Feb. 19, 2017 Afternoon Service - Waiting on God by Pastor Josh Sheldon

Well, as last week, let us, for the declaration of God's Word, set our attention to Psalm number 7, and if after the table is over, if any of you who were here last

Sunday see someone who was not here last Sunday and wish to tell them just what occurred when we started

Psalm 7, you are welcome to. I will not take offense. I would be a little embarrassed, but it's perfectly fine.

This is the Word of God, and this will be our devotion before the table for the next

Sunday, possibly two. Psalm 7, a shigion, or a meditation, a reflection of David, which he sang to the

Lord considering the words of Cush of Benjamite, O Lord my God, in you do

I take refuge. Save me from all my pursuers and deliver me, lest like a lion they tear my soul apart, rending it in pieces with none to deliver.

O Lord my God, if I have done this, if there is wrong in my hands, if I have repaid my friend with evil or plundered my enemy without cause, let the enemy pursue my soul and overtake it, and let him trample my life to the ground and lay my glory in the dust.

Selah. Arise, O Lord, in your anger. Lift yourself up against the fury of my enemies.

Awake for me. You have appointed a judgment. Let the assembly of the peoples be gathered about you, over it return on high.

The Lord judges the peoples. Judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness and according to the integrity that is in me.

O let the evil of the wicked come to an end, and may you establish the righteous, you who test the minds and hearts,

O righteous God. My shield is with God, who saves the upright in heart. God is a righteous judge and a

God who feels indignation every day. If a man does not repent, God will wet his sword.

He has bent and readied his bow. He has prepared for him his deadly weapons, making his arrows fiery shafts.

Behold, the wicked man conceives evil and is pregnant with mischief and gives birth to lies.

He makes a pit, digging it out, and falls into that hole. It falls into the hole that he has made.

His mischief returns upon his own head, and on his own skull his violence descends. I will give to the

Lord the thanks due to his righteousness, and I will sing praise to the name of the Lord, the Most High.

So we're only given really one clue, one alert to what the situation was that caused

David to mark down this reflection, this shigion that he gives us here in Psalm 7.

And the only clue we get is the name of the accuser. He is

Cush the Benjamite. This is the song that David sang to the Lord concerning the words of Cush, a

Benjamite. Now we know in Scripture, names are remarkably important in Scripture.

Names are prophetic. When names are changed, that shows the authority of the one who can change the name over the one whose name is changed.

Nebuchadnezzar, when he brought the captives back, Daniel and his two friends renamed them Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, showing his authority over them, as did

God when he changed Abram to Abraham in several other cases. But the only point here is names are very important in the

Scripture. Psalm 7 is a reflection on the words of Cush, a

Benjamite. This name Cush first comes up as one of Ham's sons.

This tells us something. Ham was the one who dishonored his father Noah soon after the floodwaters had receded.

And we know from 1

Samuel 24, verse 9, 1 Samuel 26, verse 19, that Saul's court was one of innuendo, and slander, and rumors, and that Saul was insanely paranoid against David.

And so he was prone to believing falsehoods without hearing any proofs. And it seems to be that's what this

Cush, this Benjamite was doing, and a Benjamite, of course, would be related to Saul in that tribe.

Saul himself was a Benjamite. This Cush who inspired, small

I, inspired David to write this meditation was of that tribe. Why was

Saul so ready to believe what Cush, this Benjamite, was saying? These words, as we will see, were very hurtful against David.

Well, he was prone to believing falsehoods without hearing any proofs because they supported his own prejudices, which is too often how we choose what we're going to hear and the validity that we're going to offer in any report.

If it matches with what we've already determined to be the case, something we're going to like but more often than not dislike, it's because we already believe this or we want something to support this belief that we've already come to.

And so the lesson comes quickly to us from this psalm. So let us be those who, with one or two witnesses, establish every matter.

And do not simply believe foul and false reports immediately, but check them out and see if they're true.

