Psalm 27 – “The LORD is My Light & My Salvation”
This is part of our summer Psalms series in 2009, where we are preaching through some of Pastor Duane’s favorites Psalms. This week is an exegetical sermon on Psalm 27 titled The LORD is My Light and My Salvation. This sermon looks at facing enemies and difficult situations, fearing God, seeking the LORD, prayer and waiting on God. This sermon was originally preached July 6th, 2009 at The Resolved Church in San Diego, CA.
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The Resolved Church
Pastor Duane Smets
July 5th, 2009
Psalm 27 – “The LORD is My Light & My Salvation”
I. Enemies and the Fear of the LORD (v1-3)
II. Insecurity and the Refuge of the LORD (v4-5)
III. Victory and the Joy of the LORD (v6)
IV. Prayer and the Presence of the LORD (v7-12)
V. Waiting and the Courage of the LORD (v13-14)
Introduction
Okay, so we’re going to do Psalm 27 this morning. We’re hitting random Psalms this summer. A lot of you are in and out with vaction and what not, so it seemed good for us to work through some stuff this summer where each week isn’t dependant on the previous week, like when we go through books of the Bible.
I’ve said a number of times that the Psalms are very personal for me. I read ‘em a lot, about one a day…they are simply very powerful and very relevant to life in this world if you’re a person who loves God and actually try to deal with things like your heart, people, and Jesus.
This particular Psalms has been very special to me, not only because of the numerous times it has ministered to me, both during times of trouble and times when I was really seeking after God…but this is the first passage of Scripture that my wife and I ever memorized together.
With that let’s read this Psalm together, pray and then get into it.
I. Enemies and the Fear of the LORD (v1-3)
So right of the bat here, David (the author of this Psalm) opens up a ton of huge, immense, deep issues. He calls God his personal light, salvation, and rock and then he brings up one of the most intense human emotions, fear.
In fact throughout the entirety of this Psalm we are pulled from one end of the spectrum to the other…confidence and uncertainty, life and death, light and darkness, joy and pain, abandonement and adoption, distance and closeness, good and evil, waiting and receiving.
Seems a little intense for a July 4th summer weekend…it just worked out that way. It was kind of funny preparing this week because this Psalm really calls for this heart wrenching struggle and trial…and I had a pretty good week. Sounds funny to say, “man I wish I had a real crappy week this week so I could identify with this Psalm better.” Maybe that’s a good thing.
I think what we have here with this Psalm is either the situation that is described in 1 Samuel 23 with David or a situation like it, and David is preaching to his own soul as he deals with it. Several times throughout the Psalms you’ll see David do this. Sometimes you have to preach to yourself, some of you need to learn how to do that when facing temptation, learn how to fortify yourself.
So let me share with you the story and then we’ll see and hopefully learn from David how to face fears, enemies, and insecurities and come out joyful, prayerful and confident.
Most of you are pobably familiar with the story of David Goliath. I shared some of the story a few weeks ago. Saul is the king of Israel. They are in a war against the Philistines. They have this huge Shaquille O’Neal size warrior, who in a time without guns is like having a Nuclear weapon. Everyone is scared of him including King Saul who is supposed to be the strongest warrior of all.
Nobody wants to fight Goliath, little scrappy red-haired David comes in and takes him out with his sling, steals Goliath’s own sword and cuts off Goliath’s head with it. It’s every dude’s favorite story in the Bible.
After that, though Saul is thankful, he becomes jealous because David turns out to be quite a good warrior and gains a following, including Saul’s own son Jonathan. So Saul tries to kill David. David gets back from a tour kicking some Philistine arse and they’re hanging out in Saul’s house and Saul throws a spear at him. David leaves and Saul takes after him with his army.
David gets a head start on him, first hiding out at the priests house, but Saul follows him there, so David goes to Gath. Saul catches up there too so then David goes to a cave in Adullam, but gets word that Saul is on his way, so David heads off into the forest in Nob. Saul can’t find David there so he goes and gets the priests, the pastors of the town and kills them for helping hide David.
This goes on and on. He follows David to Keilah, to the wilderness of Ziph and then to Moan. Now listen to the words of Samuel 23:24-29 and then we’ll re-read these first couple verses of Psalm 27.
Samuel 23:24-29 “24 Now David and his men were in the wilderness of Maon, in the Arabah to the south of Jeshimon. 25 And Saul and his men went to seek him. And David was told, so he went down to the rock and lived in the wilderness of Maon. And when Saul heard that, he pursued after David in the wilderness of Maon. 26 Saul went on one side of the mountain, and David and his men on the other side of the mountain. And David was hurrying to get away from Saul. As Saul and his men were closing in on David and his men to capture them, 27 a messenger came to Saul, saying, “Hurry and come, for the Philistines have made a raid against the land.” 28 So Saul returned from pursuing after David and went against the Philistines. Therefore that place was called the Rock of Escape. 29 And David went up from there and lived in the strongholds of Engedi.”
