Let's pray together before we look into God's Word. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day that we can come before you and hear from you. We thank you for your mercies given and for your grace and mercies to come. We pray that you would help us to be attentive to your word, and Lord, that you would hear the groaning and the crying of our heart to you. Thank you for fellow gospel preaching churches. Lord, we pray you would bless them this morning. Thank you for healing mercies We are so thankful that you are better to us than we deserve. Be with us this morning. Help us to hear your word. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

If you could make your way to Psalm 5. Psalm 5, when James asked me about what to read, There's some belief that Psalm 5 and 3 have some relationship to each other, other than they're both Psalms. So I thought that might be a good easy portion and we can reference it having heard it read earlier. But Psalm 5, give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my sighing. Listen to my cry for help, my King and my God. For to you I pray. In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice. In the morning, I lay my request before you and wait in expectation.

You are not a God who takes pleasure in evil. With you, the wicked cannot dwell. The arrogant cannot stand in your presence. You hate all those who do wrong. You destroy those who tell lies. Bloodthirsty and deceitful men, the Lord abhors. But I, by your great mercy, will come into your house. In reverence will I bow down toward your holy temple. Lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness because of my enemies. Make straight your way before me.

Not a word from their mouth can be trusted. Their heart is filled with destruction. Their throat is an open grave. With their tongue they speak deceit. Declare them guilty, O God. Let their intrigues be their downfall. Banish them for their many sins, for they have rebelled against you. but let all who take refuge in you be glad. Let them ever sing for joy. Spread your protection over them that those who love your name may rejoice in you. For surely, O Lord, you bless the righteous. You surround them with your favor as with a shield.

Now, I've been asked on more than one occasion to, not necessarily in the setting here, but what I thought about prayer, and I remember as an early believer in Christ, reading lots of books about prayer, and the other subject that comes up in this passage, knowing the will of God, And I'll have to say, by not really going and looking for either one of those, I've learned more about those subjects just from hearing and contemplating the Psalms.

I think it was back when we were looking at Hebrews probably close to a year ago that I was looking at Psalm 95 and I came across some musical compositions that were put together and they have word for word from another translation the Psalms and it really heightened my awareness of how much I needed to learn from the Psalms. And perhaps that's the reason why we have the Apostle Paul saying that we should speak to one another or sing to one another in Psalms, in hymns, in spiritual songs. And I know that there are some have beat on people to use Psalms exclusively, but certainly the opposite is not good. I think even with the hymns that we hear, the better hymns are the ones that are good paraphrases of what we have in the Psalms. When we looked When I had James read Psalm 3, like I said, there is believed to be a relationship there.

And I didn't read the heading on this one. In our NIV, if you have an NIV, it says for the Director of Music for Flutes, and it says it is a Psalm of David. But it doesn't talk about the background Whereas Psalm 3 says it's a Psalm of David when he fled from his son Absalom. And one of the important things I think to know, whether it's limited to the first couple or if it goes through Psalm 5, these Psalms at the beginning of the book of Psalms are not chronological.

In other words, Psalm 51, which comes later, is actually about an earlier time in David's life. But here I think in Psalm 5 we have the mature David, perhaps when he's fleeing from his son, but perhaps at a later time, but a mature David thinking about his need before a holy God. And I think if we look at this passage, perhaps you picked it up in the reading, there is a, I would say, a dissonance here, and an alternation between prayers to God and what we would call, imprecatory sort of thoughts where David is not only calling on God to judge evil, he's using language which wouldn't be considered to be winsome to the lost. I know that there are people who put great stock in those sort of things, and I forget, probably many people have said this, but I've heard it said many times, I've read the Bible to make commentaries on the Bible clearer, if you know what I mean, is God's word can help clear up our misunderstandings brought on by others in their theology. So looking at this, Psalm 5 breaks into five sections.

The first is a prayer for help. The second is a proclamation of God's holiness and the outcome of that. The third is a prayer for direction. Fourth section is a prayer for judgment. And then the last part is praise for God's protection. So let's look at this prayer for help.

