Latest / Reformed Thinking / The Lord My Strength and My Shield (Psalm 28) | Charles Spurgeon

Transcript

The Lord My Strength and My Shield (Psalm 28) | Charles Spurgeon · Reformed Thinking

0:00
Welcome back to Reformed Thinking.
0:01
We are diving deep today and our source is really a classic.
0:06
Excerpts from Charles Spurgeon's celebrated work, The Treasury of
0:10
David, and we're focusing specifically on Psalm 28.
0:14
This is a song David wrote, it seems, when he was under some
0:16
intense pressure. A period of public slander
0:21
maybe, and just deep misunderstanding from the people
0:24
around him. That's right.
0:25
And for a deep dive today, our mission is really to look at how
0:28
David, while he's under fire, gives us a very precise model
0:32
for, well, for true and effective prayer.
0:35
The whole framework of this Psalm is what captivated
0:38
Spurgeon. You see, it starts with this
0:40
desperate, almost life or death plea.
0:43
Then it shifts pretty dramatically to a declaration of
0:46
God's justice against the wicked.
0:48
And then it ends in this established, triumphant praise.
0:51
So in a way, it offers a complete map for the spiritual
0:53
life. It guides you from that initial
0:55
anguish all the way to assurance all through, you know, focused
0:59
reliance on God. And Spurgeon's description of it
1:01
is so good he calls it another of David's songs in the night,
1:05
the idea being that his deep grief didn't silence him, it
1:09
actually did the opposite. It made him, as Spurgeon says,
1:12
profoundly eloquent in holy psomity.
1:15
So instead of just sinking into despair, his suffering was the
1:18
fuel for his devotion. And the idea, the thing that
1:22
holds it all together, seems to be separation.
1:24
He's not just asking for help, he's asking God to forcefully
1:27
distinguish him from the workers of iniquity all around him.
1:30
And we really have to establish the broader connection right
1:32
away. Our sources are very clear that
1:34
the Lord Jesus himself can be seen here.
1:37
He's presented as pleading this very Psalm, you know, acting as
1:40
the representative of his people.
1:42
So it's not just David's personal problem.
1:44
Not at all. It elevates the personal lament
1:47
of David, who is the type into this communal covenant plea by
1:50
Christ anointed head who is petitioning for the whole church
1:54
militant. What David felt personally,
1:57
Christ experiences and overcomes corporately for the benefit of
2:00
all believers. OK, let's unpack this earnest
2:03
entreaty. Then, starting right at the
2:04
beginning, verse one. Unto thee will I cry, O Lord, my
2:09
rock, the whole nature of the prayers right there in that one
2:13
word, cry. It's not a polite request, is
2:16
it? Spurgeon says.
2:17
It's the natural expression of just overwhelming sorrow.
2:21
It's what you do when all other ways of appealing to someone
2:24
have just failed. Precisely.
2:26
It's the language of a soul at its limit, You know, way past
2:29
the point of just making polite requests.
2:31
And you see, the direction of the cry matters just as much as
2:34
how intense it is. It has to be directed alone to
2:36
the Lord. The notes warn us that crying
2:39
out to man seeking human sympathy or help in this kind of
2:42
deep spiritual distress is just a waste of breath.
2:45
It's a waste of entreaties on the air.
2:47
David's wisdom is right there in his immediate, singular focus on
2:50
God. And when you think about it,
2:51
God's infinite readiness to hear and His, well, His omnipotent
2:55
ability to help, it just shows the folly of looking anywhere
2:58
else. It does.
2:59
And notice David's language. He doesn't say I hope to cry.
3:02
He says I will cry. Yeah, that's a firm resolve.
3:05
It's a decision. It's rooted in what he knows
3:07
about God, even if his feelings are pulling him towards silence
3:11
or, you know, despair. And that leads right into the
3:15
name he uses for God my Rock. The rock metaphor, it's so
3:19
powerful in Scripture. It is, and Spurgeon analyzes it
3:23
as signifying Jehovah as the immovable foundation of all real
3:27
hope. He's the ultimate refuge when
3:30
you're in trouble. I mean, think about what a rock
3:32
gives you in a desert, in an unstable place.
3:34
Stability. Safety.
