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| I, David We come today to the sixtieth of the psalms. Given that this series on the psalms began three years ago, and we are barely more than a third of the way through them, I thought we needed something to help this one stand out. Psalm 60 is hardly the most popular of the psalms, yet it is the Word of God. How can we best appreciate its value? What if we were to hear it from the perspective of the author, David, himself? Of course, that would be impossible, or would it be? Couldn’t we conjure him up in our imaginations? That might help us understand the curious introduction to the psalm:
Let’s see. If David were here today, what would he look like? We know David in Scripture from youth to old age. Picture him today during the days of his reign as king over Israel. As you look at me, you might have to picture a younger man, maybe the age of 30. I would be wearing sandals and an ornate robe, possibly with a crown on my head. Being a warrior king, maybe through the break in the robe you could see the sword of Goliath strapped around my waist. I am bearded, with hair possibly as long as shoulder length. My hands are calloused from a hundred battles, and my face tanned and weathered from the hot, Judean sun. I am David, son of Jesse, champion over Goliath, king of Israel, and author of many of the psalms. I’ve come to explain the circumstances behind one of my lesser known poems, the one you know as Psalm 60. Although this one may not be as popular as, for example, the one that begins, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want,” if you look closely at it, you’ll see how important it is for everyone. Even for the woman I read about in your newspaper who said that she had given up on God many years ago. Her name is Brenda, and she suffered two tragedies, the paper said. First, her two-year-old son fell from the back of a sofa and died. Then, her boyfriend, who was home with the child when this happened (though Brenda was not), was arrested and charged with murder. Without the wisdom of someone like my son Solomon to decide who was responsible, a court determined that this man had beaten the child to death, not that he died as a result of a fall. He was sentenced to prison. Brenda said that when all this happened, she lost her faith in God. (Source, Union-Tribune, August 8, 2004) Such a thing brings me to tears, and yet I know how she must feel. She felt despair. I have felt despair myself many times, and have almost lost my faith along the way. That’s something you probably don’t know about me, but it’s true. In fact, that is the setting behind this psalm. It begins, I’m sorry to say, on a morbid note,
It ends a little more happily, but the same sense of gloom is still there (“Is it not you O God ... who have rejected us?”). The middle of it, however, is all about victory – “God has spoken... in triumph I will parcel out Shechem....” Not only is the theme different, the whole meter is different, which you can’t tell so easily from your English version. In Hebrew it sounds almost like two different psalms, which, you could say, it is. Here is why. First, let me back up a little. I didn’t know a lot of happiness in my childhood. I grew up in a family of 8 sons, and I was the last. Such a runt my father didn’t even think of me as a son. Once Samuel came to our town, Bethlehem, to my own father’s house. Samuel was the most famous man alive in those days. It’s true that Saul was king, but Samuel was a holy man, the closest thing to Moses that we had. Someone said that you have a man named Billy Graham today who is loved and respected for having faithfully served God his whole life, and that now he is old, and will likely not live many more years. Samuel was like that for us. The day that the great prophet came to my father’s house he asked to see all of my father’s sons, so Dad rounded up all the boys. Every son of Jesse stood before the famous Samuel, except me. Nobody had even bothered to tell me he was there. That should tell you something about my father’s attitude toward me. “David, go out back and take care of the sheep,” that’s about all he ever said to me. Never mind the fact that wild animals would regularly attack the sheep, and that I was left out there alone to protect them. I felt alone. I never felt accepted as one of my father’s sons. But then everything changed the day Samuel visited us. God sent him out to anoint a future king to replace Saul. And he came to our house! Not a single one of my brothers, and not even my father, thought I could have been the one, but Samuel, when he learned that there was one more son, refused to even sit down until I was found. I came into the room and saw him, and it was like seeing an angel. I was embarrassed because of my dirty hands and sweaty face, but, when he saw me, the old prophet’s eyes lit up. He poured oil over my head and, as it dripped from my chin, God’s Spirit came upon me. I felt a power like I’ve never felt. The Spirit of God began to give me poems to write and songs to sing. Some were joyful. Many were sad, as what you call Psalm 60 is. It is sad because in those days, when I first began writing psalms, things were bad for Israel. The Philistines pressured us from the west. Those godless wretches controlled us, really, because they controlled the iron. They wouldn’t let us have any swords, knowing that we would rise up against them if we had weapons. These were the same people who had stolen the Ark of the Covenant. I was so angry at them! We were the children of Israel, the Lord’s chosen people. They made us feel like the Lord’s rejected people! But we weren’t the Israel that we used to be. The strength was gone from our muscles. We were like sheep without a shepherd. The Spirit of God was gone from our midst. We hung our heads as we sat in the presence of God on Sabbaths, and sobbed as we heard the Scriptures read. Our people had escaped from Egypt in the days of Moses. Joshua, Deborah and Gideon had routed the Caananites. Where were men like Joshua or women like Deborah now? Now all we had was Saul, and it wasn’t as it is for you. We couldn’t vote him out of office after four years. We were stuck with him. Things were very hard for me in those days. Regardless of the promise of the future, Saul was king, not me. Things were bad enough while Samuel was still living, but after he died they got a lot worse. Samuel had been Saul’s conscience. With him gone, Saul was insane. The king, who at first had been proud of me, came to resent me bitterly. One moment I was a house guest at the palace and the next moment I was an enemy of the state, being tracked down like a jackal. During those dark days, the Lord gave me this psalm – the first draft of it, that is. (The final draft came later, as I’ll explain.) It was a lament.
