Uh, no, no, no.

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Yeah. The full verse five, the foolish shall not stand in thy sight. Thou hatest all workers of iniquity.

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Now, how much does God hate sin? Any answers?

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Completely hates it. But have we ever heard that God loves the sinner and hates the sin?

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Yeah, it's super cool saying, if you ask me, it just doesn't describe the God of the Bible. It's, it's really cool.

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It sounds cool. God loves the sinner, hates the sin, but that's not how the

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Bible describes God. It says very clearly here that he hates the workers of iniquity.

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That's the center. He doesn't just hate the sin. He hates the center. That's a radical thought.

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And so we need to unpack it just a little bit. Um, because weren't we all sinners?

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So how can we make this jive with who God really is? We were all sinners.

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So does that mean he hated us? Ooh, that's well, but he hates centers.

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So how do we make it work? Here's how Ephesians one chapter four,

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I'm sorry, Ephesians chapter one, verse four, according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.

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All right. So before the foundation of the world, we see that God loved us.

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Right. So how's that work? Well, best way

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I can describe it is, is this when I was a kid, I absolutely detested mushrooms.

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I still kind of hate them. I'm not a big fan of mushrooms. I really, has anybody else just really hate mushrooms?

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Okay. There, see my family, it runs in the family here. Pop pop was one of those people that grew up in China.

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Things, things are different over there. But I mean, I, I really, really hate mushrooms.

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Like I didn't want to eat them. I didn't want to smell them. I didn't, I didn't want to hear people talk about them as if they were good.

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I didn't want to see them. I didn't even want to think about them. Is that how you are with mushrooms?

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Maddy grace? Like, I don't like mushrooms. They're disgusting. Everything about them. Disgusts me.

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They're the most repulsive thing that was ever considered a food. And if you knew how they were grown, you would agree with me like gross, disgusting.

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And, and when I think of how much I just absolutely despise mushrooms, I think God hates sin way more than that.

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And, and when it comes to mushrooms, I don't just hate mushrooms. I hate mushroom factories.

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I drove by a mushroom factory in Florida. Once we were five miles away from it.

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Didn't even know I was driving by it. We thought that it was a bunch of us college kids.

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And we started blaming each other for who, you know, broke wind in the car.

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And this was worse than breaking wind. This is somebody needs to go like clean up.

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This was bad. And, and it was just really, really bad.

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And that's when the local who was with us explained to us, no, no, that's the mushroom factory.

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Where's the mushroom factory. It's about five miles from here. Are you serious? Like five miles?

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It's disgusting. So I, I, I hate the factory for mushrooms.

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Well, God hates sinners. He hates the workers of iniquity. That's how much

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God hates sin. It repulses him. Every bit of it repulses him.

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And those who do it are repulsive to him. Now, what does that mean for us?

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That means we serve a God who has the capability to love something as repulsive as we were.

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Like we, we looked every bit like what God hates.

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We looked like that, but he chose to love us.

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And I want us to, to understand God didn't choose us because he loved us.

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That's a, that's a choice he never had to make. He also didn't love us because he chose us.

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God chose to love us because it is within him to do it. And that's it.

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There's no, if there's no, because there's no, in spite of there's no, but, and, or it's just God had the ability to love something as repulsive as someone who looked like the rest of the world.

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And because he had that ability, he chose to do it. And not only did he choose to do it, he chose to transform us into something that he sees only as beautiful.

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Old things pass away. Behold, all things become new. He absolutely took everything that was repulsive about us and just separated us from it.

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As far as the East is from the West. Now, when God looks at us, we're absolutely gorgeous to him.

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We're amazing to him. He, his thoughts are continually towards us. He can't stop thinking about us.

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For most teenagers, this might be like pizza or something instead of mushroom pizza without mushrooms.

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All right. Pizza without mushrooms. Like God's like, man, that's a good looking person.

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And he, he absolutely loves everything about us. Think about that.

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That is a radical transformation. And that's how much God loves us. And, and only he could do it.

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No one else could, no one, no one else has that within them to love something so repulsive.

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So then when he chose that and he changed us, it brings new light to things like the scripture that says, as such were some of you, we looked exactly like the rest of the world.

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There is a contrast between us and the world. Now we need to stop comparing ourselves with the world.

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And we need to start comparing ourselves with God because God has transformed us to be more like him and less like the world.

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David chooses to compare himself with God and contrast himself with the world. The more you compare yourself with the

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Lord, the more that contrast is going to show up. The more you compare yourself with the world, the more you will contrast with the

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Lord. So we need to compare with the Lord and contrast with the world. All right.

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So that was my bunny trail for the day. See if we can get through the rest of this chapter before we run out of time.

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God absolutely despises sin and he despises it so much that in verse six,

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David says, thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing. The Lord will abhor the bloody and the deceitful man.

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So he just said, the foolish shall not stand in my sight. And now hadest all workers of iniquity. Now he's saying, you hate people who speak iniquity.

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So those who do it and those who speak it, you hate them all. You're going to destroy them all.

