Latest / Reformed Thinking / Answer Me When I Call: Trusting God in Distress (Psalm 4) | John Peter Lange

Transcript

Answer Me When I Call: Trusting God in Distress (Psalm 4) | John Peter Lange · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  Welcome to Reform Thinking. So when your life is just
• 0:05
  totally falling apart, what do you do at 3:00 in the morning?
• 0:08
  Yeah. That is the big question, isn't
• 0:10
  it? Right.
• 0:11
  I mean, picture the scenario the crisis has hit.
• 0:13
  Maybe. Maybe everything went wrong at
• 0:16
  work, or a really critical relationship just shattered.
• 0:19
  Or your reputation is under attack.
• 0:21
  Yeah, that's a big one. Yeah.
• 0:23
  And the house is completely silent.
• 0:24
  The lights are off and you were just lying there, staring
• 0:26
  straight up at the ceiling. And your heart is just racing.
• 0:29
  Exactly. I mean, your mind is running
• 0:31
  through 1000 different disastrous scenarios, right?
• 0:34
  You're cataloguing every single mistake you made, every threat
• 0:37
  looming on the horizon. It's awful.
• 0:39
  Sleep is completely out of the question.
• 0:41
  It is your nervous system is just on fire.
• 0:44
  And, you know, the physical toll of that kind of anxiety is
• 0:47
  intense. That elevated cortisol, the
• 0:49
  shallow breathing. People describe it as feeling
• 0:53
  like haunted by their own thoughts.
• 0:55
  Haunted by your own thoughts, man, that is a heavy way to put
• 0:58
  it, but it's so true. Well, today we are taking a deep
• 1:01
  dive into an ancient texts Psalm 4 and we were relying heavily on
• 1:06
  John Peter Lange's massive, highly detailed work, a
• 1:10
  Commentary on the Holy Scriptures.
• 1:12
  A really incredible resource. It really is.
• 1:15
  We're looking at a man who was experiencing the ultimate
• 1:18
  midnight crisis. I mean, he was betrayed by his
• 1:21
  own family. He was haunted by an actual
• 1:23
  army. His reputation was totally
• 1:25
  destroyed. And yet, amidst all of that, he
• 1:27
  closes his eyes and sleeps like a baby.
• 1:29
  Which is wild. So to grasp how staggering that
• 1:32
  is, we really have to set the historical stage here, right?
• 1:36
  So we're talking about King David, but not David the
• 1:39
  Conqueror, not the guy with the slingshot or the giant Slayer.
• 1:43
  Yeah, this is David the Fugitive.
• 1:44
  Right. He is fleeing from his own son,
• 1:46
  Absalom. And this is not a foreign
• 1:48
  invasion from, you know, the Philistines or the Ammonites,
• 1:50
  where the lines of allegiance are super clear.
• 1:52
  Yeah, you know who? The bad guys are in those
• 1:54
  situations. Exactly.
• 1:55
  But this this is an internal devastating rebellion that just
• 1:58
  toward his family and his entire nation in half and.
• 2:01
  It wasn't a sudden thing right? Absalom have been running this
• 2:03
  like long term calculated psychological operation.
• 2:06
  Oh, absolutely. Four years of slow subversion.
• 2:10
  Absalom would literally stand by the gates of Jerusalem
• 2:13
  intercepting people who brought legal disputes to the king.
• 2:16
  Yeah, he would hold their hands, kiss their cheeks and tell them
• 2:20
  your claims are good and right, but there is no man deputed by
• 2:23
  the king to hear you. Classic politician move.
• 2:26
  Total gaslighting, he'd say. If only I were judge in the
• 2:29
  land, I would give you justice. And he just stole the hearts of
• 2:33
  the men of Israel right out from under his father.
• 2:35
  Just undermining him every single day.
• 2:37
  Right. He gathered the prominent
• 2:38
  leaders, the military minds and orchestrated this massive coup.
• 2:42
  And so the betrayal comes from the very people David trusted
• 2:46
  most. I mean his own counselor
• 2:48
  Hithophel defects to Absalom side.
• 2:51
  That had to hurt so much, yeah. And the shock of it forces David
• 2:55
  to abandon his capital city, Jerusalem, like immediately.
• 2:59
  He leaves with just a small band of loyalists weeping as he walks
• 3:03
  barefoot up the Mount of Olives. His head covered in mourning.
• 3:06
  Yeah, he is essentially a refugee in his own Kingdom.
• 3:10
  He doesn't even know if he will survive the week.
• 3:12
  So the commentary points out a brilliant structural detail
• 3:15
  about the literature that emerges from this flight.
• 3:18
  Psalm 3 and Psalm 4 are structurally paired.
• 3:21
  Oh, really? How so?
