Psalm 39 Devotional
By Pastor Lawrence

As the Spirit says to the church in Hebrews 12:6 “the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives, so David proves in this psalm to be a child of God under God’s chastening hand. In the first few verses, in the midst of his pain and suffering, David vows to remain silent under God’s correction, especially in the presence of unbelievers, so as not to present a poor testimony to the wicked. But as his suffering wears on, and his heart is about to burst, he finally opens his lips in private complaint unto God rather than before men.

In v.4, he cries out for wisdom, as God tells us to do in James 1:5 when we are facing trials of many kinds, and David asks particularly that God would make him to know his end and the measure of his days. In this petition, he acknowledges that his times are in God’s hand and that his time is ever so brief, measuring it in handbreadths, which was the smallest unit of measurement in ancient times (see 1 Kings 7:26). He also compares his life and the life of all men to that of a shadow which is measured in mere hours rather than days, and to that of a breath which dissipates in seconds rather than minutes to acknowledge his finitude in light of God’s everlasting glory.

Man’s temporal life and the turmoil that he often endures in many vain pursuits should lead him to acknowledge his sin and weakness before the Lord and to look to him for his purpose and to be his greatest end, and this is exactly the conclusion that David comes to in v.7, when he asks “for what do I wait? My hope is in you.” Therefore, David is quick to acknowledge his transgressions and to seek a right relationship with the Lord. At the same time, he pleads with the Lord to remove from him his chastening hand, begging the Lord to look away from him for a moment. Here, he does not want the Lord to remove his presence entirely but merely to turn away from him his chastening hand, for David is overwhelmed by the discipline that he has endured.

Nevertheless, in v.11, David shares with us one of the insights that the Lord had given to him in the midst of this trial as a result of his request for wisdom. He says “When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him.” By this David does not suggest that God is somehow a cosmic killjoy but rather that he is ruthless in tearing down the idols of our hearts that diminish our love for God and others and wreak havoc all around us. Because God loves us as his sons and daughters, He will continually take away the things that we love inordinately when those things are not worthy of our love. Of course, when we are in the process of losing something that we hold so dear, we don’t often sense God’s love for us at that particular moment, but upon reflection we will see that God in fact knows what is best for us, and we will rejoice in due time. But in the meantime, we must learn, like David, to muzzle our mouths as wait upon the Lord to shed more light on the matter. It is in that time of waiting and wondering that we are learning to put our hope in the Lord.