And this is what the Lord Jesus would have us do, to gain one or two witnesses and establish every matter in accordance with what's written back in Deuteronomy, that somebody is not condemned on the word of one witness, but on more than that.

One or two witnesses must confirm these things. And Saul, apparently, if Cush is this

Benjamite who is back there in 1st Samuel and speaking against David and starting these rumors against him and slandering him, this would be the first thing that we see.

What should Saul have done? What must we do? As Jesus says, look at things with one or two witnesses.

Look at them carefully. Look at them according to scripture. We're not told what Cush actually said.

David just gives us this characterization of the wound that it gave him, where he said, lest like a lion they tear my soul apart.

It tells us how serious and how hurtful it was. Not just this is hurting my feelings, this is making me sad.

It's tearing him apart in his inmost being, his soul, his deepest self is being ripped to shreds by what this

Benjamite Cush is doing to him. So if Cush was indeed an attendant in Saul's court, which seems the most likely scenario, if he was a whisperer behind the scenes as suggested by the allusions here in the

Psalm, then the slander was probably against David's loyalty to the king.

As you read 1st Samuel, this was constantly Saul's accusation against David, that he was disloyal, that he was trying to conspire against him, that he wanted to take the kingdom for himself.

And it would seem that these rumors against David by this

Cush, this Benjamite would feed into that. So again, if we assume all this to be the case, and I think it's a good assumption, then another immediate lesson comes to us from the

Psalm. Right away we see rumor mongering and gossiping, and just how damaging they are.

And sometimes we let things slip with our tongue very easily, and we don't stop before we speak. And James says, he who can control his tongue is a perfect man.

This is how hard it is. Tongue can do great damage. We need to stop immediately and think about that, and look at ramifications, and think how far is this going to go, what is this going to do to this person, how much truth is behind this.

These are all scriptural matters. As we said this morning in Sunday school, how do we know if it's

God's will for us to say anything at all? Well, let's look at God's word. Let's pray through God's word. Let's get other counselors, brothers and sisters in the

Lord, to look at the situation with us. Rumor mongering, gossiping, behind the scenes, going around people's back, none of this is appropriate.

This puts us in the wrong company. Kush, this is Benjamite's company. Jesus tells us, let your no be no and your yes, yes.

Anything more than this comes from evil. I think one of the quick lessons we find in this psalm right away is we are to speak plainly, truthfully, directly.

Hebrew poetry often has a form that in our Western ear, we're not really accustomed to it.

There are different ways the language is used to emphasize different points. So oftentimes, as in psalm number seven, verses that are separated from each other make the same point, but in somewhat different ways.

In psalm seven, we have the first two verses taken together and then the last verse. So verses one and two and then verse 17, they're like that, where they combine on a general theme that they work together to accentuate.

They both speak of going to God as our refuge. Read them again.

Verse seven, oh Lord my God, excuse me, in you do I take refuge. Save me from all my pursuers and deliver me.

Verse two, less like a lion, they tear my soul apart, rending it in pieces with none to deliver.

And then verse 17, I will give to the Lord the thanks due to his righteousness and I will sing praise to the name of the

Lord, the most high. These all speak of going to God as our refuge, which is really as far as we're going to go this afternoon, and I do intend to keep working through the different themes in this psalm in a couple of subsequent

Sundays. But this first point is going to God as our refuge, as our only refuge.

Another psalmist says in the pilgrimage psalms, I lift my eyes to the hills, from where does my help come?

My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. And in verses one and two of psalm seven, this is where David repairs, this is where he goes, this is where his refuge is, to the

Lord. In you I take refuge, save me from my pursuers, you deliver me.

And we can notice that to take refuge is an active enterprise.

Even trusting God as his refuge, which sounds sort of passive, I'm just going to wait and see what happens.

No, he took action, he escaped from Saul's hand. You remember his friend Jonathan, Saul's son, helped him to escape and they laid plans for getting away from Saul and his wrongful persecution of David.