• 3:22
  Well, the ancient consensus this is that Psalm 3 is David's
• 3:25
  morning prayer during this desperate escape, while Psalm 4
• 3:28
  functions as his evening prayer. OK, that makes sense.
• 3:31
  And the musical directions provided in the ancient title
• 3:34
  are incredibly telling. It is assigned to the chief
• 3:37
  musician on Nejunath. Nejunath OK, so that indicates
• 3:40
  stringed instruments, right? Yes, exactly.
• 3:43
  The scholars make a really sharp distinction regarding that
• 3:45
  choice. This text was not meant to be
• 3:47
  accompanied by wind instruments. No horns.
• 3:50
  Right. No horns, no trumpets or
• 3:52
  shofars. You know, the instrument that
• 3:53
  would typically signal war, or an alarm, or the gathering of
• 3:57
  troops. Yeah, the loud blaring stuff.
• 3:59
  Right, it is accompanied exclusively by strings.
• 4:03
  Think of like the harp or the lyre.
• 4:05
  The acoustics are literally designed to create a soothing,
• 4:08
  methodical rhythm. I love that.
• 4:10
  Yeah, the poetic structure of the text itself, particularly
• 4:14
  those final stanzas, it's engineered to bring a chaotic,
• 4:18
  terrifying day to a peaceful close.
• 4:21
  Man, I just love the psychological contrast happening
• 4:23
  there. I mean, the entire world around
• 4:24
  David is layering alarms. Literal alarms.
• 4:28
  There are literal trumpets blowing in Jerusalem declaring
• 4:30
  Absalom king. There are troops mobilizing to
• 4:33
  hunt him down, but David's internal soundtrack is this
• 4:37
  soothing string melody. He refuses to let the external
• 4:41
  panic dictate his internal rhythm.
• 4:44
  And that brings us right to the opening cry of the text, the
• 4:46
  very first verse where David establishes his theological
• 4:49
  footing. He cries out, Hear me when I
• 4:52
  call, oh God of my righteousness.
• 4:55
  And that phrasing, God of my righteousness, it carries
• 4:57
  immense weight. Yeah, unpack that for us.
• 4:59
  So Franz de Lich, one of the prominent scholars cited in
• 5:02
  Launch's commentary, offers a really brilliant analysis of
• 5:05
  this. He explains that Jehovah is the
• 5:07
  possessor of righteousness, the author of righteousness, and the
• 5:10
  supreme judge of righteousness. So when David is misunderstood,
• 5:14
  when he is slandered and actively persecuted by his own
• 5:17
  people, he does not look to himself to prove his innocence.
• 5:21
  Right, he doesn't hold a press conference.
• 5:23
  No, not at. All he does not send out
• 5:25
  messengers with a scroll detailing his track record,
• 5:28
  trying to convince the public that he was actually a good
• 5:31
  king. And Absalom is lying.
• 5:34
  Which is what we would all do. Oh, absolutely.
• 5:37
  The natural human reflex when you were attacked is to get
• 5:40
  incredibly defensive. You want to list all your good
• 5:43
  deeds, all your qualifications, and prove to your critics that
• 5:46
  you are justified. Yeah, you want to clear your
• 5:48
  name. But David bypasses that entire
• 5:50
  process. He appeals to a higher court.
• 5:54
  De Lich notes that God justifies righteousness when it is
• 5:57
  persecuted on earth. David recognizes that his right
• 6:01
  standing is not generated from within himself, nor is it
• 6:04
  validated by public opinion. Pulse.
• 6:06
  It's anchored entirely in the character of God.
• 6:08
  Right, God is the one who secures his position.
• 6:11
  He hands his reputation over to the Creator, which immediately
• 6:14
  shuts down that frantic defensive reflex you just
• 6:16
  mentioned. Because I mean, if the Supreme
• 6:19
  Judge of the Universe holds your righteousness, the opinions of
• 6:22
  the rebels back in Jerusalem just do not matter.
• 6:25
  They fade into the background, yeah.
• 6:27
  And right after that appeal, David uses a phrase that
• 6:30
  introduces an incredibly physical sensation.
• 6:33
  He says thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress.
• 6:37
  The Hebrew concept there translates literally to
• 6:40
  expansion, expansion. OK.
• 6:42
  Yeah, it means creating space for the anxious heart, or
• 6:45
  creating space out of a straightened, restricted, tight
• 6:49
  situation. So let's talk about the physical
• 6:52
  sensation of a panic attack for a second.
• 6:53
  Sure, when that distress hits, your chest tightens up.
• 6:56
  The walls feel like they're literally closing in, Your
• 7:00
  peripheral vision narrows. It's terrifying.