David says or writes, give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my sighing, listen to my cry for help, my King and my God, for to you I pray, In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice. In the morning, I lay my request before you and wait in expectation. Now, again, this is not meant to be a criticism of other things, but as I was thinking about this passage, it's like, wow, this is very familiar and If you were to look at the King James Version, I'll read it to you here. Perhaps if you listened to that style of music, what used to be called contemporary music, but from 1970, what would that put it, 50 years ago. not so contemporary anymore, but there was a praise chorus from the King James from the beginning of this, and perhaps you remember it. Give ear to my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation. Hearken unto the voice of my cry, my King and my God, for unto Thee will I pray. My voice shall thou hear in the morning. In the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee. and we'll look up.

And it's a beautiful song, and it's a great thought, but it's not a complete thought. And I think in our approach to scripture and our desire to understand, we want to understand not just small sections of scripture, but we want to put them in their appropriate context. And of course, to understand how we see Christ and his gospel in there. So, yes, it's true.

David comes with these words, but I think in the language of the King James, we lose a little bit of the sense of urgency that is here, and by just looking at those three verses, we lose a sense of what David is after in this entire psalm. He asked to be heard. Some place the first petition later on, down in verse eight of Psalm 5, but His petition starts, and this comes to my comment about learning about prayer. He asked God to listen to his prayers. Seems like an odd thing to do. Maybe it's because we don't understand or we take it for granted how God is and how he acts, but David doesn't take it for granted.

He says multiple times, give ear, consider, in other words, listen carefully, which goes with the word sighing. It's translated meditation in the King James and it's groaning in other translations. The idea is that it's inaudible, hard to hear. So give ear, consider, and then we have listen to my cry for help. So David, while it might seem, is rushing into prayer. In a sense, what he's doing is he's ensuring his audience here. And he not only says it in that way, but in verse three we read, you hear my voice.

And while we wonder sometimes people or where is God in this trial? Why doesn't God deliver me from this situation? One thing you can be sure of, even if what you're going through is not what you expected, if what you're going through is something that has you completely undone, if you belong to God and you cry out to Him, if you've grown in words, as Paul says, that are not uttered, that the Spirit of God is able to discern, you know that God hears you if you belong to Him. Such a great comfort.

Now this doesn't mean that Paul just, Paul, I said Paul here, David just did whatever. It says here, I lay my request before you. It's a very deliberate sort of idea or wording here. In fact, in another translation, they supply the word sacrifice because it's the same sort of wording as you would have for carefully laying out a sacrifice.

I don't believe that sacrifice has to be added here, but what David says clearly here is, I want you to hear me, God, and it's not how loud I cry or that I have the right words, but it's also I'm thinking about what I'm doing as I'm coming before you. And as we hear and heard and will read again, it seems like this is related to a particular act of worship, a worship gathering that David was about to participate in.

So, David prays to God. He calls on God, not only in his need, but he calls in expectation. And it says, you hear my voice, and when I lay my request before you, I wait in expectation. What a wonderful consolation if You're concerned when you pray to God, nothing seems to be happening or going your way.

Child of God, and I need to hear this. As they say, one finger that way means four back this way. I need to hear this as well. Just because something seems unresolved in your life, it does not mean that God doesn't hear you. Well, who is the God we pray to? And I think this is how, even with the alternation, the dissonance here, this builds on itself. Notice who he's praying to. Give ear to my words, O Lord, Yahweh. Listen to my cry for help, my King. The King David prays to the greater King, God, and my God, to you I pray in the morning, O Lord. Again, Yahweh or Jehovah, you hear my voice. He prays to the sovereign God.

Now, I don't want to get into anything political here. But if you're a believer and you say, I want no king, I have serious doubts about what you believe. Now I understand what people mean in our current political situation. I ask if that is your cry, you're concerned about our current political leader, that you say no king but Christ, because if you don't have a king, if I don't have a king, if I don't have a sovereign in heaven to rely on, I don't have hope. Free willism, being good enough, being accepted enough, a democratic thing, a democracy where everybody who is worthy has a vote would mean we would have no vote.