3:35
Stability, safety, shade, and often it's where you find life
3:39
giving water. So God isn't just a place we
3:41
visit, He is the immovable geological feature that our
3:44
entire spiritual existence is built on.
3:46
That image of stability is so comforting, but the sources,
3:50
they immediately contrast it with a really terrifying
3:52
thought, don't they? The the eventual fate of the
3:55
ungodly. Yes, in the Day of Judgment, the
3:57
wicked will cry out to the literal rocks and mountains,
4:00
begging them to fall on them and hide them from God's wrath, and
4:03
those rocks will be totally useless.
4:04
But not our rock. But our rock, the eternal living
4:08
God, He attends to the cries of his people immediately,
4:12
unfailingly. This contrast just reinforces
4:15
the kind of security that's only available through faith.
4:18
The. Assurance is complete.
4:19
It is. The notes even include stories
4:21
of Christians on their deathbeds resting completely on Christ the
4:25
Rock and saying here my religion began and here it must end.
4:29
That kind of certainty which covers the beginning and the end
4:32
of faith, that's what this name gives you.
4:34
So now we get to the core of David's urgency, the other side
4:38
of that certainty, the fear of divine absence.
4:41
He pleads, Be not silent to me. Now I have to ask, because a
4:45
listener praying about daily struggles might think, wait,
4:47
isn't silence sometimes good for reflection?
4:50
How do the sources justify this being so terrifying?
4:53
That is a critical question because a genuine supplicant
4:56
like David isn't satisfied just with the calming effect of
4:58
having prayed. You know, the emotional release.
5:00
They need actual replies from heaven.
5:03
They're seeking the comfort and the counsel of the Holy Spirit
5:06
speaking to their heart. Or they just can't rest.
5:09
The dread of God's silence is existential.
5:12
The silence he fears isn't a short pause.
5:15
It's abandonment. It's the silence of abandonment.
5:18
The theological terror here is that for God to be silent is for
5:22
him to withhold the covenant promise, the assurance of his
5:25
presence and his favor. So it's a fear of being
5:27
spiritually cut off, of being treated as if that covenant bond
5:31
was broken, which would be a kind of spiritual death.
5:34
Exactly. And it's a paradox, right?
5:36
God's voice, when he speaks in judgement, is thunderous and
5:39
terrifying. It shakes the wilderness.
5:41
And yet his silence, when it's withheld from an eager
5:44
supplicant, is just as full of awe and dread.
5:47
So what's the counsel then, when God seems silent?
5:50
The counsel is not to close our mouths, but to cry with even
5:53
greater earnestness. David knew that if his cry got
5:56
shrill with eagerness and grief, the Lord wouldn't deny him a
5:59
hearing for long. The need for God's voice is the
6:02
need for spiritual survival itself.
6:04
And that profound urgency is why David turns the sphere into a
6:08
high stakes argument with God. Lest if thou be silent to me, I
6:13
become like them that go down into the pit.
6:16
He's basically saying Lord, your reputation is on the line.
6:19
Because if you treat me like 1 of the lost, I'm going to become
6:22
indistinguishable from them. It's the ultimate argument.
6:25
David is claiming that to be deprived of a God who answers
6:28
prayer is a worse situation than being dead in the grave.
6:31
It's sinking to the level of the lost, those cast into the pitch.
6:34
She'll or hell. So he turns it into a plea.
6:37
He turns this thought, the necessity of divine
6:39
communication for his spiritual survival, into this compelling
6:42
plea for God to intervene. The implication is that a
6:46
believer cannot perish if the Lord just speaks peace to his
6:48
agitated mind. Because the Lord will never
6:50
abandoned his own. He won't.
6:53
The notes mention the worry of the preacher Massalon, and it's
6:56
captured perfectly here, the fear that he might become such a
6:59
coward as to blush at thy name, or such a Sinner as to resist
7:02
God's grace leading to a criminal complicity with those
7:06
headed for the pit. So the plea be not silent is the
7:10
believers necessary cry for the sustaining grace of election.
7:13
Then, moving to the next verse, we see this active, intentional
7:16
physicality of His prayer. When I lift up my hands toward
7:20
Thy holy Oracle uplifted hands, it signifies reaching upward
7:25
toward the divine source, showing a readiness and an
7:29
eagerness to receive something from heaven.