The crisis here is that he's being pursued, again putting us in mind of David's exile, of Saul's fixation against him,

Saul so determined to find him and to kill him. It's more than just his life though, he complains to God that should

God tarry, should God not answer, his very soul is going to be ripped apart the way lions do their prey.

So words like this, these kind of words that do such damage to David, where do they come from?

Well Jesus teaches us that words come from the heart, and from the passion of the heart to the movement of the hand is really only a very short distance.

We generally, when we have something that we are planning within, we're building up an agenda, we're making a case for hatred of a person and what we're going to do against If we let this go on, if we don't stop and repent, if we don't catch ourselves, again how do we catch ourselves?

By prayer, by studying God's word with other counselors. If we don't do that, if we let our old nature continue to overtake, the hand will find a way to carry out the plan of the heart.

You need to be careful here. Words do come from the heart, this is exactly what

Jesus tells us, and it will finally come out the hand, by which

I mean we will do what we're planning, we will find a way to actuate it, it will come out our lips, words can do great violence, as James says, with the same mouth we bless the

Lord and we curse others, and my brethren, this should not be, and to think about it, what damage would it do to someone if they knew your or even my thoughts against them?

Wasn't there a movie like that where, I forget who the actor was, but he could read the thoughts or he could hear the thoughts as they were going, and he was so surprised so many times,

I can't even remember the name of it, but what would happen if we were in a situation like that? If when we're talking to somebody or just walking by the way and we see a brother or a sister and we say, how are you doing,

God bless you, but our real thought was up there legible somehow, able to be seen, what damage would it do?

Would they be better off than if a lion was shredding at their flesh? And Saul is one, he proved his bloodthirst against David.

You remember when he had Doeg massacre the priests of Nob because they had the temerity to help him with the showbread and give him some sustenance for his way.

David is in a lot of trouble here, the words are tearing at him and the words are having effect with Saul, Saul is using them as a justification for chasing and continue to persecute

David. The last few words of verse 2 say, with none to deliver, with none to deliver,

David may have by then had his band of followers, the off scouring in a way of Israel when he first began, he was beginning to build up a following, but if the

Lord didn't act, there could be no help. He says, none to deliver, none but the

Lord will deliver me. Matthew Henry notes here, I love the way he says it, it is the glory of God to help the helpless.

That time, if David did indeed have his band of followers beginning, they are very, very small, but I think

David would have said the same thing if he had a massive army behind him. If he goes to the Lord, and if the

Lord doesn't deliver, there is none to deliver. He said, when we seek our own solution, we leave behind God's ways and make ourselves vulnerable to great harm.

In verses 3 to 5, David actually offers to receive as his own punishment that which he is claiming his enemies deserve.

That is a bold claim. That is something very bold to say before the living

God. We are going to look at that in more depth next week, Lord willing.

But note what David implies here. He will turn only to the Lord. If the Lord doesn't step in, there is none to deliver.

He is claiming his own innocence here, but he is saying, God's way or there is no way.

I think it was Nehemiah who was offered the guard by Nebuchadnezzar to take him home.

He said we are ashamed. Why were they ashamed? Because if anyone delivered them but the Lord, it would be a shame to them.

This is what David is saying here. None to deliver, only God. And again, what is our lesson here?

Our lesson is let us not be those with one eye on the Lord and another on a contingency plan.

If we can take what Jesus said about our being unable to serve God and money to apply as a principle, we could say you cannot call on God for rescue and at the same time make plans just in case he fails.

We either trust God as our refuge or we don't. He either delivers us or there is none to deliver.

Rather would I suffer the pains of persecution and the world's rage than deny my

Lord. Better to be beaten for our faith in Jesus than to take a worldly way out. Verse 17 says,

I will give to the Lord the thanks due to his righteousness and I will sing praises to the name of the Lord, the

Most High. Of course, that is the end of the prayer as I said. We did the first two verses.

