SINKING DOWN (Psalm 69)

This culvert near our home takes an irrigation ditch under the street for

about 100 feet. Not something I'd want to crawl through, which

makes me think all the more of what happened in Thailand

(A series on the 48 psalms recommended for times when depression comes, from the book Healing for Damaged Emotions by pastor/counselor David Seamands.)

All the scandals and attacks of our troubled planet took a back news page in July when twelve Thai boys and their soccer coach went missing. Their excursion into a complicated cave system turned into a two-week nightmare of darkness as rains poured, the cave flooded, and hope for their survival waned. But they were rescued!

The opening sections of Psalm 69 reminded me of this tense, despairing situation. Attributed to David, it begins:

Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in the miry depths where there is no foothold. I have come into the deep waters; the floods engulf me. (vv. 1-2)

Similar to Psalm 40, David likens his emotional state to a drowning or being sucked down in quicksand. If he’d gone to a counselor, his “get to know you” session might have sounded like this:

“I’m hoarse from screaming for help.” (v. 3)

“Everybody hates me for no reason.” (v. 4)

“Even my family has given up on me.” (v. 8)

“I’m scorned, disgraced, and shamed.” (v. 20)

Now, attach those descriptions to Jesus, for Psalm 69 is more than one man’s take on his dive from popularity. The One who perfectly showed us God’s love was hated for no reason.  Except for His mother, many doubted that He was who He claimed to be. He was scorned, disgraced, and shamed all the way to the cross where his executioners gave Him vinegar for his thirst.”  Yes, verse 21 and many other snippets of Psalm 69 are prophetic of what the Lord Jesus went through in dying for our sins. Seven of this psalm’s 36 verses are quoted in the New Testament.

This is one of twelve “imprecatory” psalms, and the only one chosen for Dr. Seamands’ list of “study” psalms for people battling depression. These psalms are full of revenge, even bitterness, toward people around them. This bothered me because Romans 12:19 says to leave vengeance to God. But here’s the basis for the psalms’ harshness. The people being called “enemies” in these psalms have rebelled against God, His chosen people, or His anointed king. 

Go ahead and skim through Psalm 69 and pause at verse 20:

I am in pain and distress; may your salvation, O God, protect me.

Then head into the last seven verses that start, “I will praise God’s name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving.” Draw a line from “name” in that verse to “name” in verse 36. When life is the pits (or we feel like we're drowning in one), one remedy is to deflect our attention to what is “praiseworthy.”  It is good medicine for “down times” to simply focus on God and His attributes. 

This is the other end of the under-the-street culvert,

so narrow that it would be impossible for a person to 

crawl under it. Maybe that's an analogy for the saying

that our impossibilities are God's possibilities.

I keep a little prayer notebook that fits into the outside pocket of my Bible. One of its tabbed sections is titled “God’s names,” and in there, in A-Z order, are the names of God as I have encountered them in my scripture reading. When I am feeling down, it is helpful for me to go there and just read those names and praise God for Who He is and All that He is. Sometimes at night when I can’t sleep, I lay in the darkness and go through the alphabet, speaking those names to God as worship. The negative circumstances and people who  contribute to my feeling “down” may not go away. But focusing on the One who is Light and Hope reminds me that there’s a way out of my temporary “miry depths.”

I can only imagine the astonishment of those Thai lads when a rescuer popped into their chamber. They weren’t entirely rescued yet, but the hope was there. Maybe that’s why there are psalms like this one, to remind us that when we feel lost and hopeless, as Christians we’re not really alone.

Making 'Psense' of Psalms--Psalm 69: Trampled

 Part of a continuing series on selected psalms.
A recent praise song alludes to Christ as a rose, trampled on the ground.* That image comes to me as I read through Psalm 69 and think first of David’s troubles, then of its amazing prophecies of Christ’s rejection and crucifixion. Living 1,000 years before Christ, David could not have known his words would match the experience of the future Messiah. The Jews were looking for a perfect king, one to end all the corruption and oppression of their times. Christ came instead as a suffering servant:  “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).

GOOD AND ANGRY!