7:32
And those ends aren't full. They're stretched out as empty
7:34
hands, like a beggar waiting to receive alms, and they're
7:37
positioned toward the mercy seat.
7:39
This gesture embodies our posture of complete need and
7:42
expectation. It's an admission that we have
7:45
nothing of our own to offer God. Or destitute without him
7:48
utterly. And the direction is everything
7:50
toward thy holy Oracle. This phrase can get glanced
7:52
over, but it anchors the whole action.
7:54
It does. The Hebrew word is Deb here.
7:57
This is the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle and then the
8:00
Temple, the inner sanctuary with the Ark of the Covenant, the
8:02
mercy seat. It's where God spoke and gave
8:05
his answer to Israel. The dev here was the place of
8:08
revelation. But as the notes stress, that
8:10
was just a type. It was merely a type, a symbolic
8:13
representation of the ultimate reality, our Lord Jesus Christ.
8:17
So when David directs his prayer toward the Oracle, what's the
8:20
application for someone praying today?
8:23
The application is that our acceptance is never based on the
8:26
direction we physically face. It's based on the direction of
8:29
our faith. If we want acceptance, we must
8:31
turn ourselves always toward the blood be sprinkled mercy, seat
8:35
of Christ's atonement crisis, our true and living divvier.
8:38
So our prayers have to be anchored in His finished work,
8:41
not our own piety. Exactly the direction points to
8:44
the ground of our acceptance. And that focus connects
8:46
perfectly with the request. Hear the voice of my
8:49
supplications. The source material makes a key
8:52
distinction here about the word voice.
8:54
It does. It stresses that voice hints at
8:58
an inner meaning, the heart voice, and that's what spiritual
9:01
people are far more concerned with than, you know, just
9:04
audible utterances. So it separates true worship
9:07
from just empty ritual. Right.
9:09
A silent prayer coming from a contrite and sincere heart, A
9:13
heart that knows Christ is the Oracle.
9:15
The prayer can have a louder voice in God's ears than the
9:18
physical shouts of the Pagan priests of Baal, who shout and
9:22
get no answer. And he says supplications
9:24
plural. Yes, that implies the sheer
9:26
number, the continuance, the variety of a good man's prayers.
9:30
True faith is never satisfied with just a single fleeting
9:33
moment of devotion. And what about those times when
9:35
the heart cries out, but heaven just seems closed?
9:39
That's where faith is exercised and strengthened.
9:41
We have to remember Rutherford's insight, which is in our notes.
9:44
Christ often hears when he does not answer and he is not
9:46
answering. Sometimes speaks and it says
9:48
pray on, go on and cry. So the silence can be an
9:52
encouragement. God may be encouraging and
9:54
testing our faith through a temporary silence.
9:57
It requires persistence and increases the value of the
10:00
answer when it finally comes. The sound of our voice is just a
10:03
vehicle. The real supplication is that
10:06
inner wrestling of the Spirit. This intense yearning for a
10:10
response leads us right into the third big movement of the Psalm.
10:14
The fear of contamination and the appeal for divine justice
10:17
starts in verse 3. Draw me not away with the
10:21
wicked. So after salvation from silence,
10:24
his next big request is separation from sinners.
10:27
And the imagery he uses is incredibly visceral.
10:30
It illustrates the danger of just being close to them.
10:32
He's afraid of being bound up in their bundle, drag off like
10:35
felons to an execution or like logs being drawn to a fire for
10:38
burning. That's a terrifying image.
10:40
It is. The danger is that God, when he
10:42
executes final judgement, might just sweep up the righteous with
10:45
the unrighteous because of their association.
10:48
This is a terrifying and appropriate fear for every godly
10:51
person. The source warns that even the
10:53
best of the wicked, the most outwardly appealing ones, are
10:56
dangerous company now and will be terrible companions for
10:58
eternity. So we have to avoid them in
11:00
their pleasures if we want to avoid their miseries later.
11:03
That's the idea. It sounds like David is asking
11:06
not just for salvation from judgement, but salvation from
11:09
the very behavior that leads to it.
11:11
A prayer for preservation from complicity from.
11:14
Complicity and contamination, yes, and David gets very
11:18
specific about the kind of wickedness he hates, linking it
11:21
to that threat of being dragged away, which speak peace to their
11:24
neighbors, but mischief is in their.
