When I was young I had trouble connecting with the Psalms. So many of the lament psalms, like this one, are written about situations in which the psalmist has been oppressed by his enemies. I had trouble identifying with that experience. I got along well with most everyone in my social circles growing up. I don’t recall having enemies. What can a psalm like this one say to me? As I have grown older, I have come to see that being a disciple of Jesus in this world guarantees that you will have enemies. Ever since Genesis 3:15, God has decreed that there will be enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. And it is the serpent who holds power over this present age. When Satan showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, he said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” Satan is a liar, but he was not lying about having authority over all the kingdoms of this world. He is the god of this age, and as long as we are living in this age, we are living in enemy-occupied territory. We should not be surprised, then, that the great culture-making institutions of our day—the media outlets, Hollywood, universities, etc.—think that we Christians are enemies of societal progress.
In his dissenting opinion in the case The United States vs. Windsor, the watershed case from a few weeks ago that has cleared the ground for the imposition of same-sex marriage in all 50 states, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote, “It is one thing for a society to elect change; it is another for a court of law to impose change by adjudging those who oppose it hostes humani generis, enemies of the human race.” Scalia’s scathing dissent draws attention to the fact that Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion ascribes hateful motives to the Congress that originally passed the Defense of Marriage Act, which by implication would apply also to those who continue to oppose same-sex marriage today. Although the majority opinion does not use the words “enemies of the human race,” Justice Scalia believes that kind of evaluation of those who oppose same-sex marriage is being implied in the Supreme Court’s decision.
It has become clear to me in the last few years that society has found the club it will use to beat us with: our allegiance to the biblical teaching on sexuality and marriage. The narrative being framed is one of social progress, the next wave of the civil rights movement, only this time it pertains not to skin color but to sexual orientation. Societal progress today means the full acceptance and affirmation of homosexual behavior. And we all know what happens to those who are enemies of the progress of human rights: they are opposed, then ridiculed, then marginalized, and, in some cases, then locked up and silenced.
We should not be surprised by this. Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 3:12, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” The fact that we have enemies was something of which I was largely unaware in my childhood, but as I grow older, the value of psalms such as this one become more real to me. David’s prayer should be read as a courtroom plea to God, the judge, against his enemy. We do not know the specific situation that called forth this psalm from David, but there were plenty of times in his life when he found himself pursued by enemies. Like the widow in Jesus’ parable in Luke 18, David wants justice against his adversary. He wants God to declare him to be in the right and his enemy in the wrong, so that his enemy might stand under divine condemnation and David might know the joy of divine vindication.
This psalm is about justification. Normally, when theologians discuss justification, they talk about the imputation of Christ’s righteousness to us by faith so that we are given right standing with God. And that is certainly true. But the concept of justification is bigger than that. As I have studied this doctrine from Scripture, I have come to see that justification is both a present and future reality. In the present, we are justified, that is, declared righteous, the moment we put our faith in Christ. At that moment, we are united to Christ in his death and resurrection, so that we have already passed through the final judgment with him, and the verdict of righteousness that was pronounced over him at his resurrection is pronounced over us. We are right with God. But being justified by faith means that we do not yet see the full results of that reality. Our justification remains hidden in this present age; it is not a public reality. In fact, though we are justified before God, we are condemned by the world. The world does not see that we belong to God and stand righteous before him. And this is where the future aspect of justification comes in. On the day that Christ returns, he will call us from our tombs. And on that day, when we are raised from the dead to the glory of the age to come, our justification will go public. It will no longer be hidden from the world. The fact that we belong to God will be clearly seen by all, and those who have condemned us will be condemned by the Christ in whose righteousness we share. So we should understand the biblical doctrine of justification not merely as the divine verdict pronounced over us at the moment of faith, but also as our vindication by God before the world on the last day.
As believers in Christ living in an age under the power of the serpent, we stand in a similar situation to David in this psalm. The danger to our faith is that, when faced with personal distress owing to hostility on the part of unbelievers or to the circumstances of life, we might interpret such events as indicators of God’s disapproval of us, and we will then lose sight of the final vindication that is coming. And if we allow that idea to take root, we will have no motivation to call out to God in our distress but will instead withdraw from him, and the enemy will have begun the process of chipping away at our faith.
God was incredibly gracious to give us psalms that model for us a posture of prayer and trust in him in times of personal distress. Psalm 143 teaches us that though we are opposed by the powers of this age, we must seek vindication in the divine courtroom. Our hope for deliverance from the serpent lies solely with the God who has justified us in Christ and will take our justification public on the day of resurrection. Dividing the text at the most natural point, the word selah at the end of verse 6, we end up with two sections of equal length. Each of these sections gives us instructions on how to enter God’s courtroom in times of personal distress.