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They're all destroyed. Well, David is obviously not including himself in this.

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He's saying, no, I'm, I'm compared with God and contrasted to the world. And then watch what he does.

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He begins to compare himself with the Lord by describing these people the way that he knows the

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Lord would see them. All right. Um, actually

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I'm getting ahead of myself. First, first, he's going to contrast himself with the world. See on verse seven, but as for me, you see there's, there's the world.

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You hate them. You're going to destroy them. You hate what they do. You hate what they think like, oh, and by the way, if you, if you really want to know just how much

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God hates it, here's some quick points for you. Proverbs 15, nine, the way of the wicked is an abomination unto the

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Lord, but he loveth him that followeth after righteousness. God hates their ways. Proverbs 15, 26, the thoughts of the wicked are an abomination to the

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Lord, but the words of the pure are pleasant words. He hates their thoughts. The sacrifice of the wicked.

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This is Proverbs 15, the sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but the prayer of the upright is his delight.

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He hates their worship. That's why he rejected Cain's sacrifice.

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Didn't give him half credit. Didn't give him a good job. Didn't give him a, Hey, you got so close.

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Just try again. He just utterly rejected Cain's sacrifice. Jesus despised the outward acts of the

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Pharisees. One of his first acts in ministry was to overthrow the tables of the money exchangers. God hates even their worship.

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Proverbs 6, 18, these six things doth the Lord hate. Yay. Seven are an abomination unto him.

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A proud look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked imaginations and feet that be swift in running to mischief.

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He hates the way they look. He hates the way they act. He hates the way they walk. He hates the way they talk.

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God despises evil and despises the evil doers.

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But David, he says, but as for me, you see, like, but I'm not that because God changed me, right?

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As for me, I will come into the house, into thy house in a multitude of thy mercies.

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Why does he have to come to God's mercy? Because he knows he looked just like everyone else. So he appeals to the multitude of God's mercy because of the multitude of his own sins.

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And in thy fear, will I worship toward thy holy temple? Question, what is in thy fear mean?

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Maybe reverence? It's whose fear? In thy fear, in the fear of the

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Lord, right? So what is the fear of the Lord? The fear of the

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Lord is beginning knowledge, right? Turn with me quickly to Proverbs 8, 13.

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And notice how David by saying in thy fear, will

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I worship toward thy holy temple? Notice how he compares himself with God. Proverbs 8, 13 says the fear of the

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Lord is, that means equals to hate evil. Now it may be the beginning of knowledge, but the reason why it's the beginning of the knowledge is because the beginning of knowledge is to begin hating evil.

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So if you want to know what is the fear of the Lord, that right there tells you the, the definition of the fear of the

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Lord. It's hatred of evil. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil, pride and arrogancy, and the evil way in the forward mouth, do

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I hate? That's walking, talking, thinking, acting, all the evil things, hate the evil things.

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So David, when he says, when he says, and in thy fear, will

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I worship toward thy holy temple? What he's saying is in a hatred of evil,

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I will, I will make my sacrifices to you.

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I will make my worship towards you. So like everything that I do for you is rooted in a hatred of evil.

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You see it? How much is he comparing himself to God right now? He just finished telling God how much he hates evil.

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And now in my hatred of evil, I'm going to come before you in, in your mercy, because I know

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I had evil. So you're going to, you're going to accept me because you have a multitude of mercy to cover my multitude of sins.

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And so I'm going to come to you in my own hatred of evil here, which isn't mine.

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It's yours because it came from you. It's thy fear. You see? So he doesn't even claim it as his own.

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He knows that he has it, but he has it because of God. So that's how he will come to the

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Lord. And then he asks the Lord to lead him, lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies.

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He understands that he needs to be led. And he says, because of his enemies, because his enemies want to see him fall.

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His enemies want to see him mess up. His enemies want to see him curse God, want to see him doubt

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God, want to see him abandon God. Ultimately, that's what the enemy wants

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David to do. And David knows that the only way that he can walk in righteousness is to be rooted in the evil, rooted in the hatred of evil, be rooted in the hatred of evil and, and have

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God literally pull him through, lead me because everyone's watching me.

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Things are bad. People are bad. The world is bad. Everything is evil.

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They all want me to mess up. So please don't let me mess up. Make thy way straight before my face.

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Make your way straight. You see, I want to go in your way, not my way, your way. Make your way straight before my face.

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Then he says, for there is no faithfulness. He's going to begin describing them again. There's no faithfulness in their mouth.

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Their inward part is very wickedness. Their throat is an open sepulcher. They flatter with their tongue.

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He's literally describing these people as putridly as he possibly can. They're like an open grave with a stinking decomposing body inside.

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When they talk, it's that disgusting to my ears, to my nose, to my eyes.

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It's that, oh, it's so gross. Don't you agree, God? Don't you agree? You see, he's like you and me, we're on the same team.

