PSALMS 13
We will begin by giving chapter 13 of Psalm in metre to show how
easily it could be sung.
THE PSALMS OF DAVID IN METRE
Chapter 13
verse 1 "How long wilt thou forget me? Shall it forever be?
O Lord, how long neglect me, And hide thy face from me?"
verse 2 "How long my soul take counsel? Thus sad in heart each day,
How long shall foes exhulting, Subject me to their sway?"
verse 3 "O Lord, my God, consider, And hear my earnest cries;
Lest I in death should slumber, Enlighten thou my eyes;"
verse 4 "Lest foes be heard exclaiming Against him we prevailed;
And they that vex my spirit, Rejoice when I have failed."
verse 5 "But on thy tender mercy I ever have relied;
With joy in thy salvation My heart shall still confide."
verse 6 "And I with voice of singing, Will praise the Lord alone,
Because to me his favor He hath so largely shown."
Now we will get into the verse by verse study of this Psalm,
taken from the King James version of the Bible. Psalms 13:1 "{To the
chief Musician, A Psalm of David.} How long wilt thou forget me, O
LORD? for ever? how long wilt thou hide thy face from me?"
I asked in a previous lesson, have you ever felt like crying out
to God, how long? It seems that David feels the situation is
desperate. He must hear form God immediately. This is not a
murmuring, but a cry for God to help. If you have never started a work
for the glory of God, you have not experienced what David is feeling
here. It is as if David is saying, I did the best I could Lord, Have I
displeased you so that you are hiding from me? David really had not
displeased God. Perhaps, David was being taught a lesson of patience.
Sometimes, it seems the harder we try, the slower our answers are in
coming. I wrote a little book on Time Shall Be No More. In the book I
talked about how time flies when we are doing something we enjoy. I,
also, related that when we are sick or suffering, time seems to just
drag by. Perhaps, this is the case here. David is suffering, so time
is dragging by. The Lord never forgets His own. Hebrews 13:5 "[Let
your] conversation [be] without covetousness; [and be] content with
such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor
forsake thee."
Psalms 13:2 "How long shall I take counsel in my soul, [having]
sorrow in my heart daily? how long shall mine enemy be exalted over
me?"
This reminds me so much of the things we try to do by our own
might. We try this and that and it fails. David is in the same fix
here. He knows war and is not afraid to go into battle to win. He
seems to have tried all the things he knows to do in the flesh, and
none of these things have worked. Have you ever read, When all else
fails, read the instructions. We Christians, and David as well, need
to take that advice. The Bible is our instruction Book. There is an
answer for every problem we face, and even for the one David is facing
here. It is not by our might that things work out, it is by God's
help. Zechariah 4:6 "Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, This
[is] the word of the LORD unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor
by power, but by my spirit, saith the LORD of hosts." Have faith in
the instruction Book {Bible} and the Instructor {God}, then you cannot
fail. Even though the enemy seems to be winning, I have read the last
page and God wins. All of God's children, who learn to trust in the
Lord, will have the last laugh over their enemies.
Psalms 13:3 "Consider [and] hear me, O LORD my God: lighten mine
eyes, lest I sleep the [sleep of] death;"
David has done the only thing left to him. He is praying to the
Lord for help. When we feel that God is not listening to our prayers,
it brings the worst despair a person can know. David says, he is
sorrowful unto death. Perhaps, death would be a relief from his great
sorrow. Even Jesus felt this great sorrow, as we read in the following
verse. Matthew 26:38 "Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding
sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me." Jesus
prayed and submitted to the will of the Father.
Psalms 13:4 "Lest mine enemy say, I have prevailed against him;
[and] those that trouble me rejoice when I am moved."
One of the reasons that Moses gave God, not to destroy the
children of Israel out in the wilderness, when they made the golden
calf, was that the Egyptians would rejoice about it. David is
explaining to God that God's enemies will rejoice over the destruction
of David. Those who are opposed to David are God's enemies, as well as
David's. In fact, they associated David with the God of Israel. When
David killed the giant {Goliath}, David came against Him in the name
of the God of Israel. This is a good reason David is giving here, but
it is not necessary. God will help David, because He loves him. God
will help you and me, because He loves us. He is our Father.
Psalms 13:5 "But I have trusted in thy mercy; my heart shall
rejoice in thy salvation."