Then came the day that, unexpectedly, Saul was killed on the battlefield. Soon after, Judah gathered around me, then all of Israel. And I was king, just as old Samuel had said so long ago. After so many years of waiting you probably think I began to dance, but I didn’t. First of all, I mourned the loss of Saul. Not only had he been the Lord’s anointed, but my closest friend in the world, Jonathon, Saul’s son, also died in the same battle. I felt that a part of my soul had been cut out. And I realized that being king did not mean the end of my troubles. I was king of an empire that was tottering and on the verge of ruin. Saul had been a soldier and a good one, but he was not a field general. He was not a leader. He had no vision for Israel. We needed a capital city, we needed a palace, we needed a temple. We needed something to bring together all the tribes. Moses had predicted that the Lord would choose a place for himself where He would make his dwelling, a place to which all of us could come. Saul had done nothing about that. As king, I chose Jerusalem for a capital city and brought the Ark there to make sure it never fell into enemy hands again. But that didn’t make our enemies go away. It just put them on the alert. Once again, they began gathering for war against us. Now, the Arameans, Edomites, and Moabites were on the prowl as well. We were still singing that lament on the Sabbath.
We felt fear. We felt despair. We needed a miracle. It was time for action. I had the servants find Joab, the highest ranking officer in our army.
I told Joab, “Our enemies gather strength even as we speak –
Philistia in the west, Edom in the south, Moab in the east, and now Aram
in the north. It’s only a matter of time. If we wait, they will
strike first. So I have decided that we will strike first. I am sending
you against Edom. Tomorrow you will leave for the Valley of Salt.”
Joab gathered the troops. We raised a shout of victory, then pounced like hungry lions. Every man was prepared to die, but determined to live. It was all or nothing. Reports came in from the western flank, the eastern flank, and from the north – Philistines, Moabites, and Arameans fell like flies. The most thrilling report came from Joab. He had gone to the Valley of Salt and had slain twelve thousand Edomites! God’s Spirit was with our armies again. That campaign changed everything for us. After that, God gave me the rest of this psalm, the middle section in which God claims all this territory for himself, and declares victory over our fiercest enemies.
Manasseh, Shechem, Ephraim, Philistia, Succoth, Edom, Moab, and Gilead. God said to me, “I own it all, and you are going to have it all, because my favor now rests upon you.” So, believe me, I know about disappointment; I know about despair. And now you know why it hurts me so much to hear of anyone losing faith in God. There were times when we had nothing but faith in God. If we had lost that, we would have had nothing. I wonder if there is anyone here today ready to give up on God. Maybe
you have enemies, and you feel that they are too many and are too strong.
Be glad they are not Philistines, that’s all I can say! Still, maybe
you are afraid. Or, maybe you feel forsaken somehow by those who are supposed
to be there for you, as I felt as a child. Or maybe you’ve just
been given a new responsibility and feel nervous about it, as I felt when
I first became king. God will come through for you, just as He did for us. I know he will. I have to go now, but if you see that woman I read about, Brenda, will
you tell her what I said? And even if you don’t see her, please
don’t forget it yourselves. Being desperate is not a bad thing,
if your desperation leads you to God. |