The first word of instruction is this:
Enter the Divine Courtroom with Assurance, vv. 1-6.
We have much to learn from David’s example here. I know that in my own life, when I am going through a dark time, I often have difficulty praying. When facing circumstances of personal distress, I have a tendency to lapse into the error of Job’s comforters and assume that I can read God’s attitude toward me in the events of my life. If darkness covers my life, I feel, on some level, that it is a darkness that proceeds from God’s heart and represents his disapproval of me. And I cannot pray to a god whose heart toward me is only darkness and condemnation.
But David shows me here that such a god is a figment of my imagination! Notice his situation in verse 3: “For the enemy has pursued my soul; he has crushed my life to the ground; he has made me sit in darkness like those long dead.” David is being pursued, and that pursuit has forced him into the shadows. He sits in darkness. And the external forces have caused him internal turmoil, according to verse 4: “Therefore my spirit faints within me; my heart within me is appalled.” Circumstances have left him in constant fear and sorrow. He is appalled at the cruelty and injustice of his enemy. In short, the life has been sapped out of him.
So what does David do? Does he read his circumstances as an expression of God’s heart toward him and sink further into despair? No! If he had done that, we wouldn’t even have a Psalm 143. David never would have cried out to God to begin with. But David does not build his theology from his own experiences. He builds it on the Word of God, which reveals God’s character and promises, which in turn give David assurance to come before God in prayer. We know David has God’s character and promises in mind because of verse 1: “Hear my prayer, O LORD; give ear to my pleas for mercy! In your faithfulness answer me, in your righteousness!” David has a contention to bring to the court. He has a complaint against his enemy, and he wants God to take his side in the contention. Why does he believe that God will do so? First, because God is faithful. You see, David is not appealing to a disinterested third party. He is appealing to the God to whom he is bound by covenant. He is appealing to the God who has made promises to David. And now he asks God to make good on those promises and deliver him. Second, David believes God will take his side because God is righteous. He is the one who intervenes in his creation to set things right again and again, and in this situation, it means he is the one who will intervene to deliver the victim of unjust oppression. David approaches the court to get God on his side in a contention, but he does not try to bribe or flatter God into it. God cannot be bribed, for he owns everything, and he cannot be flattered, for he cannot be deceived. Instead, David trusts in the faithfulness of God to his gracious promises and the righteousness of God’s character.
Now, maybe you are thinking, “Okay, I get it. The circumstances of my life are not the basis for me to determine God’s heart toward me. But if not my circumstances, then at least my sin should come into consideration here. I know how bad a sinner I am, and so surely God must be against me for the things I have done. I have developed an addiction to pornography.” Or, “I have homosexual desires.” Or, “I have had an abortion.” Or, “I have spoken terrible, hurtful words to the people who are dearest to me.” Or, “I have lost control with my children.” This is where something remarkable happens in verse 2. You see, David enters the divine courtroom to ask God to take his side in a contention against his enemy, but he does so fully conscious of the fact that God has every right to enter into contention with David! And if God decided to press his own claims against David because of David’s sin, David knows full well that it would mean condemnation for him. So he prays, according to verse 2: “Enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous [or, better ‘will be justified’] before you.” This verse appears to be the inspiration behind Paul’s statement in Romans 3:20: “For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.” David acknowledges that he is a sinner, and he further acknowledges that he, along with every other human being, could never hope to be justified before God based on what he has done.
And yet he prays with the assurance that God will not enter into judgment with him. He, a guilty man, enters the divine courtroom with full assurance that he will not be condemned! How can he do this? Again, he is banking his hope on the promises and character of God. He knows where he stands with God, not because of his own worthiness but because of God’s promise. Notice verse 5: “I remember the days of old; I meditate on all that you have done; I ponder the work of your hands.” He intentionally reflects on the works of God in the past, presumably not only toward him but also toward Israel. What is the value of meditating on God’s past deeds? It helps you get your bearings. If God’s character does not change, then reflection on his gracious words and deeds toward you in the past should anchor your understanding of his love for you in times of distress. Every Christian should meditate regularly on the wondrous deeds of God, especially the one that shows us the very definition of love: the cross of Christ. First John 4:10 says, “In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” There is a reason we come to the Lord’s Table every Sunday to memorialize the broken body and shed blood of Christ for us: it is to orient us once again to the love of God for us. David remembered the works of God, and it gave him assurance to plead with God in prayer. At the moment of blackest despair, remember that God has given his Son for you, and if he has done that, how will not also with him graciously give you all things?