11:26
Hearts, the original frenemy. This describes a type of moral
11:30
baseness that uses trust as a weapon.
11:33
It's the deepest sign of spiritual baseness when the
11:36
tongue and the heart don't ring to the same note, as Spurgeon
11:39
puts it. The soft, oily words of
11:42
pretended love, that outward show of peace, are described as
11:45
the deceitful meshes of the infernal net in which Satan
11:48
catches the precious life. So a deceitful man is worse than
11:51
a wild beast. More to be dreaded because the
11:54
Beast attacks openly, the dissembler uses the cover of
11:57
trust. There's a proverb in the notes
11:59
that I found very applicable here.
12:00
He who cries peace too loudly means to sell it if he can get
12:04
his price. It's a timeless warning against
12:06
superficiality, isn't it? If a person were genuinely
12:10
peaceful and harmless, they wouldn't need to protest their
12:13
goodwill so much. The need for that excessive
12:16
outward show often implies that mischief is lurking underneath,
12:20
just waiting to take advantage once you let your guard down.
12:24
David sees this hypocrisy as deserving of God's attention.
12:28
And that recognition brings us to Psalm 28, verse 4, which is
12:31
one of the most challenging parts of this whole deep dive,
12:35
the passage of imprecation. Give them according to their
12:38
deeds. Render to them their desert.
12:41
This seems to conflict so sharply with the Christian call
12:44
to love and pray for our enemies.
12:47
How do we square this? This is where we have to engage
12:49
the source material with a lot of care, a lot of theological
12:51
nuance, because if we just read this as a burst of personal
12:54
vengeance, we miss the entire point of divine justice.
12:58
The sources immediately caution us that these desires are not
13:01
readily made consistent with the spirit of the Christian
13:03
dispensation. The resolution is twofold.
13:06
What's the first part? The 1st is to see these words
13:08
not as a personal, venomous petition for David's immediate
13:12
gratification, but rather as prophetic, a declaration of a
13:16
fixed future fact of divine judgement.
13:19
David is declaring in the Spirit what will happen to all workers
13:23
of iniquity, whether he asks for it or not.
13:25
So they are prophecies of a reckoning that God must carry
13:28
out. Yes, against all enemies of
13:31
Jehovah in Christ. And the second resolution has to
13:34
do with the posture of the heart that's allowed to even say
13:36
something like this. OK, what is that?
13:38
This is where we draw on the doctrine cited from Calvin.
13:41
The human heart has to 1st vigorously shake itself free
13:45
from all improper feelings of personal wounded pride or
13:48
revenge before it can legitimately pronounce
13:50
judgement. The one praying must look at the
13:53
wicked simply as such, seeing the objective sin, the violation
13:57
of God's law, not just the personal insult to David.
14:00
It's an appeal to God's righteousness against
14:02
unrighteousness itself. Not David's emotional need for
14:05
payback against a rival. That's the aim.
14:08
When we pray this, we're praying for the establishment of God's
14:10
holiness and justice on earth, acknowledging that sin deserves
14:13
the measure it has earned. And this leads to a really
14:16
fascinating detail about how God judges.
14:18
It does. God judges not only according to
14:21
what the wicked have actually done, but according to the
14:24
wickedness of their endeavors, what they would have done if
14:27
they could. Wait, God judges the attempt as
14:29
if it were the successful act that gives that line, according
14:33
to the wickedness of their endeavors, immense weight it.
14:35
Does this is a profound concept in divine jurisprudence.
14:39
Our endeavors are taken as facts.
14:42
God takes the will for the deed and punishes or rewards
14:44
accordingly. So if a man intended murder but
14:48
failed, the divine court treats the intention as the deed.
14:51
Because the corruption of the heart is the real measure.
14:54
It's the true measure. This confirms God's standard is
14:57
perfect holiness, measured deep within the hidden springs of
15:00
thought and desire, not just our outward actions.
15:03
God will repay His enemies to their faces, meeting out
15:06
vengeance precisely according to their mischievous deeds and
15:10
ignoring their fawning, deceitful words.