• 7:02
  It is like being trapped in a suffocating, overcrowded
• 7:05
  boardroom. The air conditioning has failed,
• 7:07
  people are arguing aggressively, the tension is just unbearable,
• 7:11
  and you can barely draw a single full breath.
• 7:14
  The restriction is physical. That is a very visceral
• 7:16
  description of extreme psychological pressure.
• 7:20
  Right. But then suddenly the double
• 7:21
  doors of that boardroom open and you step out onto a wide open
• 7:26
  balcony. The relief?
• 7:28
  Yes, the cool, crisp night air hits your face.
• 7:31
  Your lungs immediately expand. The immediate crisis of oxygen
• 7:35
  deprivation is just over, right? That physical expansion of the
• 7:38
  chest, That sudden, glorious rush of fresh air.
• 7:42
  That is what this phrase captures.
• 7:45
  Thou hast enlarged me. It is the gift of breathing
• 7:48
  room. And we can actually trace that
• 7:49
  back to David's literal geographic reality at this very
• 7:53
  moment. Oh really?
• 7:54
  Tell me about that. Yeah, the commentary notes this
• 7:56
  likely refers to a very recent physical deliverance.
• 8:00
  So during his flight from Jerusalem, David was in a
• 8:02
  cramped, dangerous and claustrophobic position in the
• 8:05
  Judean Hills. So he was physically trapped.
• 8:08
  Almost. Absalom's forces could have
• 8:10
  easily flanked him, trapped him in a ravine and ended the war in
• 8:13
  a single afternoon. But David managed to cross the
• 8:16
  Jordan River. He reached the wider, safer
• 8:18
  region of Mahaneem, which is located in the Trans Jordanian
• 8:21
  Plateau. So he physically moved from a
• 8:23
  claustrophobic trap to a wide open space.
• 8:26
  Exactly. He went from a tight, perilous
• 8:28
  geographical bottleneck into a broad territory where he could
• 8:32
  actually breathe freely, gather his loyal men, restock supplies,
• 8:36
  and prepare a defense. The spiritual reality perfectly
• 8:40
  mirrors the physical reality here.
• 8:43
  God gave him geographical breathing room and in doing so
• 8:46
  granted him psychological and spiritual breathing room.
• 8:49
  That is amazing. And it makes you think about
• 8:51
  where you turn to find breathing room when your own circumstances
• 8:54
  feel suffocating. Right?
• 8:56
  Like when the bills pile up or the workplace turns toxic.
• 8:59
  Do you try to claw your way out using your own strength, just
• 9:02
  grasping for control? Yeah.
• 9:04
  Or do you look to the God who can suddenly enlarge your space,
• 9:07
  alter the terrain and give your lungs the capacity to draw
• 9:10
  breath again? It completely shifts the focus
• 9:13
  from the restriction of the problem to the expansiveness of
• 9:16
  God's provision. It totally does.
• 9:18
  It changes the entire paradigm of how a person processes a
• 9:20
  threat. Yeah, absolutely.
• 9:22
  So, having established this cry for breathing room, David makes
• 9:25
  a sharp pivot. He turned his attention away
• 9:28
  from his prayer to God, and he directly addresses his
• 9:30
  antagonists. Right, He speaks to them
• 9:33
  directly. He.
• 9:33
  Calls out to the sons of men. Now, when I hear Sons of Men in
• 9:37
  this context, I am picturing the aristocracy, the people who
• 9:41
  bankrolled Absalom's coup. Well, the linguistic breakdown
• 9:45
  in the commentary confirms your suspicion.
• 9:48
  The phrase sons of men often contrast with God to highlight
• 9:51
  general human weakness, but the specific Hebrew words used here
• 9:56
  indicate prominent men. So not just the average citizen.
• 9:59
  Right. We are not talking about the
• 10:01
  common foot soldiers or the peasant class who just got swept
• 10:04
  up in the excitement, as the great reformer Martin Luther
• 10:07
  called them. These are the great fellows.
• 10:09
  The great fellows, I like that. Yeah, this refers to the
• 10:12
  political elite, the wealthy land owners, the influential
• 10:15
  leaders who threw their weight in their capital behind Absalom.
• 10:18
  The power brokers, yes. David asks these power brokers
• 10:22
  how long they will turn his glory into shame, how long they
• 10:25
  will love vanity and seek after leasing.
• 10:28
  And leasing is an archaic English word for lying and
• 10:31
  falsehoods, right? Correct.
• 10:33
  The commentary explains that vanity here refers to the
• 10:36
  absolute emptiness of their designs.
• 10:39
  They are building a new government on hollow arguments
• 10:42
  to justify their treason. Because Absalom's entire
• 10:45
  platform was basically a fabricated public relations
• 10:47
  campaign. Exactly.