And David goes crying to his king and to his God. He knows that God is in control and that is our comfort as well. Part of the reason he emphasizes this is because he's trying to reconcile his waiting in expectation with no resolution, apparently, with the understanding that God is sovereign. And then as he contemplates that, that moves him to the next part of this psalm. And I'm sure there was, well, I shouldn't say I'm sure, I believe there was probably some thinking and rewriting and consideration, but perhaps this just came to him. As he is thinking about this sovereign God, this king of the universe, he thinks about how little anyone can go to him.

You, verse four, are not a God who takes pleasure in evil, and with you the wicked cannot dwell. We need to tell the truth about God and evil. I know it's been, again, no longer a contemporary idea, but this idea of a seeker-sensitive church continues to work in our churches these days where we don't want to scare anybody off with a holy God. Well, there is no other God for us to present. And if we're talking about salvation, we're talking about salvation from something.

And David understood this, so he goes from his petitions being laid out to saying to God in his prayers, I know that you don't take pleasure in evil and that wickedness cannot dwell. The arrogant cannot stand in your presence and you hate all who do wrong. You destroy those who tell lies. Bloodthirsty and deceitful men the Lord abhors. God hates evil, and we should too.

And when David expresses this, he's thinking about it in the context of he has boldness to access God, but that doesn't mean that God has somehow lowered his standards. No, God is not a God who takes pleasure in evil. but destroys those who tell lies.

Well, what's next? As he's laying this out before God and he's considering worship before a holy God, he talks about his means of access. And I struggled about where to put this, but it just struck me when I thought about this. When you think about David, and so I'm gonna put this in here, maybe you feel uneasy about this idea, and some of the language here, if you properly understand who you are as an individual, I mean it talks about, Psalm 51, David said he was conceived in iniquity and scripture talks about children coming forth from the womb speaking lies.

A message that I listened to from Joey said, anybody who doesn't believe in original sin has never had children because if you have children, you understand that concept. But what's interesting here when it talks about God not being one who takes pleasure in evil and that the wicked cannot dwell, the arrogant cannot stand, that God destroys those who tell lies, bloodthirsty and deceitful men the Lord abhors. All we have to do with David is, and I'm not gonna turn over there, but I'm gonna give you references for your own study, is 2 Samuel 11 and 12, and possibly add in chapter 24. Every one of the sins that are mentioned here are sins that David committed. What's more wicked than adultery? Did David tell lies about Bathsheba and Uriah? What's more bloodthirsty than to send a man to his death, essentially murdering him?

Arrogance, well, this is where 2 Samuel 24 comes in. And I think I'm gonna turn over there. I wasn't prepared to do that, but I'm gonna turn over to 2 Samuel 24, because in our translation, it talks about the arrogant, but it could talk easily about the foolish. And in 2 Samuel 24, it talks about David being provoked to number the people. Second Samuel 24, one, the anger of the Lord burned against Israel and he incited David against them saying, go and take a census of Israel and Judah.

They were prohibited by the law to do it. But later on, verse 10, David says he was conscious stricken after he had counted the fighting men and he said to the Lord, I sin greatly in what I have done. Now, O Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing." The arrogance and foolishness of David was true of him. So how can David come boldly before God? How can David, on the one hand, say God doesn't take pleasure in these things, the arrogant can't stand in his presence, and so on?

Well, two sections here, but this one brings it out the most. Verse seven, but I, and the NIV is too sparse in its wording, by your great mercy, it says, but by the abundance of your mercy or loving kindness or loyal love. It's by the abundance of mercy. Later on, David says, in verse 10, banish them for their many sins in the same word that's translated many here abundant is the same word many should be translated abundant but could also be used and it's the same word in verse 7. Why is it that David can stand before God? Is it because he did better? Nothing in his prayer is, God, because I'm righteous, and you think of the tax collector and the Pharisee, right? You know, Lord, I thank you I'm not like this man. And he wouldn't lift his head to heaven. He said, Lord, you know, be merciful to me.