Now, we see a statement of confidence in the mercy of God. We see
David remembering his trust he had placed in the Lord. Just as every
one of us must place our trust in the salvation that Jesus has
provided for us, David must activate his faith and trust. God is a God
of mercy. Prayers are answered when we have faith that they will be
answered.
Psalms 13:6 "I will sing unto the LORD, because he hath dealt
bountifully with me."
What a beautiful way to end this chapter. David is praising God
in song for dealing so bountifully with him. The sorrow we feel when
we are convinced that God has forgotten us, is quickly turned to joy
and thanksgiving when we remember all the blessings He has showered
upon us. Pray with faith, and God will bless you above what you can
ask or think.
THE PSALMS OF DAVID IN METRE
Chapter 14
verse 1 "The God who sits enthroned on high The fool doth in his
heart deny; Corrupt are they, vile works have done, And
doing good there is not one."
verse 2 "From heaven with searching eye the Lord Did all the sons of
men regard; To see if any understood, If any one were
seeking God."
verse 3 "From righteous ways they all depart; All are corrupt and
vile in heart; Among them doing good is none, Among them
all, not even one."
verse 4 "Has knowledge from the wicked fled, That they my people eat
as bread? That they delight in works of shame, And call not
on Jehovah's name?"
verse 5 "There fearful terror on them fell; For God doth with the
righteous dwell; The poor man's counsel you despise, Because
in God his refuge lies."
verse 6 "May Israel's help from Zion come, When God shall bring his
captives home, Then Jacob greatly shall rejoice, And Israel
shout with gladsome voice."
We will now begin our study in Psalms 14:1 "{To the chief
Musician, [A Psalm] of David.} The fool hath said in his heart, [There
is] no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, [there
is] none that doeth good."
It would certainly be a fool who would say, there is no God. We
have only to look around us at all of God's creation and know there is
God. Just the fact that a planet rotates out in the atmosphere and
does not fall, shows that there is order in the universe. Some One,
greater than you and I, put the planet there and told it what to do.
So many people, in the age we live in, have the false idea that we
will become a god some day. To answer them, I say, have you created
any worlds lately? An intelligence so far above our comprehension
created the entire universe, and everything, and everyone in it. I can
dig a hole in the ground and plant a seed, water it and watch it grow.
The strange thing is that, I did not make the ground to put it in, I
had nothing to do with the making of the seed, and I didn't even make
the water to water it with. You see, if there were no God to provide
the earth, the seed, and the water, then I could not grow a plant. I
am not even in control of the next breath I breathe. When God gets
ready for me to stop breathing, I will. How foolish it is to say there
is no God. You see, we do not even have the ability to save ourselves
from hell. We all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. If
we say, we have not sinned, we are a liar. Our only hope is God. He
loved us and sent His precious Son to die on the cross to save us. Our
sins are not just covered up, they are wiped away in the blood of our
precious Saviour, Jesus Christ. The only thing we are required to do
is to believe. What a fool, to say there is no God.
Psalms 14:2 "The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children
of men, to see if there were any that did understand, [and] seek God."
In the days of Noah, God did this very thing. He was grieved in
His heart, because He had made man. He searched to see if there were
any who believed, and He found Noah. The really sad thing was that,
God could not even find 10 people in right standing with Him in Sodom
and Gomorrah. It appears from this verse, that even in David's day, it
was hard to find anyone living for God. We might say, if God looked
down today, He might decide that it is worse now than then. There are
a few real Christians, but the world as a whole, has gone bad. Sin is
on every corner.
Psalms 14:3 "They are all gone aside, they are [all] together
become filthy: [there is] none that doeth good, no, not one."
This is speaking of humanity as a whole. Truly our generation
would be classified as the most evil generation. I personally believe
that television has had a great deal to do with the evil that is so
rampant today. Movies, so filthy they would not have been allowed even
in B movie houses a few years ago, are shown on prime time television
now. Drugs and alcohol are rampant in our society. My own opinion of
why drugs and alcohol are used so much is, because people are not able
to face the realities of each day. They think, if they get high on
drugs or alcohol, it will help them face the day to day problems of
life. Wholesale credit plans have ruined many marriages. Soap operas
cause young girls to put unrealistic hopes on their marriages. Little
children {neglected by parents} are seeking love in gangs. It really
seems the whole society has gone crazy. Where are the true Christians
who will stand up and try to change things for the better? Someone
must say, STOP! Christian women and men of America must take a stand
for God. We are in a war. Who will stand, even in the face of death,
for Christian principles set down in the Bible? Will God say of our
generation, where is even one who truly loves Me?