This is the last verse. A faithful way to end this prayer. He's gone to the Lord as his one and as his only recourse.

He's told God the danger he is in that he'll be torn to shreds in his inmost being if God doesn't act.

But that fate is only if God does not hear, if God does not do something. In this verse he anticipates, in verse 17 he anticipates something very different than that.

When he says he will give thanks, it may sound like he's saying something like if you deliver me,

I will worship you. But what he has here is an expression of full confidence in God.

That God has heard, that God cares, that God will do something and God will only do what is right.

It doesn't wait for the solution as though we then look and assess whether it meets with our approval.

No, thanks are due to God simply because of his righteousness which does not depend on anything related to us.

Even while the way of deliverance is unknown, David sings his praises. The conflict here between Cush the

Benjamite and David is really a very old one. This conflict, this hatred that he has for David.

And I would suggest that it goes all the way back to the garden. The seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman,

Genesis 3 .15 says, will be an ongoing and intense struggle. Cush descends from the serpent,

David from the woman. First Peter 5 .8 warns us about this as well for us.

He warns us that our adversary the devil prowls about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

His goal is the same, the same as it was with Cush the Benjamite speaking against David, the same as it is today with our adversary prowling around trying to devour one of us.

It's to take us off course. It's to divert our attention from following our Lord Jesus Christ. It was

Abraham who refused to take any of the share of the plunder from the king of Sodom because only God was to have any credit for any success that he had.

He'd have no help from anyone or anything but from the Lord.

Had he shared with that king, the king of Sodom and his leader of the expedition that gained it, the expedition that gained the plunder, he had every right to share it as his prize.

But had he done so, his dependence on the Lord would have been compromised. His testimony would have been less than it was.

A temptation to take the easier path, which only seems easier for the moment, that's the devouring we have to be wary of.

That's the soul being torn to shreds. I think of how easy it is to take an easier way out, to not join

David and say, unless the Lord delivers, there's none to deliver. The Bible says that our

Lord Jesus was tempted at all points as we are, yet without sin. His public ministry began with 40 days of temptation.

And what was the temptation? I think the temptation was very much like what David was tempted of here, what we face every day.

And that's to sink deliverance from any way other than by God, according to his word, his will expressed to us in this revelation of himself.

Let's pray that we would be those who say with David that only if the Lord delivers us will we be delivered at all.

Lord, may we be those who look always to God's word. We know that the word spoken against us sometimes at work and in our neighborhoods, they can be hard, they can be harsh, they are hurtful, they can tear us apart like a lion tearing at our soul.

We know how much it hurts. And yet, what is our deliverance? Who is our defender?

But God. And what is our deliverance? It's not to seek revenge. Jesus, Peter says in 1

Peter, when he was being reviled, he did not revile in return. He didn't get his revenge against his persecutors.

Nor must we. That means that we don't answer back in kind. It means that we should be never heard saying something like,

I only want you to see what it's like. Because what does that mean? We're justifying, we're returning evil for evil.

Our Lord Jesus, the one whose death and burial and resurrection we're going to celebrate in a few moments.

Our Lord Jesus, being tempted by the tempter himself, did not revile or give an accusation to borrow from Jude.

How much less we, David, at the very end of the psalm, waiting for God's response.

Waiting to see and anticipating it, but still not having in his hand the

Lord's deliverance and says, I will give to the Lord the thanks due his righteousness. We still praise God.

How can we praise God when we're being harmed like this, when somebody's tearing our soul apart like a lion? How can we give praise to God during a time like that?

Is it enough to give praise to him just knowing that he hears us? Just knowing that when we fall down on our knees before him and cast all our cares upon him in the name of his son

Jesus, he's heard us. Is that not enough? And I will sing praise to the name of the

Lord, the most high. Let us be those who with David say that unless the

Lord delivers, there is none who will deliver. There's no deliverance that we will accept.