A Word in Season: Untrue Speech (Psalm 73:15)

Asaph’s Melancholy Struggle in Psalm 73

The Asaf, who seems to have written a good number of the Psalms, appears to have been a most interesting character. A lot of his Psalms are characterised by a more melancholy outlook, as if he's wrestling to get through the perceptions that he has and the things that he sees to a clearer and more stable view of God and his dealings.

One of the places where that's particularly clear is Psalm 73, where Asaf begins with a testimony of what he's learned, that truly God is good to Israel, to such as are pure in heart, but also explains the turmoil through which he arrived at that conclusion.

But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped. And the first part of this Psalm, as you may know, is a catalogue of complaints and concerns about the fact that the wicked seem to have an easy life.

There are no pangs in their death, he says, their strength is firm. They're not in trouble like other men, nor are they plagued like other men. Pride is their necklace, violence their garment, their eyes bulge with abundance.

And the contrast then is with God's people, who seem to be at a distance from him, to have no real enjoyment of him, who are persuaded to some extent that God has no knowledge of them or regard for them.

And so as he develops his thinking, the people are saying, how does God know and is their knowledge in the most high? Behold, he says, these are the ungodly who are always at ease. They increase in riches.

And then this devastating conclusion, verse 13. Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my hands in innocence. For all day long I have been plagued and chastened every morning. Now, can you imagine a couple of believers talking to one another and that's the conclusion that they reach?

What's the point? Why do we bother? Why should anybody follow a God who doesn't seem to have any thought of us, any regard of us, who doesn't seem to know what we're going through? There are people who are utterly opposed to him, who have no thought of him, and yet their life and death seem to be so easy.

We have cleansed our hearts in vain. We've washed our hands in innocence because our life is miserable and difficult and short and painful. Asaf concludes in verse 15. If I had said I will speak thus, behold, I would have been untrue to the generation of your children.

The Danger of Speaking Untrue Things About God

Asaf was thinking some of those things. He was feeling some of those things, but he needed to learn not to speak those particular things. To speak in that way, to deny God in that way, to dismiss the pursuit of godliness in that way, would have been to discourage, to undermine, to pull down and bring low God's true children.

His perception was that this was so, but it was not reality. And it's important for us in days when there does seem to be a rising tide of godlessness, when some people seem to have that easy life and that painless death, when the Church of Christ may in some places seem to be battered down and on the back foot, that we should not think and feel and so speak as Asaf was tempted to do.

We need to take account of the fact that to speak in that way would make us untrue to the generation of God's children. Now, it may be that we need to identify that perception, that we need to say that there are some things which Asaf saw and which we see that do reflect the reality of this present world, that there do seem to be those prosperities and pleasures in the path of wickedness, and there can seem to be only pains and difficulties in the path of righteousness.

Seeing the World Correctly in Light of God’s Character

But that is not true. And as Asaf understood more of the character of God and more of God's dealings with the righteous and the wicked, not just in this life, but in the life which was to come, then he appreciated the fact that though his present perceptions might have carried him in that direction, to make those conclusions and to speak in that way would have been devastating to the saints of God.

The same is true for us. We cannot go simply on such flawed perceptions, and we need to be careful with our complaints and our conclusions. We need to make sure that we speak what is true and right and to prove true to the generation of God's children in which he has placed us.