15:12
This source material gives some pretty dramatic historical and
15:15
scriptural examples to illustrate this principle of
15:17
justice matching the deed. And these examples just under
15:21
score God's consistent justice. You see Haman, who built a
15:24
gallows for Mordecai, being hung on that very gallows Adono
15:29
Bedsack, after cutting off the thumbs and toes of 70 Kings, had
15:32
the same thing done to him. They aren't just poetic
15:34
coincidences. No, they are illustrations of
15:37
the divine decree that the punishment will often reflect
15:40
the nature of the sin. It emphasizes God's inherent
15:44
righteousness. And that pattern continues even
15:47
into later historical accounts. Spurgeon sites like the French
15:51
King Charles the 9th who oversaw the Paris massacres, later dying
15:54
of a bloody sweat. Or Cardinal Beaton, who had
15:56
George Wishart burned at the stake and was later murdered and
15:59
his body displayed from the very window where he watched
16:02
Wishart's death. The principle here isn't to
16:04
endorse human revenge. Right.
16:06
Rather, it's to affirm that God's righteousness is his
16:09
immutable nature. Sin must be met with a
16:12
commensurate punishment. God cannot deny His own nature.
16:16
The matching of the punishment to the crime just confirms that
16:18
the judgment is exact, just and inescapable for the
16:22
incorrigible. This intense focus on
16:24
retribution then leads us to the core reason why they are subject
16:27
to this destruction. Psalm 28, verse 5 Because they
16:31
regard not the works of the Lord, nor the operation of His
16:34
hands, it suggests their destruction is due to a kind of
16:38
culpable negligence, not just their actions.
16:41
This is the indictment against carnal men who despise Where
16:44
angels wonder. They refuse to learn.
16:46
Their spiritual blindness isn't passive.
16:49
It's an active, willful rejection of the revelation
16:51
that's all around them. And the source specifies 3 main
16:54
arenas of God's work They ignore, yes.
16:56
First, creation. Nature is teeming with proofs of
17:00
His wisdom and goodness. Yet atheists and infidels, they
17:03
just close their eyes and refuse to see Him.
17:05
They attribute design to chance. What are the other two?
17:08
Second, Providence, God's hand, is manifest to human history,
17:11
ruling and over ruling nations and individual lives, raising up
17:15
and casting down. But the skeptic won't discern
17:17
his hand. They see only chaos and human
17:19
plotting, rejecting the sovereignty of God over all
17:22
events. And the third is Grace. 3rd is
17:25
Grace, remarkable conversions, displays of mercy, the ongoing
17:29
work of the Holy Spirit. These are still happening all
17:32
around us in the Church Militant.
17:34
Yet the ungodly refuse to see and appreciate the operations of
17:38
the Lord in the salvation of souls.
17:41
They are willfully ignorant of the very things that demand all.
17:44
And the consequence for this persistent, deliberate ignorance
17:47
is absolute. He shall destroy them and not
17:51
build them up. This describes utter and final
17:53
destruction, the perpetual annihilation of all hope and
17:56
welfare for both soul and body forever.
17:59
The judgement is both positive destruction and negative no
18:03
rebuilding. What's the significance of that
18:05
negative part? Not build them up.
18:07
It means that they're accumulated heritage of evil
18:09
prevents them from receiving any good or comfort.
18:12
Spurgeon uses this vivid metaphor that the ephah, the
18:15
container, shall be too full of wrath to contain a grain of
18:18
hope. And the architectural metaphor
18:19
seems key here. They aren't just damaged,
18:21
they're deemed structurally unsound for eternity.
18:24
Absolutely. They're like old, rotten,
18:27
decayed houses of timber. They're useless to the owner and
18:30
they harbor evil and vermin. The great builder will demolish
18:33
them utterly. They are incorrigible offenders
18:35
who, having refused to be mended or corrected by the lessons of
18:39
creation, Providence and grace, are just thrown away as
18:42
worthless materials. This certain total destruction
18:46
is the inevitable result of refusing to pay attention to
18:48
God's work. After all the intensity of
18:51
describing that absolute reckoning, the Psalm just pivots
18:55
abruptly and beautifully in verse 6.
18:57
Blessed be the Lord. This is the great transition to
19:00
assurance and praise. And it shows the immediate
19:03
result of the prayer he just prayed.
19:05
It's the moment where the prayer is recognized as answered, even
19:07
if it's just by assurance in his heart before the physical
19:10
fulfillment. It powerfully shows that those
19:12
who pray well will soon praise well.
19:13
Our sources have some beautiful descriptions for prayer and
19:16
praise. They do.