• 10:48
  He stood at the gates and told the people that David did not
• 10:51
  care about their problems, that the current administration was
• 10:54
  corrupt and that under King Absalom there would be perfect
• 10:57
  justice for everyone. It was an empire built on
• 10:59
  deceit. Just a total mirage, yeah.
• 11:02
  David is calling out the elites for buying into that mirage, but
• 11:06
  then he says something that honestly stops me in my tracks.
• 11:09
  He tells these rebels, no, that the Lord hath set apart him that
• 11:13
  is godly for himself. Yes.
• 11:15
  Wait, looking at David's track record, the horrific incident
• 11:18
  with Bathsheba, the calculated murder of Uriah the Hittite, how
• 11:22
  can he possibly call himself the godly man here?
• 11:25
  It's a fair question, right? That feels incredibly
• 11:28
  hypocritical. Is he claiming flawless moral
• 11:30
  character? That is the trap many readers
• 11:32
  fall into. They assume godly means
• 11:35
  subjectively perfect, but the commentary strongly refutes that
• 11:39
  interpretation. OK, lay it on me.
• 11:41
  What does it actually mean? So the Hebrew word translated as
• 11:45
  godly is Hasid. Herman Huppfeld, one of the
• 11:48
  scholars cited, provides a thorough analysis of this term.
• 11:51
  It is a denominative of the word haste, which refers specifically
• 11:55
  to the covenant, grace and mercy of God.
• 11:57
  Oh, OK, so the root of the word points to God's action, not
• 12:01
  man's behavior. Precisely in its passive form,
• 12:04
  which is used here, Hasid means someone who is favored, someone
• 12:07
  who stands in a condition of grace, someone brought into a
• 12:10
  covenant of grace by Jehovah. That changes everything.
• 12:14
  It really does. It does not mean David earned
• 12:16
  his throne through his own flawless morality.
• 12:19
  It indicates an extraordinary distinction in the divine
• 12:21
  government. God select someone for His
• 12:23
  specific use and glory based entirely on His own sovereign
• 12:27
  choice. So the assurance of answered
• 12:29
  prayer, the confidence David has, comes from God's election,
• 12:33
  not human merit. Spot on.
• 12:35
  That is a massive theological distinction.
• 12:37
  He is not saying I am a perfect person, therefore God will save
• 12:40
  me from Absalom. He is saying God has sovereignly
• 12:44
  chosen to set His unmerited favor upon me and therefore my
• 12:48
  standing is secure. The commentary quotes the
• 12:51
  Puritan writer Thomas Watson to illustrate this beautifully.
• 12:55
  Watson says we set apart things that are precious.
• 12:58
  The godly are set apart as God's peculiar treasure.
• 13:01
  God's peculiar treasure. He compares them to fine gold,
• 13:04
  double refined, a royal diadem. The value is not inherent in the
• 13:09
  individual's flawless performance.
• 13:11
  The value comes from the fact that the sovereign king has
• 13:13
  selected them for his treasury. Yeah, God has not brought David
• 13:18
  into this high position because of men or because David
• 13:20
  manipulated the Poles, but because of his own wonderful
• 13:23
  guidance. And think about how liberating
• 13:25
  that is for you. I mean, if you're standing in
• 13:27
  the world, your ultimate security relies on your flawless
• 13:31
  performance. You will live your entire life
• 13:33
  in terror. You'd never rest.
• 13:35
  No, you will be terrified of making a mistake, terrified of
• 13:38
  human opposition, terrified of being cancelled, replaced, or
• 13:42
  exposed. But if your standing relies on
• 13:45
  God's unmerited sovereign selection, the pressure is
• 13:48
  entirely off. The burden is lifted, yeah.
• 13:51
  You can face the opposition of prominent, influential people,
• 13:54
  the great fellows, without an ounce of fear, because they are
• 13:57
  not the ones who determine your worth or your destiny.
• 14:00
  It entirely removes the crushing anxiety of having to justify
• 14:03
  your own existence. If the creator of the universe
• 14:06
  has set you apart for himself, the opinions of the sons of men
• 14:10
  become irrelevant. Background.
• 14:12
  Noise. Totally irrelevant and if you
• 14:13
  know God secures your position, it completely changes how you
• 14:16
  respond to the people slandering you.
• 14:18
  You don't need to lash out during the day, you can actually
• 14:20
  process that anger differently. Which leads right into the next
• 14:23
  verse. Right, the text says, stand in
• 14:25
  awe and sin, not commune with your own heart upon your bed and
• 14:29
  be still. Now, my initial assumption is
• 14:32
  that David is still telling the rebels to calm down.
• 14:35
  And a lot of people read it that way.