Psalms 14:4 "Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who
eat up my people [as] they eat bread, and call not upon the LORD."
These workers of iniquity are those who have rejected the Lord
Jesus Christ as their Saviour. They are not satisfied with being lost
themselves, but constantly are encouraging weak Christians to get
involved with them. It is dangerous to fellowship with those of
unbelief. Christians should witness to the lost, but do not go into
their places and get involved in their sin to witness to them. These
workers of iniquity desire to absorb Christians into their way of life
{eat them}. Christians are to be separated people. We are not to be
caught up in the things of this world. When we receive Jesus as our
Saviour, we are symbolically buried with Jesus. We rise to new life in
Him, which means we live our life the way Jesus would live if He were
living it. The world, and the wicked in it, are headed for hell. Don't
go with them, Christian.
Psalms 14:5 "There were they in great fear: for God [is] in the
generation of the righteous."
This fear is speaking of the terrible awareness of knowing you
have sinned and deserve to go to hell. This fear {reverence} of God
causes a man to repent. Repentance of sin and accepting Jesus as our
Saviour, makes us righteous in God's sight. Those, who have accepted
full pardon through the shed blood of Jesus, are the generation of the
righteous in God.
Psalms 14:6 "Ye have shamed the counsel of the poor, because the
LORD [is] his refuge."
The evil doers of this world, laugh at the righteousness of the
believer. There is a day when their laughing will cease. Proverbs
14:26 "In the fear of the LORD [is] strong confidence: and his
children shall have a place of refuge." God fights our enemies for us.
Hebrews 6:18 "That by two immutable things, in which [it was]
impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who
have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us:"
Psalms 14:7 "Oh that the salvation of Israel [were come] out of
Zion! when the LORD bringeth back the captivity of his people, Jacob
shall rejoice, [and] Israel shall be glad."
Throughout all Jewish history, they have looked for Messiah,
their Saviour. This Scripture, possibly, is prophetic in more than one
way. Not only, did Jesus come to the earth and save all who would
believe, but this, also, looks to the time when physical Israel comes
back into the land. I believe that it further indicates the coming of
the Lord for the church {Zion}. To further understand this Scripture,
study about the 2 sticks that come together. The 37th chapter of
Ezekial is good hunting ground. I will leave this part of the study to
you. Just one note here. The ones to study are Jacob and Israel.
Questions 13
1. Have you ever felt like crying out to God, How long?
2. This from David is not a murmuring, but a ___ ___ ____.
3. Perhaps, David was being taught a lesson of ________.
4. Time _____ when we are doing something we enjoy.
5. Where do we find the Scripture that says, I will never leave you
nor forsake you?
6. In verse 2, what has David tried, that didn't work?
7. When all else fails, read the ___________.
8. What is the instruction book for the believer?
9. Not by might, nor by power, but by my _______, saith the Lord.
10. What is probably the worst despair for a Christian?
11. Who is sorrowful, even unto death, in Matthew chapter 26 verse 38?
12. What was one of the reasons Moses gave God for not destroying all
the Israelites, when they made the golden calf?
13. David's enemies are _____ enemies, as well.
14. What was the name of the giant that David had killed?
15. David came against the giant in whose name?
16. When are prayers answered?
17. What did David do, that showed he thanked God for dealing so
bountifully with him?
18. Pray with ______, and God will bless you.
19. The fool has said in his heart, _____ __ __ ___.
20. What is one undeniable proof that there is God?
21. When we think we are a little god, what question does the author
ask us?
22. What is the strange thing about growing a plant?
23. Our only hope is ___.
24. In the days of Noah, God looked down to the earth and was sorry
about what?
25. God could not find ___ righteous men in Sodom and Gomorrah.
26. What would God think, if He looked down and saw our society?
27. What does the author believe is a large contributing factor to the
evil in our society?
28. What does the author believe is the underlying reason that people
are alcoholics and drug addicts?
29. What has ruined many marriages?
30. What is the underlying cause of many young girls having
unrealistic ideas about marriage?
31. Why do a lot of children join gangs?
32. What must Christian men and women do to change things for the
better?
33. Who are the workers of iniquity in verse 4?
34. Why is it dangerous for Christians to fellowship with those of
iniquity?
35. God is in the generation of the __________.
36. Describe what makes us righteous.
37. Quote Proverbs chapter 14 verse 26.
38. In what ways is Psalms chapter 14 verse 7 prophetic?
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