19:18
They're called the two lips of the soul, or two bells to ring
19:21
out sweet and acceptable music in the ears of God.
19:24
The one just naturally follows the other.
19:26
David pleaded for separation, and the assurance of that
19:29
separation prompts immediate adoration.
19:32
And the reason for this pivot is completely explicit.
19:35
Because he have heard the voice of my supplications.
19:38
It grounds the praise not in some blind emotion, but in
19:42
verifiable experience. This is the bedrock of living
19:46
faith. Real praise is built on
19:48
sufficient constraining reasons. It rises from the deeps of
19:51
experience. Answered prayers must be
19:54
acknowledged. And the source questions if we
19:56
often fail in that duty. It does.
19:58
Do we forget to return and thank the Giver?
20:00
Acknowledging answered prayer greatly encourages others, and
20:03
it strengthens our own faith. God's mercy is far too
20:06
significant to receive without Thanksgiving.
20:08
We have to shun in gratitude and live daily in that heavenly
20:11
atmosphere of thankful love. This gratitude then leads to
20:14
David's personal triumphant confession of faith in verse 7.
20:18
The Lord is my strength and my shield, a dual declaration
20:22
covering both his His internal capacity and his external
20:24
security. It's a comprehensive statement
20:27
of dependence. Inwardly.
20:29
Jehovah doesn't just use his power for us, He infuses
20:32
strength into us in our weakness.
20:34
The psalmist, through a genuine act of appropriating faith,
20:38
takes God's omnipotence to be his own resource.
20:41
So if the burden is doubled, the strength is troubled.
20:44
And the burden becomes lighter. Outwardly, God preserves his
20:47
people from unnumbered ills, seen and unseen.
20:51
The Christian warrior is safe for shelter behind his God, who
20:54
acts as a shield, and behind bronze or triple steel.
20:57
And this trust leads to an absolute result.
21:00
My heart trusted in him and I am helped.
21:03
It brings the focus back to the centrality of the heart.
21:06
Heart work is sure work. Heart Trust is never
21:08
disappointed. This is so vital for a believer
21:11
to grasp. Faith has to come before the
21:13
visible help, but that help will never be far behind.
21:16
So the believer lives in a perpetual state of being helped.
21:18
Every single day the person of faith can say I am helped
21:21
because divine assistance is constantly afforded.
21:24
Without it, we would immediately fall into perdition.
21:27
The notes observed that faith even alt with the tense changing
21:30
future hope into present assurance.
21:32
And the joy that results from this is intense.
21:35
Therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth, and with my song will
21:38
I praise him. The repetition of heart shows
21:41
the genuineness of it all. And we had to pay attention to
21:44
that adverb greatly. We should never be afraid of
21:47
being too full of rejoicing at grace we've received.
21:51
We serve a great God, therefore we should rejoice greatly in
21:54
Him. A song is the soul's fittest
21:56
vent for happiness. It is.
21:59
It's always better to be like the singing lark rising to the
22:01
heavens with joy than the croaking Ravens stuck on the
22:04
ground dwelling on despair. When the heart is glowing with
22:07
answered prayer and grace, the lips shouldn't be silent.
22:11
David then expands that personal testimony in verse 8 to include
22:15
the whole body of believers. The Lord is their strength.
22:18
He moves beyond himself to the wider covenant community.
22:21
This is the principle of communion, the realization that
22:24
the heavenly experience of 1 believer isn't isolated.
22:27
It's a pattern for all. To the whole militant church,
22:30
Jehovah is the same as he was to David.
22:32
So the least of them shall be as David.
22:34
They need the same aid, and they will have it because they are
22:37
loved with the same eternal covenant love.
22:41
There is enough of God's strength and light for every
22:44
single believer. And the final line of the stanza
22:46
shifts the focus from the people to the leader.
22:49
And he is the saving strength of his anointed.
22:53
This is where that Christological theme gets
22:55
sealed. This connects all the previous
22:57
blessings to Christ Jesus David, the anointed King.
22:59
He's the type and he's now superseded by the anti type
23:02
Christ the Messiah. He is our covenant head and
23:05
anointed Prince, and it's through him alone that all
23:08
blessings flow. The strength of the militant
23:11
church flows directly from Christ.