• 14:37
  But the commentary presents a highly compelling historical
• 14:39
  perspective from Christopher Wordsworth, suggesting
• 14:42
  otherwise. What does he say?
• 14:44
  Wordsworth argues that this warning is likely directed at
• 14:48
  David's own zealous, fiercely loyal partisans.
• 14:51
  His inner circle, the men who sled Jerusalem with him.
• 14:54
  Yes, think about men like his nephew Abhishai.
• 14:58
  Oh, Abhishai was intense. Very intense.
• 15:01
  The historical record tells us that during this chaotic flight,
• 15:04
  a man named Shimei from the House of Saul came out and
• 15:07
  started cursing David. Yeah, I remember this story.
• 15:09
  Shimei is throwing literal stones at the king, kicking up
• 15:12
  dust and yelling come out, come out thou bloody man.
• 15:15
  Just totally humiliating the king.
• 15:17
  And Abishai, who is a hardened military commander, is furious.
• 15:21
  He turns to David and says, why should this dead dog curse my
• 15:24
  Lord the king let me go over and take off his head.
• 15:27
  Wow. I mean, Abishai is experiencing
• 15:29
  intense righteous indignation. He is angry, and he has a valid,
• 15:34
  logical reason to be angry. His anointed king is being
• 15:37
  unjustly abused by a traitor. But David restrains him.
• 15:40
  Right. David refuses to let Abishai
• 15:42
  retaliate. Wordsworth suggests this verse
• 15:45
  stand in awe and sin not is David's counsel to his own loyal
• 15:49
  followers. That makes so much sense.
• 15:51
  They have righteous anger, but they must not let it boil over
• 15:55
  into sin. They must not act rashly or
• 15:57
  violently in the heat of the moment.
• 15:59
  The Hebrew word for stand in awe can translate to trembling with
• 16:02
  anger or agitation. So David is saying you're
• 16:06
  agitated, you're furious, your blood is boiling.
• 16:08
  But do not let that drive you into sinful retaliation.
• 16:11
  Exactly. And the bed acts as a midnight
• 16:13
  counselor. Commune with your own heart upon
• 16:16
  your bed and be still. The silence of the night is the
• 16:20
  absolute best environment to stop rash daytime reactions.
• 16:25
  During the day, everything is incredibly loud.
• 16:27
  The adrenaline is pumping, the critics are yelling, the stones
• 16:30
  are flying, and your friends are aggressively urging you to fight
• 16:33
  back. But when you lie down in the
• 16:35
  dark, the external noise stops. It forces you into a state of
• 16:39
  ethical rational consideration. And the Angel Hebrew
• 16:42
  understanding of the heart is vital here.
• 16:44
  OK, tell me more about that. In their thought, the heart is
• 16:47
  not just the seat of fleeting emotions, it is the center of
• 16:50
  cognition. It is the sphere of ethical
• 16:54
  deliberation. So it's where you think, not
• 16:57
  just where you feel. Right.
• 16:59
  It is where you weigh your motives and form the
• 17:02
  determinations of your will. The quiet of the evening is
• 17:05
  perfectly suited for this intense self examination.
• 17:08
  You take that boiling, trembling anger, you lay it on your
• 17:11
  pillow, and you let the silence cool it down.
• 17:14
  Man, how many disastrous decisions could be avoided if we
• 17:17
  took our anger to bed instead of to the Internet?
• 17:19
  Oh. So many.
• 17:20
  Right. You draft that furious e-mail.
• 17:22
  You formulate that biting response to a critic, and
• 17:25
  instead of hitting send while your adrenaline is biking, you
• 17:28
  commune with your heart upon your bed.
• 17:30
  You let the silence of the night interrogate your motives.
• 17:32
  You ask yourself, am I defending God's honor or am I just
• 17:35
  defending my own bruised ego? And David takes it a step
• 17:38
  further. He tells his men to offer the
• 17:40
  sacrifices of righteousness and put your trust in the Lord.
• 17:43
  Which creates A striking immediate contrast with the
• 17:46
  rebels. Yes it does.
• 17:48
  Because Absalom and his followers are currently
• 17:50
  occupying Jerusalem, That means they have physical control of
• 17:53
  the bronze altar. Right, they have the actual
• 17:55
  temple apparatus. They have the priests who
• 17:57
  defected, they have access to all the religious rituals, the
• 18:01
  incense, the sacrifices. So they're going through all the
• 18:04
  proper liturgical motions. They look incredibly pious on
• 18:07
  the outside. But the commentary points out
• 18:09
  that while the rebels have the rituals, they lack the required
• 18:14
  internal disposition. Because true religious practices
• 18:17
  requires a heart aligned with God's will.
• 18:20
  Exactly. Empty rituals mean absolutely
• 18:23
  nothing if the worshipper's heart is in a state of active
• 18:25
  treason against God's anointed King.