Now listen to Psalm 27:1-3 again.
Psalm 27:1-3 “1 The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? 2 When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall. 3 Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident.”
Sounds pretty similar huh? The stronghold, the adveraries and foes against him personally? If this isn’t the situation is one very much like it.
But it’s not the exact situation that matters so much is it? It is any situation where there is a particular person, persons, or circumstance that is seemingly after you…crowded all around you like a great darkness. Have any of you ever felt like that? Just trapped?
Many people feel like that right now with the financial crisis we are facing. A dark force crowded all around you. Some may have experienced situations or season in life when it just seems like nothing is going right. There are fears of failure (new), fears of the future (job), fears of nuclear warfare (North Korea), fear of death (M.J.), fear of the unknown (Stella), fears of conflict (people), fears of change… Few have probably ever faced a situation exactly like David’s, where somone has called you out, your name, and declared and attempted to take your life. That’s intense. But we all experience fear.
With David, he’s got a king and his whole army and war after him, personally, him alone. He says here they want to “eat up his flesh.” That’s like what birds do to carcasses of animals that are killed and left to rot. This is daunting, the level of emtotional turmoil. But in the midst of it he is able to say, “the LORD is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?”
Three times he says he isn’t afraid. “Whom shall I fear?” “Whom shall I be afraid?” “My heart will not fear.” What is the ground of his confidence? Look at it. It’s the LORD. Do you think you could say that if you were in a dark place like this? If you’re there now, are you seeing the LORD as your light, salvation and stronghold?
Why is it that seeing the LORD that way dispells fear? It is this, listen close. Many simply want to get rid of fear altogether. Fear is bad, we don’t like how it feels, so we just need to figure out how to dismiss it. That’s not the answer.
The answer is this: God is the biggest thing to be afraid of. He’s the most powerful. He’s the one who knows and controls everything. He’s the one who spoke the world into existence and he’s the one who can wipe out an army with a word. The beginning of the book of Proverbs starts off with the theme, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge (Prov. 1:7).”
If we truly come to have a knowledge of the LORD, fear of anything else dissipates because we know there is truly nothing and no one else to be afraid of.
But here is the amazing thing. Though God is to be feared and fearing him dispells all fears, being afraid of him is not like a fear where we think he is out to get me, because God is good God. That’s what the next verses are about. How our fears are really our insecurities and how turning to the LORD and in fearing him we find a refuge.
II. Insecurity and the Refuge of the LORD (v4-5)
Look at it, how does confidence instead of fear come about? By this, verse 4. Having, “One thing I ask of the LORD, that I will seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and inquire in his temple.”
This is how fearing God is different. Most things that we are afraid of we run from, we avoid dealing with them, whether they are people or situations. But when you fear the LORD, you run to him and seek him out. In fact a primary theme of the Bible is seeking God. Seeking God is one of the primary paradigms of what it means to be a Christian. We are a people who are in pursuit of God.
I love that little phrase, there is one thing, one thing I will seek after…the LORD. Could you say that about your life, that God is the one thing you seek after? Above all the other things you seek after, work for, spend your time and thought on…is God the one thing before and above all those things…the one thing?
Now there are two ways you can look at this little section about seeking the Lord…One that it is a church thing. That the house of the LORD is a church service, it is there that you behold the being of God in his beauty and you come to inquire and study and learn. I think that would be fair and true.
But there is also this little phrase there, “all the days of my life.” And I don’t think he’s saying, you know what I really want is to be able to go to a church service everyday. So I think it is taking what is true about worship services with God’s people and saying, I need a microcosm of what the Sunday experience is supposed to be…dailiy.
Where daily God is at the forefront of everything. Where daily I am looking to the beauty of the LORD. And daily I am inquiring and growing and learning from him.
What happens if you are being enriched by the goodness of God is that it changes you…because you begin to experience God at work in you. Verse 5 tries to say this three different ways, he hides us, conceals us and lifts us up. Hide and conceal are similar, lifts up is a little different.
The shelter and the cover of his tent are probably referring to the royal tent. When there would be a war or a battle between two armies, in the middle of there camps would be the royal tent, where the king would be. It is the most heavily guarded of all the tents and the safest place to be in all of the camp.
This is how it works. When we seek the Lord, there are fears, but as we seek we then begin to experience his blessing…his comfort, his assurance, even his correction shifts our viewpoint and our affections. And the result is we are no longer downcast and afraid but our spirits are lifted and we turn confident. In Psalm 3:3 David says God is ,”the glory and the lifter of my head.”