And David here is able to say, by your great mercy, I can come into your house. I can worship you. I can bow down toward your holy temple. And if you're worried about it, if you're one of those people worried about chronology, that could also be translated tabernacle because of course there wouldn't have been a temple at the time of David. It wouldn't be built until Solomon's time. But it's God's mercy, the very sort of person that we can rightly condemn and agree with God because God is holy and condemning, we were. But by God's great mercy, we can come into his house. We can come to gather with the people of God and worship.

And what he asked for is, as I alluded to earlier, kind of a favorite subject of self-help sort of books. And I guess there's nothing new under the sun, or so Solomon wrote. Christian, so-called Christian self-help books, a lot of them, you know, 12 steps to determining what God's will is in your life. Well, I can give you one step. I can save you those other 11 steps.

He says here, Lead me, O Lord, make straight your way before me. He's asking for God's will. He's in a time of turmoil. He has desires on how he wants things to be resolved, but The most important thing is by God's mercy, he can come before him in worship, and the first thing that he says, other than asking God to listen to his prayers in the first place, is that God would lead him and make his way straight before him.

So many times people say, I missed it. I missed God's will for my life. Well, certainly in our actions we can sin. Certainly in our actions we can directly act against and contradict. what God's word clearly calls us to do. So in that sense, in the revealed sort of sense, the direct commands of scripture, yes, you missed it if you sin against God.

But a sovereign holy God who is in control of the universe doesn't have stray, loose ends. And so, even in the midst of our wickedness and sin, by God's great mercy, we can come before him and ask him to lead us and make his way straight before us. Now, some might read some of what I had James read from Psalm 3 and what comes a little bit later as vindictive sort of speech, but I don't think so. I think it's David agreeing with God that without God's intervention and mercy, what's deserved is punishment. But even in his request for leading, It's leading in God's righteousness.

It's not, help me make sure those people don't get their way with me. I don't want them to win. Because of my enemies, David says, it's all the more important, Lord, that you lead me and make your way straight before me. You know, at least in my way of thinking, I can conceive of lots of ways to deal with things that I think are causing me problems in my life, whether it's people or circumstances or whatever the case may be.

But what we should want is God's righteous way to be the way that God directs us and makes straight before us. Because of enemies, because of everyone who rebels against you, as it says later on, against God, we need to be led. We need to trust by God's great mercy, the same great mercy that brings us into a saving relationship with him. That same mercy has to lead us all the days of our lives. But that great contrast here is David The one who verses four through six could speak of is able to pray for direction because of God's great mercy.

Now this next section in the alternation, the dissonance that here he goes back to talking about the wicked and the evil. And it's interesting, and there's a lot of layers to this psalm. It's interesting to take what's in this section and compare it to the first section. Because both of them are talking about speech. Give ear to my words, consider my sighing, and so on.

And here we have words as well. but not good words. And while it's tempting, I'll only mention it and hopefully it doesn't throw you too much. Not a word from their mouth can be trusted is not speaking about politicians exclusively. But not a word from their mouth can be trusted. These wicked people, their heart, As opposed to the heart that God has changed, their heart is filled with destruction.

Their throat is an open grave. When you think about word pictures, and I try to think about what's being pictured for these sort of things, think about word pictures, that's some bad breath. You open your mouth and it smells like an open grave. And back then, they didn't use formaldehyde or anything like that. With their tongue, they speak deceit.

Now, I don't know which particular situation is here. being spoken of, and maybe that's on purpose in the arrangement of the Psalms, because this applies to a lot of different situations. I mentioned earlier about self-help books, ones that refer to things that are contrary to scripture. These words could apply to. But I think in the day-to-day place of life, I think it's our own thoughts and words that can lead us astray, or we can listen a little more readily to the speech of others who seem to be giving us a shortcut to the situation that is plaguing us at the moment. Well, David here, this, again, NIV is a little bit tame here in the wording.

It says, declare them guilty. Well, what he's saying here is make them bear their guilt, oh God. Make them pay. Earlier in Psalm 3, Strike all my enemies on the jaw and break the teeth of the wicked. I think this is even further, although in a time before dentistry, having broken teeth would be a bad thing. This is further. Make them bear their guilt, oh God. If there's anything I don't want to be said of me, and that is to make me bear my own guilt.