• 18:27
  So David is essentially telling his followers, we might be out
• 18:31
  here in the dirt of the wilderness, completely severed
• 18:33
  from the physical altar, but we can offer the true sacrifices of
• 18:37
  righteousness by bringing a humble, trusting heart to
• 18:40
  Jehovah. It is the classic conflict
• 18:42
  between form and substance. Yeah, you can have the beautiful
• 18:45
  building, the flawless choir, the perfectly executed
• 18:47
  ceremonies, but if your heart is full of deceit, ambition and
• 18:51
  malice, it is just noise. Meanwhile, you can be sitting on
• 18:55
  a rock in the wilderness offering a genuine broken prayer
• 18:58
  of trust, and that is a true, acceptable sacrifice.
• 19:02
  It strips away all the external trappings of religion and
• 19:05
  focuses intensely on the state of the individual's trust.
• 19:08
  But let us be brutally honest about human nature here, OK?
• 19:11
  Even with all this midnight reflection, even with a solid
• 19:14
  theological grasp of divine election and true sacrifices,
• 19:18
  prolonged stress eventually wears people down.
• 19:21
  It does. It takes.
• 19:22
  A toll. The adrenaline wears off, the
• 19:24
  reality of the cold, hard wilderness sets in, and morale
• 19:27
  inevitably starts to plummet. And that leads to a doubting
• 19:30
  question that starts circulating among David's ranks, the text
• 19:33
  says. There'll be many that say who
• 19:35
  will show us any good. The commentary describes this as
• 19:38
  a question born of pure, crushing despondency.
• 19:41
  So these are his own guys asking this.
• 19:43
  Yeah, these are not the enemies mocking them from the walls of
• 19:46
  Jerusalem. These are David's own followers,
• 19:48
  the people who sacrificed everything to stay loyal to him,
• 19:52
  but the situation looks incredibly bleak.
• 19:54
  They are looking at the horizon and they see no path to victory,
• 19:58
  no hope of restoration, no supply lines.
• 20:01
  They are exhausted, hungry and terrified of the massive army
• 20:05
  Absalom is gathering. It is the voice of absolute
• 20:08
  burnout. I mean, when you have been
• 20:09
  fighting an uphill battle for so long and you look around and
• 20:12
  think, is anything good ever going to happen again?
• 20:14
  Are we just going to die out here?
• 20:17
  It is a deeply relatable human moment.
• 20:19
  It is a stark reality, but David counters this despondency not
• 20:24
  with a shallow motivational speech, not with false promises
• 20:27
  and an immediate military victory, but with a prayer.
• 20:30
  What does he pray? He says, Lord, lift thou up the
• 20:33
  light of thy countenance upon us.
• 20:35
  And that language is heavily loaded with ancient context,
• 20:38
  isn't it? Oh yes, the scholars point out
• 20:40
  that this directly merges the ancient priestly blessing of #6
• 20:44
  the Lord make his face shine upon thee with a very military
• 20:47
  concept. Military concept.
• 20:49
  Yeah, the specific Hebrew word used here carries an allusion to
• 20:54
  a waving banner or standard. Like a banner being raised on a
• 20:57
  battlefield. Exactly when the troops are
• 20:59
  scattered, demoralized and confused in the fog of war, the
• 21:02
  commander raises the banner high on a hill so everyone can see
• 21:06
  it, Orient themselves and rally around it.
• 21:08
  Oh that is such a cool image. Right.
• 21:10
  David is asking God to raise the light of his face like a
• 21:14
  luminous banner over his despairing followers.
• 21:17
  Instead of complaining alongside them, he opposes their
• 21:20
  unbelieving question with a prayer for divine illumination.
• 21:24
  And then David makes a massive claim following that prayer, he
• 21:27
  says, Thou has put gladness in my heart more than in the time
• 21:31
  that their corn and their wine increased.
• 21:33
  That is a bold statement. Let's look at the physical
• 21:36
  reality. Though David's men are starving.
• 21:38
  They're sleeping in the dirt. The rebels are sitting in the
• 21:41
  capital city eating from the royal storehouses.
• 21:44
  When David claims he has more gladness in his heart than the
• 21:47
  guys with all the food and wine, isn't that just a classic case
• 21:50
  of sour grapes? I mean, isn't he just using
• 21:52
  spiritual rationalization to make himself feel better about
• 21:55
  losing everything? From a purely cynical
• 21:57
  perspective, it might sound like an empty cope, but the
• 22:01
  historical reality provided by de Lich proves otherwise.
• 22:04
  Oh, tell me. This event likely occurred
• 22:06
  around the time of the Feast of Tabernacles.
• 22:09
  The agricultural harvest was officially passed.