Psalm 69 should be read on two levels. The first is the laments of someone who is literally “good-and-angry,” meaning he considers himself a “good” person but he’s angry over how his enemies mistreat him. The second, prophetic level is of Someone who was perfectly good, but took the punishment of the divine anger over sin, dying on the cross. Psalm 69 is one of fourteen psalms have obvious Messianic references.

DAVID’S TALE OF WOE

David wastes no time asking for God to intervene in his problems.  “Save me!” he cries. He compares his situation to drowning (vv. 1-4) amidst enemies who number more than the hairs on his head (v. 4). He claims his innocence (“I am forced to restore what I did not steal,” v. 4c) and then turns around and admits that God knows about his folly and guilt, too (v. 5).  He essentially says, “I’m not perfect, but I still look to you.”  He details the abuse he goes through: mocking, ridicule, shame, having no sympathizers, unable to get decent food.  In short, he experienced major “pain and distress” (v. 20). Finally, he prayed fiercely (vv. 21-29) for his enemies to get their just due. “Do not let them share in your salvation,” he urged, “May they be blotted out of the book of life and not be listed with the righteous (v. 27). On the other hand, Jesus said He came to seek to lost, and we should rejoice that our names are written in Heaven (Luke 10:20).

JESUS' TALE OF LOVE

In the midst of David’s woes, I see Jesus in these passages:
“Those who hate me without reason…” (v. 4). In His discourse about the vine and branches, Jesus quoted this phrase (also in Psalm 35:19) to show how those who opposed Him were fulfilling prophecies of His rejection ((John 15:25).

“I am a stranger to my brothers, an alien to my own mother’s sons (v. 8). The Bible says Mary bore at least six children (Mark 6:3) and that even his brothers didn’t believe He was the Messiah (John 7:2-5).

“Zeal for your house consumes me, and the insults of those who insult you fall on me” (v. 9). John 2:17 pictured that zeal when Jesus threw the dishonest moneychangers out of the temple. Romans 15:3 says, “For even Christ did not please himself but, as it is written: ‘The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.’”

 “Do not hide your face from your servant” (v. 17). Shortly before His death, Christ called out from the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46, Mark 15:34).

“You know how I am scorned, disgraced and shamed; all my enemies are before you.  Scorn has broken my heart and has left me helpless; I looked for sympathy but there was none, for comforters, but I found none” (v. 20). Gospel accounts of the crucifixion tell of those who passed under the cross hurling insults at him. Hebrews 12:2 says of Jesus, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Recently I attended a performance of Handel’s “Messiah” in its entirety—nearly three hours of scripture sung by students from two colleges. It all moved me, but probably more than ever before, the tenor’s rendition of Christ’s suffering left me feeling, “These are holy words. This has become a holy place. How He loved me to suffer so!”

“They put gall in my food and gave me vinegar for my thirst” (v. 21). The Gospel accounts of the crucifixion tell how Jesus was offered vinegar with gall (a sedative), then just vinegar for thirst (Matthew 27:34, 48 and John 19:28).

THE BETTER SOLUTION

The psalm concludes David’s tale of woe with a call to praise: “I will praise God’s name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving” (v. 30) and concludes, “those who love his name will dwell there” (v. 36). The references to “captive people” (v. 33) and “rebuild the cities of Judah” (v. 35) led commentators to believe that the concluding section wasn’t David’s lyrics, but added many years later, after the nation’s captivity and deportation. Also, David reigned over all Israel, and it wasn’t until his grandson’s reign that troubles erupted and the land was divided into kingships of “Israel” (the northern part) and “Judah” (the southern part). Later came the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities, which left both political entities desolate until a remnant of faithful ones returned.  

 Despite its questioned authorship, the concluding section is still consistent with David’s heart. I only need to turn back a few pages in my Bible to his Psalm 34 to read, “I will extol the LORD at all times; his praise will always be on my lips…Glorify the LORD with me; let us exalt his name together” (34:1, 3).

Psalm 69 is clearly about “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief”—and I don’t mean just David. From the other side of history from the crucifixion—from that pure Rose of Sharon trampled on the ground by scorning sinners--we can consider ourselves most blessed…because we have a Savior!

Next: Psalm 73.

*The © 1999 song is “Above All,” by Lenny LcBlanc and Paul Baloche.