David doesn't shy away from something that I think people innocently, in some cases, but in other cases, not so innocently shy away from, and that is that God is just in declaring everyone guilty. In fact, you may have noticed their throat is an open grave. That's mentioned by the Apostle Paul in Romans 3, where he ends the section with, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Well, that's the outcome. If we're guilty before God, If there's no mercy shown to us, that's the only thing that can happen is that we could be declared guilty.

Banish them, send them away. And he says, let their intrigues or their crafty words or whatever be their downfall. And if you think about it in life, a lot of times our tensions are brought about by people who are good at deception and by using words when it comes to our problems with them. They take things that have been said and they twist them and they turn them. They don't know They don't wanna know the truth in a lot of cases, they just want to get their way.

But apart from the grace of God, that would be us as well, but David says here, banish them for their many sins, not because they've sinned against me, just like he said in Psalm 51, against you and you only have I sinned, He says here, they have rebelled against you. As bad as it is for us when people sin against us, that is not the big tragedy. We deserve worse than whatever we could get from our enemies. And yet, God is the one who is faulted. Well, all this speech, and I can think of David here preparing himself for worship and thinking these things, and he ends on a high note here. He says, let all who take refuge in you be glad.

When we have trouble, yes, we want God's justice to be done. Yes, we want resolution. Psalm that I thought about teaching on Psalm 40, I just can't quite do it because it starts, I waited patiently on the Lord, and I was thinking, I don't wait patiently, so I don't know if I can teach that quite yet. But we wait, whether it's patiently or not, But we have this hope.

We need to turn ourselves aside from the wickedness in the world. It's still there. It's not going away until Christ comes back and judgments are completed and this world is burned up and a new heavens and a new earth come about. There won't be a complete resolution.

There will be evil in the world, but one thing we can do, we can rejoice in God's great mercy, and that's what he says and how he ends this psalm. He says, let all who take refuge in you be glad. Let them ever sing or shout for joy. So he had started with, Words sighing, muttering, crying, and here as he considers that God takes a sinner like him and he will judge others who are unrepentant, he says, I can rejoice. because I'm taking refuge in God. Spread your protection over them that those who love your name may rejoice in you.

For surely, O Lord, you bless the righteous. And David didn't think he was righteous in himself. He knew he was righteous because of the covering that he had. And we know more than he did in that we know that we have a righteousness in Christ because we're in Christ and God will bless the righteous, God will bless Christ, and we will be blessed in him.

You surround them with your favor as with a shield. Instead of being left in his rebellion against God, God caused David to take refuge in the only righteous one, the Lord Jesus Christ. have it in my notes, but I came across a quote earlier this week, and if you know the story of Martin Luther, early on in his conversion, he was asked to stand before Roman ecclesiastical or church courts to answer for his heresies or his so-called heresies of believing in the just shall live by faith and so on, his rejection of Roman Catholicism salvation by works. And he had a protector in one of the local nobles, and the name is escaping me, but he had been summoned to this ecclesiastical court, and the spokesperson for the cardinal who sent him said to him something along the lines of, you know, Martin, what will you do if your protector, you know, this man, isn't able to protect you? And Martin Luther said something along the lines of, then I will be under the shield of heaven. And that's how we have to look at these situations in life. We take for granted, and I'm not saying it's unimportant for us to prepare and to do prudent things in life.

Look both ways before you cross, please. But I think sometimes we put so much stake in the fact that we did everything the right way that we fail to recognize that the only true and lasting protection we have, the only shield that we can rely on is the shield that David speaks of here in Psalm 5. Let's pray. Father, we thank you once again for this opportunity to spend time in your word Lord, I know I fail so often to hear you in day-to-day life, and I pray that you would help me to understand that it's only by your great mercy that I have any hope at all. Be with us this week. Help us to see Jesus in everything, the good and the bad. We ask this in his name, amen. All right, James.