• 22:11
  OK, so the crops were in. Yes, Absalom and his rebel army
• 22:15
  had barns literally overflowing with grain and vats completely
• 22:19
  full of new wine. They possessed massive, tangible
• 22:22
  resources. Yeah, David.
• 22:23
  David and his loyalists look like a band of starving free
• 22:27
  booters, relying on whatever sparse provisions they could
• 22:30
  scrape together from sympathizers in the hostile
• 22:32
  territory of Gilead. So the contrast is literal.
• 22:36
  Full barns in Jerusalem versus empty stomachs in Mahana?
• 22:39
  Yes. But de Lich argues that the
• 22:41
  gladness of heart David experiences is objectively
• 22:44
  superior. Why is that?
• 22:45
  Because the light of God's face provides a soul level
• 22:48
  satisfaction that physical foods simply cannot touch, right?
• 22:52
  The rebels have material abundance, but they do not have
• 22:55
  peace with God. Their consciences are stained
• 22:58
  with treason. David has extreme material
• 23:02
  poverty, but he possesses the ultimate treasure, the
• 23:06
  conscious, joyful awareness of God's favor.
• 23:09
  The commentary includes a brilliant quote from Charles
• 23:11
  Spurgeon on this verse. Spurgeon says Thou art with me
• 23:15
  is a far more blessed cry than harvest home that hits hard.
• 23:19
  It really does. Harvest Home is the ancient
• 23:21
  shout of ultimate earthly success.
• 23:24
  The crops are safely in the barn.
• 23:25
  Winter is provided for today. Harvest tone is the full bank
• 23:28
  account, the vested stock options, the promotion.
• 23:31
  The perfect house is the cry of material security, right?
• 23:34
  But Spurgeon argues that simply saying thou art with me brings a
• 23:38
  superior, more lasting joy. Spurgeon goes on to say, Let my
• 23:41
  granary be empty. I am yet full of blessing if
• 23:43
  Jesus Christ smiles upon me, but if I have all the world, I am
• 23:46
  poor without Him. That is a radical redefinition
• 23:49
  of wealth. The rebels are wealthy in
• 23:52
  fleeting circumstances. David is wealthy in his eternal
• 23:55
  soul. And the supreme gladness, this
• 23:58
  overwhelming confidence in the light of God's face, leads us
• 24:01
  directly into the physical outcome of this entire text.
• 24:05
  Which is the most remarkable part of the song?
• 24:07
  David says. I will both lay me down in peace
• 24:10
  and sleep. It is the immediacy of it that
• 24:13
  gets me. Yeah, the Hebrew adverb used
• 24:15
  here indicates simultaneous action.
• 24:17
  At once will I lay me down and sleep?
• 24:21
  The moment his head hits the pillow, he is out.
• 24:23
  There's no tossing, no turning, no agonizing over tomorrow's
• 24:26
  battle plans, no checking the perimeter.
• 24:29
  Spurgeon makes a great observation here.
• 24:31
  He points out that David is not lying awake listening to every
• 24:34
  rustling leaf, wondering if an assassin from Absalom's camp is
• 24:37
  sneaking up on his tent with a dagger.
• 24:39
  Which, given his circumstances, would be a completely rational
• 24:41
  fear. I mean, he is the highest value
• 24:43
  target in an active war zone. He has a bounty on his head,
• 24:46
  right? Think about a small toddler.
• 24:49
  If you take a toddler and put them in a strange, dark hotel
• 24:52
  room, they might be terrified. The shadows look scary.
• 24:56
  The sounds are weird. Everything is unfamiliar.
• 24:59
  But if a parent they trust explicitly comes in, sits in the
• 25:02
  chair in the corner and says I am right here, I will watch over
• 25:05
  you, that child can close their eyes and fall asleep instantly.
• 25:09
  That's a perfect analogy. The unfamiliar environment
• 25:12
  hasn't changed. The darkness hasn't changed.
• 25:15
  The potential threats outside the dial haven't changed.
• 25:18
  The only thing that changed is the presence of the protector.
• 25:21
  David is that child. The environment is hostile, but
• 25:25
  the father is in the room. And that imagery ties perfectly
• 25:28
  into a fascinating debate among scholars over the translation of
• 25:31
  the final line. For thou, Lord, only make us me,
• 25:35
  dwell in safety. OK, what is the debate?
• 25:37
  Well, does it mean God alone is his safety?
• 25:39
  Or does it mean David dwells alone but in safety?
• 25:41
  The distinction there seems massive.