So David, confident of God’s favor toward him, says in verse 6: “I stretch out my hands to you; my soul thirsts for you like a parched land.” The image of a parched land is one of desperate need. David is facing desperation. And just as rain is the only hope for a land ravaged by drought, so is God the only hope for David’s deliverance now. So he stretches out his hands to God. Have you ever seen a child, maybe one or two years old, one who hasn’t quite mastered verbal communication? What does he do if he wants Daddy to pick him up? He stands at Daddy’s feet and stretches out his hands. And in that moment, what Daddy is going to refuse? David has come into a courtroom, but it just so happens that the Judge is his Daddy. So he stretches out his hands with the assurance that he will be heard, delivered, and vindicated.
In Luke 18, Jesus told a parable about an unjust judge, a man who neither feared God nor respected man. A widow came to him one day, a woman who would have been one of the weakest members of her society. She would have had no money to bribe him with, and no political influence to entice him to her side. But she was being oppressed by an adversary, and she wanted justice. So she pestered him into giving it to her. By sheer persistence she brought the judge over to her side in the contention. Now, Jesus’ point in that parable is to teach us the importance of persisting in prayer, but the argument works in this way: if a poor, powerless widow can win an unjust judge over by her persistence, how much more should God’s elect, who cry to him day and night, expect God to vindicate them against their enemies? You see, God is not like the unjust judge. He is completely righteous in his character and faithful to every promise he has made. And his promise is that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1), that the sufferings of this present age are not worth comparing to the glory that is to be revealed in us (Romans 8:18), that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28), and that neither death nor life, neither angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:39). So, if God is for us, who can be against us? Enter his courtroom with assurance of his favor toward you in Christ Jesus. That is our first word of instruction.
The second is this:
We often use the word “argument” in reference to a heated discussion where people lose their tempers. But that is not what I mean here. I am referring to arguments as stated reasons that seek to persuade someone. The Bible teaches us to pray by arguing our case before God. David makes at least three arguments here as he brings his case to the divine courtroom.
First, David makes a very practical argument from the urgency of his situation. In verse 7 he prays, “Answer me quickly, O LORD! My spirit fails! Hide not your face from me,” and now here is the argument: “lest I be like those who go down to the pit.” This is a very simple, very straightforward way of making his case by saying, “God, if you do not come to my aid quickly, this enemy is going to kill me.” David says the window of opportunity for God to deliver him is a small one, so he appeals to God with urgency and fervency. In one verse David combines rational argumentation with fervency of spirit. Those two things are not opposed to each other. In prayer, we should be engaged with both head and heart.
Second, David repeatedly makes an argument from the glory of God. He shows that more than his own life is at stake in this situation: the trustworthiness of God’s promise, and thus the glory of his name, is also at stake. Note verse 8: “Let me hear in the morning of your steadfast love,” and now here’s the argument: “for in you I trust.” The second half of the verse parallels the first: “Make me know the way I should go,” now here’s the argument: “for to you I lift up my soul.” Verse 9 makes a parallel argument: “Deliver me from my enemies, O LORD!” and here’s why: “I have fled to you for refuge!” David trusts in the Lord to deliver him. He lifts up his soul to the Lord as he seeks wisdom about what to do in this situation. He has fled to the Lord for refuge from his enemies. In other words, David has placed his bet. He has gone “all in” on God, and if God fails him, the implication will be that God was not worthy of David’s trust to begin with. God’s name is at stake here.
That is precisely what David says in verse 11: “For your name’s sake, O LORD, preserve my life! In your righteousness bring my soul out of trouble!” David argues with God to come to his aid, not because David deserves it, but so that God’s name might be magnified. The doctrine of justification is about more than the justification of sinners before God. It is about the justification of God before the world. When God acts in righteousness to triumph over those who oppose him and his people, he vindicates the righteousness of his own name. He proves himself to be God. In Exodus 9:27, in the midst of the plagues that God brings upon the land of Egypt in his plan to break Pharaoh’s will and release the Hebrew slaves, Pharaoh says this to Moses just after his crops have been devastated by hail: “This time I have sinned; the LORD is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong.” All of history is headed for the day when God will be openly acknowledged as Lord by all, believers and unbelievers alike. Echoing the words of Isaiah 45:23, Paul writes in Philippians 2:10-11 “that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” This is precisely what we are told to pray first in the Lord’s prayer: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” That means, “May your name be regarded as holy, may you be honored and acknowledged as God in every part of creation.” God is passionate for the glory of his name. Let the glory of God be to you like a compass that will always point you toward true north, so that all of your prayers may be oriented toward what is most important. Make your case to God, but argue with him the way he has taught you to argue, namely, with prayers that make much of him.
