Psalm 3

Psalm 3

Psalm 3 tells the story of 2 Samuel 15 &16

• vs.1-2
• According to vs.1,2 David's foes are not only numerous but they are also trying to undermine his trust in God.
• "There is no help for him in God."
• Has anyone ever mocked you for your beliefs?
• I find it fascinating how often those who believe in God live in fear of standing out from those who have no relationship with God.  Our tendency is to imagine groups of our friends standing in circles laughing at us while we are not around.  This is human nature, this idea that the world and that other people are consumed with thoughts and conversations about us.  The idea that we are the center of everyone's universe.\
• One of the most amazing things about the believers life is that the focus can be taken off of themselves and instead shifted to God.  We no longer have to live a life that is consumed with all of our personal hang-ups and imperfections.  Instead we can live out our lives with a divine consciousness.  A knowledge that the problems that we face each day (personal or public) are passing by and are equivalent to a thin mist that evaporates as the sun (SON) shines through.
• However, I'm certain that there are moments where believers are the center of everyone's focus and perhaps even their ridicule.  While these moments may be difficult to endure it is even more certain that in the private moments when we are thought of and/or focused on (which are much fewer than we might imagine) that those who might mock us outwardly, long for what we have.
• Think about it for a moment.  Do you know what a life of faith in God's promises and trust in the LORD's provision offers us?  It offers us a life free from worry, doubt, hopelessness, fear, anxiety . . . and the list goes on and on.
• Why wouldn't we want to live in such a way that exemplifies these truths, and in so doing, why wouldn't we want to be so transparently different from those who do not know God that surround us.
• The Christ-one's life is not something to be ashamed of, hidden and private.  Instead it should be something that we are excited to have brand us, that we are excited to carry as a banner for all of the world to see.
• Why would anyone really want to fit in to a culture where distractions are a necessity.  Where business must be maintained or else one might be forced to spend time in quiet reflection on their own humanity.
• What's of even greater danger here is the personal thought that this might be true.
• Charles Haddon Spurgeon wrote, "It is the most bitter of all afflictions to be led to fear that there is no help for us in God."
• The danger here is one of self-focus... see the next section.
• vs.3-6
• A lot happens between vs.1-2 and vs.3. 
• The first two verses are an expression of the crisis that come into David's life because of the uprising of a number of his enemies.
• vs.3 introduces a section of confidence in God.
• What produced this change?  David's attention turned from his enemies to God.
• Herein lies the same principle which helped David defeat Goliath.
• While the entire camp of Israel was consumed with visions of a giant, David saw past the giant and saw God.
• Obstacles and enemies always seem bigger and more impossible when they are all that you are looking at.  However, when a person turns their eyes and thoughts toward God, God is seen in his true, great stature, and the obstacles shrink to manageable proportions.
• vs.3-6 are the appropriate response to such moments of ridicule or self-doubt.
• vs.3 - The LORD is a shield.
• What does a shield do?  For a warrior like David this metaphor would have had some intense personal meaning.
• The shield David is speaking of here would have protected the entire body.  It would have protected David from any attack that the enemy would attempt.
• However, a shield only absorbs the initial force of the blow.  An attack from a powerful or close range weapon (like a family member, a dear friend, a trusted co-worker) would still be felt through the shield and might even damage, knock down, or wound the shield bearer.
• David is not saying that the person whose trust is in the LORD is indestructible.
• It's foolish to assume that a relationship with the LORD will ensure an end to every human suffering, that you will never be broken, wounded, or damaged by any of the evil's of this world.
• vs.3 - the One who lifts up my head
• 2 points of application here.
• 1) The head, in time of trouble and sorrow is naturally bowed down, as if overpowered with the weight of affliction.  To lift up the head, then, is to relieve David's distresses, or to take away his troubles.
• 2) To lift up the head would help David to change and maintain his focus on God.  The reader should be instructed to ask God, as head lifter, to help them obtain and retain the proper perspective.
• vs.4
• David is hurt in this Psalm.  He has been knocked down, he is vulnerable, he is in great need.  This is why, in vs.3, we hear David cry out to God.
• vs.4 - Selah
• We are not certain of the meaning of the word Selah.
• Selah appears a total of 71 times in the Psalms and only once, Habakkuk 3, in the rest of Scripture.
• Because of this we can be certain that Selah is a musical reference.
• Given it's placement in the Psalms, I believe that Selah serves as a crescendo mark in the music.
• Where previously the music had been soft David makes a note for the musicians to build it's intensity.
• Rarely does the word Selah appear at the end of a Psalm.  Most frequently it's found when the author wishes to draw special attention to the emotion with which a  promise is being claimed or a truth exclaimed.
• vs.5-6
• Have you ever been so troubled by something that you lose sleep?  If any person had a reason to lose sleep from worry or fear it was David.
• At any moment his enemies could have discovered where he was hiding
• Yet David sleeps peacefully.
• The looming attack.
• It's doubtful that any of us are faced with the potential military uprising of thousands at some point during our day.
• However, you may be facing a battle and enemies.  After all, how many enemies does it take to make life miserable and possibly lead to great personal loss?
• The restful night.
• The reader shouldn't be fooled into thinking that David simply prayed for safety and went to bed, sleeping like a baby.
• While this is certainly a possibility for the Christ-one, wrongly applied I believe it to be dangerous.
• David, and his small army of faithful men, would have taken great precautions before settling down for the night.
• They would have strategically hid themselves.
• They would have had watchmen, in shifts, all night.
• They would have had an attack and an escape plan pending any activity by the enemy.
• An important lesson to take away from this is that the LORD will give rest to the wise and diligent.
• David has done everything that he possibly could do.
• All that was left over was in the LORD's hands.
• Sometimes the only thing a person can do is cry out to the LORD.  There will come times when an individual is unable to do anything other than pray.  However, those times are few.
• Matthew Henry notes, Care and grief do us good, when they engage us to pray to God, as in earnest."  This is true.  I would add to this that trials and opposition do us good when they force us to practice personal discipline, when they make us honestly examine our lives, when they cause us to be more diligent in our Scripture reading, and so on.
• You can always rest on God, but God does  not always have to do all the work.
• A rejuvenating morning.
• Having rested in God and having survived the night David's trust and strength in the LORD is renewed.
• This should teach us to rejoice in the sustaining grace of the LORD.
• Although the problem had not been solved and the enemy was still in hot pursuit, David was refreshed to fight and struggle anew.
• Sometimes God's provision does not take the shape of a total solution to one's problems.  More often than not God will simply protect and sustain the believer during a trial.
• Victory in God, then, is more about the individual's response to their difficult circumstances than about the defeat of the circumstance itself.
• vs.7-8
• Strong battle and warrior imagery is used here.  The enemy is pictured as a wild animal attempting to devour.
• David, with his shepherding background, claims here that God has knocked the teeth out of the mouth of the lion or bear (his enemies) making their attacks much less lethal.
• The attacks would still come but they would be unable to harm David in the way that they intended.
• vs.8 Salvation belongs to the LORD
• This statement is true in the metaphorical, the literal, and the spiritual sense.
• The manner in which God chooses or allows an individual to be saved will change, but the power and the process of salvation belongs solely in the hands of the LORD.
• This statement should force us into the realization that turning to anything and/or anyone else for our salvation is foolishness.  We must begin by petitioning God.  The way out of any valley, out of any hopelessness, will always be found as we follow the leading of the Good Shepherd.