23:13
So because he achieved full salvation for us and because we
23:16
are united to Him. We expect to partake of that
23:19
very saving strength. So the strength that lets us
23:21
fight sin, resist contamination, achieve separation from the
23:25
wicked, it's not generated inside us, it's channeled from
23:28
our covenant head. Exactly, we share in the
23:30
anointing that was so wristly shed upon him.
23:32
The strength isn't just a force field, it is the active, saving
23:36
power of Christ applied to the lives of His people, securing
23:39
them through every trial and securing their final glory.
23:43
The Psalm then concludes in verse 9 with this profound,
23:46
weighty petition for the whole church.
23:48
Militant, save thy people. Bless that inheritance.
23:52
It's a reminder that true prayer moves beyond the self.
23:56
It's the sign of maturity and faith, isn't it?
23:59
The prayer has achieved personal assurance, and now David turns
24:02
his vision outward. The phrase Save thy people is a
24:05
petition for comprehensive deliverance from enemies, from
24:09
sins, for sucker under troubles. There's a hidden plea in there,
24:12
too. There is, the note points out
24:15
the plea within the expression thy people.
24:17
It suggests that God's own interest in the church as his
24:20
own possession, his own portion, will compel him to guard it from
24:23
destruction. It's an appeal to God's
24:25
self-interest in his covenant property.
24:27
And bless thine inheritance is a request for positive flourishing
24:31
blessings, right? Yes, it's a desire for peace,
24:34
plenty, spiritual prosperity, a request for the dearly purchased
24:38
and precious heritage to be comforted by the Spirit,
24:41
revived, refreshed and sanctified.
24:44
It's a prayer for the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit to be
24:47
manifest within the community, making them holy.
24:50
And finally, those two crucial pastoral requests.
24:53
Feed them also and lift them up forever.
24:56
To feed them is a request for God to act as the true shepherd
24:59
to his flock, and this involves supplying both bodily and
25:03
spiritual wants, primarily through the regular
25:05
administration of the Word and the ordinances.
25:08
The shepherd has to direct, rule, sustain and satisfy the
25:11
sheep of his hand, making sure they never lack spiritual
25:14
nourishment. And the request to lift them up.
25:16
The notes use that incredibly comforting metaphor of a
25:18
shepherd carrying the feeble lambs or lifting them when they
25:21
can't get up. What did that mean for the
25:23
believer today? It's a promise of sustained,
25:25
compassionate care. It means carrying them in his
25:28
arms when they're weak on Earth, His bosom in heaven securing
25:31
their final destination. So it's both now and forever.
25:33
Yes, the application. Is comprehensive.
25:36
It means elevating their minds and affections now,
25:38
spiritualizing their desires, making them heavenly Christ like
25:42
and full of God. It's a request for eternal
25:45
elevation. Begin with our sanctification
25:47
here and culminating in our glorification there.
25:50
The Psalm therefore ends not just in personal triumph, but in
25:54
a communal, covenantal declaration of absolute
25:57
dependence on the Shepherd of our souls.
25:59
So we've completed our deep. Dive into Psalm 28.
26:02
Guided by Spurgeon's rich commentary, we started with the
26:05
urgency of that focused, directed prayer toward the rock.
26:08
We moved through the impartial and just nature of divine
26:11
reckoning against deception and willful ignorance, and we
26:14
concluded with the glorious assurance that God is both our
26:17
personal strength and the saving strength of his anointed Christ
26:20
Jesus. What the Psalm?
26:22
Shows us is that the greatest antidote to that fear of being
26:25
drawn away with the wicked, that acute fear of spiritual
26:27
contamination and complicity. It's not isolation.
26:30
It's active, focused, unceasing communication with the rock,
26:35
followed immediately by sincere adoration and praise for his
26:38
proven faithfulness. It establishes a.
26:39
Necessary spiritual cycle it does.
26:42
Distress drives us to prayer, God's assurance drives us to
26:45
praise, and that cycle of praise fortifies US against the
26:48
entanglements of the world. So what does this all mean?
26:51
For you, the learner, If, as David's powerful plea reveals,
26:55
God's silence is so terrifying to the believer in urgent
26:57
necessity, what does the act of absence of a cry toward the rock
27:01
reveal about the current state of our spiritual urgency?
27:04
Something to Mull over as you seek to walk the path of
27:07
separation and faith.