• 25:44
  Yeah. I mean, if it means God alone is
• 25:45
  his safety, it focuses entirely on the exclusive source of
• 25:48
  protection. But what happens if we look at
• 25:50
  the second option? Scholars like Edward Reem and
• 25:53
  Joseph Addison Alexander argue strongly for the second
• 25:55
  translation. David is dwelling alone in
• 25:59
  safety. OK, This highlights his severe
• 26:01
  physical isolation. He is separated from the massive
• 26:04
  armies of Israel, separated from the fortified thick stone walls
• 26:08
  of Jerusalem, separated from his usual palace guards.
• 26:11
  So he is completely stripped of human defense.
• 26:14
  Right. He is physically vulnerable,
• 26:16
  exposed to the elements, and completely, completely isolated.
• 26:19
  He is dwelling alone, yet because of his intimate divine
• 26:23
  protection, he is completely, utterly safe.
• 26:26
  I prefer that second reading so much more.
• 26:29
  It speaks directly to the reality of the human experience.
• 26:31
  It does, doesn't it? You can be entirely isolated.
• 26:34
  You can feel completely alone in your workplace, standing up for
• 26:37
  what is right while everyone else compromises.
• 26:39
  You can be the only one in your family holding on to faith.
• 26:42
  You are dwelling alone, but you are dwelling in perfect safety
• 26:45
  because the Almighty is standing guard over your life.
• 26:48
  It creates a beautiful paradox, utter visible vulnerability
• 26:52
  combined with absolute invisible security.
• 26:54
  The commentary provides some incredible homiletical gems from
• 26:57
  various pastors and theologians. To summarize this, Stark notes,
• 27:02
  a quiet conscience is a good bedfellow.
• 27:05
  I love that and. Another commentator adds they
• 27:08
  slumber sweetly whom faith rocks to sleep.
• 27:11
  It connects everything back to the beginning of his prayer.
• 27:13
  If God is the God of your righteousness, if He is the one
• 27:16
  who justifies you, then your conscience is clear, right?
• 27:19
  You are not keeping yourself awake trying to figure out how
• 27:22
  to defend yourself, manage your reputation, or spin the
• 27:24
  narrative. You hand the defense over to
• 27:26
  God, which clears your conscience, which allows you to
• 27:29
  close your eyes. Doctrine is not meant to sit in
• 27:32
  a textbook. It is meant to regulate your
• 27:34
  nervous system in a crisis. That is exactly.
• 27:37
  Right, I want to challenge you listening right now to identify
• 27:40
  the literal corn and wine in your own life.
• 27:43
  What are the material metrics you are relying on for your
• 27:46
  Peace of Mind? That is a tough question.
• 27:49
  Is the balance in your retirement account, the approval
• 27:51
  of your peers? The stability of your company?
• 27:55
  When those barns are full, it is easy to feel peaceful and
• 27:57
  secure. Because you can see it.
• 27:59
  Yeah, but if those barns were suddenly empty tomorrow, if the
• 28:03
  market crashed or the job disappeared, would you still be
• 28:06
  able to lie down and sleep, seek the sleep that comes from a
• 28:09
  quieter conscience, a conscience anchored in the unshakable
• 28:13
  reality of God's favor rather than the fluctuating
• 28:16
  circumstances of the world? It requires A fundamental shift
• 28:19
  in where we place our trust, moving it from the visible to
• 28:22
  the invisible. As we close, I want to leave you
• 28:24
  with one final provocative thought to Mull over something
• 28:27
  we haven't touched on yet. The scholar Wordsworth noted a
• 28:31
  fascinating detail about David's exile.
• 28:33
  OK. By fleeing Jerusalem, David lost
• 28:36
  all access to the sanctuary. He lost the physical ark of the
• 28:40
  covenant. He lost access to the high
• 28:42
  priest's breastplate, which contained the Urim and Thummim,
• 28:45
  the sacred stones used by the priest to directly discern God's
• 28:48
  will and receive answers in times of national crisis.
• 28:52
  He lost all the physical touch points of his faith.
• 28:54
  Yes, all the physical structures, the visible routines
• 28:58
  and the tangible methods of his faith were violently stripped
• 29:01
  away. Yet it was precisely in this
• 29:04
  barren wilderness, completely void of all religious comforts
• 29:07
  and mechanisms, that David experienced the unmediated light
• 29:11
  of God's countenance. Wow.
• 29:13
  Consider that for a moment. What if the complete removal of
• 29:16
  your usual spiritual routines, the stripping away of your
• 29:19
  comfortable structures and physical security is not a
• 29:21
  punishment, right? What if it is the precise
• 29:24
  mechanism God is using to force you to experience His direct,
• 29:28
  unmediated presence in a way you never could have within the
• 29:31
  comfortable walls of your normal life?
• 29:33
  A striking paradigm shift, it forces us to reconsider the
• 29:36
  purpose of the wilderness. Something to keep you thinking.