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And he begins to describe them the way he feels as though the Lord would describe them. How can the

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Lord not destroy them? It's like I'm, he is making such a structured well, like well -planned case as if he's a lawyer walking into a courtroom and saying,

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I'm going to force God's hand. He knows he can't, but he knows that if he will just appeal to God's character and who

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God is, that God will force his own hand because God will keep his word. So here comes the ask.

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Destroy thou them, O God. Let them fall by their own counsels. Cast them out in the multitude of their transgressions, for they have rebelled against thee.

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They're David's enemies. They're, they're after David, but he goes, it's not my problem.

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It's your problem. See, when the fight comes to David, David brings the fight to God.

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David says, I'm going to let him be the one who takes this fight. I'm going to make it,

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I'm going to make it personal to him. You know, all those people that you despise, those workers of iniquity, you know how disgusting they are and how much they just repulse you.

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They're, they're picking on me. Can you just destroy them for me? It's a pretty compelling case.

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You already said you would do this. So here they are. Verse, verse 11.

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But let all those that put their trust in thee rejoice. Rejoice. Let them ever shout for joy because thou defendest them.

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Let them also that love thy name be joyful in thee. Rejoice means to have joy again.

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Ever shout for joy means to have joy forever. Be joyful in thee means to have joy in God.

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So let's break down that verse 11 one more time. But let all those that put their trust in you have joy again.

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What is David wanting? He's just coming out of this dark place from the first few chapters.

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He's asking for joy to be returned. Let, let me have joy forever because you defend me.

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You're fighting the battle, not me. Let them also that love thy name means me.

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I love your name means all those people that love you. They love your name.

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Let them have joy in you. So we've seen

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David start with praying to God. And then he prays for himself.

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But what he does in the moments when he's praying for himself is he begins to compare himself with God and contrast himself with the world.

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Because if you're going to unleash the power of a righteously just God to destroy, you certainly want to make sure that he knows you're not in the, in the kill zone.

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So he contrasts and says, over there, not over here, over there,

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I'm coming to you in a multitude of mercy. I know I have sin like they do, but I'm yours because you chose me because it was within you to choose me.

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You love me because it was within you to do so had nothing to do with any merit that I, that I brought to the table.

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It's grace. It's unmerited favor. So I know I look a lot like that repulsive stuff that you want to destroy, but I'm not because of you.

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I'm different because of you. I'm separate because of you. I'm chosen. I'm loving. I'm loved.

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I'm, I'm elect. I'm sanctified. I'm holy. I'm pure. I'm beautiful. I'm amazing because of you.

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I'm not that anymore. So now rain, fire, go at it.

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Cause I'm, I'm over here with you. Give me joy again.

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Let me have joy forever because I have joy in you because you've encompassed me.

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You defend me. The last verse for thou Lord will bless the righteous with favor will thou compass him as with a shield.

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That word favor means in this context, it means pleasure. So it pleases the

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Lord to encompass us, put that force field around us. Like we saw in an earlier chapter,

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David who's laid out prone in the battlefield and the bombs keep on coming like God completely surrounds him and creates like a force field shield around him.

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He does it because it pleases him to do so. He looks down at this creation that used to look like that and now looks like him.

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And he says, it sure feels good to save this one. And he protects us.

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Then watch out because if you are not in that force field, you are getting utterly decimated.

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And David knows that it's why he can sleep. That's why he has, he will lay me down in peace and rest.

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That's why when he wakes, he praises the Lord and says, the Lord will sustain me.

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He is in a continual conversation with God. And at night he tells

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God all the things he's thankful for all the things he needs, but he leaves it to be continued.

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You'll hear from me in the morning. And when you hear from me in the morning, it's going to be well -structured. I'm going to remind you of who you are and what you've done for your people and why you need to destroy my enemies.

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And then I'm going to look to you expectantly. When is it going to happen?

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Because I know it will. That's true faith. That's when you can depend on who

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God is and what he's done and on the promises he's given you and walk with an expectation that he will fulfill those promises.

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That's faith. And so that's the structure of David's prayer life found in Psalm chapter five.

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I think it's pretty cool. I hope you guys enjoyed it. And we are out of time. We got about three minutes.

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So anybody want to add anything or any thoughts before we close it up?

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All right. Well, let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we just thank you so much for your word.

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And we thank you for David. He is a pretty incredible person.

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And we know that he at times looked just as bad as the rest of the world, but he came to you and appealed to your mercy and appealed to your goodness and appealed to your grace.

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Father, help us to do the same because we are not better than David. We may not have murdered anyone like he did.

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We may not have fornicated. But we are just as evil.

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We're just as repulsive. Until you changed us.

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I should say we were just as evil. We were just as repulsive because we are no longer that.

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You have transformed us. And Father, help us to not be conformed to this world, comparing ourselves with others, but rather let us be transformed by the renewing of our minds, that we will be wholly acceptable unto you because that is our reasonable service.

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That's what is logical for us to do because we are yours. Thank you that you chose us.

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Thank you that you loved us. Help us to have full confidence in that love and help us to walk in it.