The third argument that David makes is closely tied to the second one. David argues from the covenant relationship that he has with God. You see, in an absolute sense, God is not obligated to us in any way. He was never obligated to create us, and having created us, he was never obligated to allow us to know him and his blessings. God is not a debtor to man. However, God is obligated to us only under one condition: when he obligates himself by his word of promise. Isn’t that what a promise is? A self-imposed obligation? When God formalizes a promise, he does so by means of a covenant. He entered into covenant with Abraham, and then later with the nation of Israel, and then later with David as an individual, binding himself to certain obligations toward each one. I can’t get into the specifics of these various covenants today, but the overall point I want to make is that being related to God by covenant means that you have entered into a special relationship with God, one in which he has bound himself to you by certain promises. He, under no obligation to you, has obligated himself, just as a man, under no obligation to a woman, freely takes on numerous obligations for the care and well-being of that woman when he enters into a marriage covenant with her.
Now, the word “covenant” does not appear in this psalm. But covenantal language does. Notice verse 10: “Teach me to do your will, for you are my God! Let your good Spirit lead me on level ground!” The phrase, “you are my God” is a covenant formula. We note the converse of it in verse 12: “And in your steadfast love you will cut off my enemies, and you will destroy all the adversaries of my soul, for I am your servant.” You are my God, and I am your servant. Lord and servant are bound to each other by covenant. And because David is bound to God by covenant, he expects God to act on his behalf, motivated by that all-important word in verse 12: “steadfast love” or hesed in Hebrew. This terms is a shorthand reference to God’s character, and it speaks of his free grace by which he has entered into covenant with those upon whom he has set his affection.
Think of it this way. In 2011 Prince William, not merely a member of the royal family but an heir to the throne, married Kate Middleton, a British commoner. Prior to his marriage to her, he was always William, Duke of Cambridge, and future King of England. And, if he happens to outlive her, he will still be himself: William, Duke of Cambridge or Prince of Wales or King of England, depending on who else ahead of him happens to be alive or dead at the time. So, we could say that in one sense, William is who he is with or without Kate. But in another sense, I think we would say that by taking Kate to be his wife, Prince William permanently changed his identity. From April 29, 2011, until one of them dies, Prince William has added “husband to Kate” to his identity, which means he lives with her and for her. He is not just William, but William-for-Kate.
God is eternally himself, with or without us, but in his free grace he has chosen, not to remain within himself, but to be God-for-us. So if God has freely bound himself to you in covenant through his Son Jesus Christ, if he has become your God by his own free grace, you have every right to expect that every good promise he has made will be fulfilled to you. So when you pray, plead the promises of God back to him. When you don’t know how you are going to make it financially, pray through Matthew 6:33: “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” When your faith is wavering under distress, quote Philippians 1:6 to him: “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” When you feel the weight of a guilty conscience, call to mind 1 John 2:1-2 in your prayers: “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” When you pray, get into the habit of saying, “God, you are my God, and I am your son in Christ. This is what you have promised to your children. Now I am asking you to fulfill your promise.” As John Calvin says, “There is nothing that we can expect from the Lord, for which we are not also told to pray. Prayer digs up the treasures which the Gospel reveals to the eye of faith.”
As we, children of God in a world under the authority of the serpent, enter into the divine courtroom to plead for vindication against our enemies, we can do so with the full assurance that God is for us, and so we should feel the freedom to argue our case before him. Have you ever heard the prayer, “Come, Lord Jesus”? It appears at the end of the book of Revelation. Why does the New Testament model for us a prayer to the Lord Jesus to come? It is a prayer for vindication. It is a cry for deliverance. It is an eager expectation that the powers that hold this world in darkness will one day be overthrown, and our justification before God will then go public before the world.
But the day of his coming could be a day of terror for you. If you are not in Christ, then you are in rebellion against him. You fall into the same category as David’s enemies here. On the day that Christ comes, he will come to press his claims against you, which will result in your condemnation to an eternal separation from God in hell. Jesus called it a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth. It is a place of unending agony, where unbearable moments become unbearable days and years and centuries and millennia. And after thousands and thousands of years have passed, you will still be no closer to relief than the day you first came there. It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So the greatest news in the world is that God extends an opportunity to you now to escape his coming wrath. Scripture declares that God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son over to death on a cross, not for his own sins but for the sins of his covenant people, and then raised him up on the third day and seated him at his right hand. And now, forgiveness of sins is proclaimed in his name to all who will turn away from sin and turn to him in faith. I invite you to come to Christ in faith and to demonstrate your faith publicly through baptism, in which you declare as you go into the water that you are united with Christ, that his death is your death, and that his resurrection is your resurrection.
Those of you who are trusting in Christ, who have been baptized, and who are now members in good standing with an evangelical church, we invite you to come to the table. Come and take of the body and blood of the Lord once again. Paul wrote that as often as we eat of this bread and drink of this cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. As the serpent draws our society toward ever-increasing ungodliness and greater hostility to the truth and those who proclaim it, let us eat and drink, proclaiming to the world with these actions that the judge has heard out case, and our vindication is coming.