Psalm 39

‘I said, “I will guard my ways, that I may not sin with my tongue; I will guard my mouth with a muzzle, so long as the wicked are in my presence.” I was mute and silent; I held my peace to no avail, and my distress grew worse. My heart became hot within me. As I mused, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue: “O Lord , make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather! “And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. Deliver me from all my transgressions. Do not make me the scorn of the fool! I am mute; I do not open my mouth, for it is you who have done it. Remove your stroke from me; I am spent by the hostility of your hand. When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him; surely all mankind is a mere breath! Selah “Hear my prayer, O Lord , and give ear to my cry; hold not your peace at my tears! For I am a sojourner with you, a guest, like all my fathers. Look away from me, that I may smile again, before I depart and am no more!”

There is a great number of profound insights we are able to glean from the Psalms, both deeply theological and intimately personal, but there is a meta-lesson that permeates them all: man is laughably unstable. This sorrowful poem should pluck the heart strings of any who have wallowed for a time in misery; surely they are words of sharp distress. They come, of course, from the mouth of the same king who only a chapter later would rejoice in the Lord his Deliverer, and would write dozens of joy-filled songs to the name of his God. The simply put fact of the matter is that David had real bad days. “Of course,” one might say, “He’s human.” Ah, but how that noble, lowly title takes on different meaning to us when we think on biblical figures- or more likely, how differently we think of ourselves. It is incredibly easy, I have found, to degrade our own stature to that of less than man in despair, and thus we condemn ourselves all the more when we come under such darkness, as though we were somehow a unique exception to what has befallen all before us. We are not. David, the king of all Israel, God’s anointed, had bad days. You, Christian, are neither more nor less saved for undergoing suffering after the manner of all mankind. Notice also how David is subtly comforted, though perhaps unknown to him at the moment of writing, by his very lamentation. Yes, it is invariably true that man is fleeting, that all of his works are vain, and that all things in this world are perishing- this only means that our hope and faith in them is utterly misplaced. It is to that end that the Most High has given us an awareness of ourselves, a holy fear of destructions certainty: so that our eyes might look ever upon the eternal, the imperishable, the perfect. When our days are sour in our stomachs, would God that we all turn to Him, trusting in our absolute frailty and His indomitable strength.

Lord God, Sovereign Father, you have given us a very short time on this earth. We thank you for this, not because we are ungrateful for what we have received, but for that you have shown us a taste in this life of such greater wonders to come, beyond our comprehension. We ask humbly O Lord that in our twilight hours, when we would almost plead you depart from us for the sake of our wickedness, that you bring us to remembrance that our lives really are incredibly short in comparison to the uncounted aeons you have promised to us in your grace, your love, your peace. We adore you Lord. Amen.