A pastor named A.W. Tozer wrote a great little book called, “The Pursuit of God” that I read a number of years ago now…I actually have one of the dudes in disicpleship with me reading through it right now. He describes this experience well. He writes,
“Let the seeking man reach a place where life and lips join to say continually, ‘Be thou exalted,’ and a thousand minor problems will be solved at once. His Christian life ceases to be the complicated thing it had been before and becomes the very essence of simplicity.”
Sometimes what we need most is just a big dose of the being of God. John Calvin says often we don’t know how to rely on God because we imagine that he is against us. But if we have experienced his grace then it doesn’t matter what we are facing because we know God and we know God is greater.
If you have ever experienced God as your refuge then it becomes imprinted into you as a reminder for you to call upon when you face an enemy, then you you are able to have a confidence to be able to say, “he will lift me high upon a rock.”
III. Victory and the Joy of the LORD (v6)
Victory is the only possible outcome and it is cause for great joy. Which brings us to our third point, “Victory and the Joy of the LORD.” Look at verse 6. Now maybe at this point you’re like, “Yeah, that sounds good but what if you seek God and he doesn’t answer your prayer and your head is not lifted up? What if your enemies do defeat you?”
Two things. One, well were you seeking God just for what you could get out of him or were you actually seeking God? Two, is what joys your heart other people’s praise and approval of you or God himself?
You see, I get it. You could easily read this in a way where you are saying that David is only turning to God as a talisman, a magical or religious trick to employ in order to beat the guys he doesn’t like…and David will only praise and sing to God if he defeats his enemies in way that they look up to David high on a rock and recognize David’s greatness. So David is really all just about himself and doesn’t really care about God. You could read it like that.
But I don’t think that is what is going on here. I don’t think the Bible is trying to teach us here to use God and be all about our enemies thinking how great we are. Yes, it seems pretty clear that David is concerned about his immediate situation. In the next section he is going to enter into a prayer specifically praying for him not to be given over to his enemies.
Yet, I think it is calling us to something much deeper. The whole Psalm seems to ring with declaration of the goodness and greatness of God…even though God’s attributes are not outlined and his past deeds are not recounted. David seems to care most, not so much for his own name’s reputation, but God’s. David has put his trust in God and he does not want God to end up looking bad, he cares about the glory of God, God’s reputation.
In his prayer we’ll hear his acknowledgement of sinfulness, so David doesn’t think he is great and he’s not in an ego battle just to beat his enemies. He has distinctly embraced God, God’s light, God’s salvation, God’s house, and God’s beauty. I believe what the shouts of joy and the song and melody to the LORD are about here…is praise to God for who he is and what he has done.
It’s what we do here on Sunday mornings. We might sing a song of petition, a prayer like song. But most of our songs are praise, thanking and honoring God for who he is and his works done in history and in our lives. That is the real substance of worship…because if all we sing is petition then we are mainly singing about ourselves.
It’s one reason why I don’t like a lot of songs with me, me, me, and I, I, I…I don’t like singing about myself. It’s much more enjoyable to sing about the beauty and power of the LORD and what he has done in history for us in Jesus’ death on the cross.
Singing is so unique when it is worship to God. It becomes more than just a song that we sing along with on the radio. The song becomes the overflow of the heart that is affected its taking in of God.
IV. Prayer and the Presence of the LORD (v7-12)
I think that is what David is really seeking in his prayer in verses 7-12, he seeks not only a physical deliverance from enemies but an experiential sense of God’s presence. Let’s look at it and talk about “Prayer and the Presence of the LORD.”
This is a beautiful prayer. We can learn so much about people’s relationships with God by looking at or listening to their prayers. They help us know how we are to relate to God in our prayers. There’s some amazing stuff about in this prayer here.
One, he cries. Have you ever really cried when praying? Really got down on your knees and called out to the Lord?
Two, he knows he doesn’t deserve God to answer, so he says “Be gracious.” Grace is getting something you didn’t earn or deserve. When we pray do we treat God like he is wronging us if he doesn’t answer us in the way we want?
Three, he is seeking, hard. He senses God calling him into a deeper devotion, “You said ‘seek my face.’” Maybe God is calling you to seek him more than you ever have before. I was challenged by this text this week, to really, really spend time seeking God more. I’m turning 31 next month, I want to grow deeper this next year in my life with God. Do you want to grow deepr with God?
Four, he recognizes God has reason to be angry with him. He is a sinner. This is recognition that what we deserve is not grace but justice. David really deserves to be put out by his enemies, if God and his holiness was the standard. Do you believe you are a sinner?
Five, he remembers past times when God has helped. God is not one to change his mind, if he’s helped before, why would he have if he didn’t intend to help again. God, you have been the God who is my help, you are the God of help…help again. Do you turn to God as your help?
Six, he calls God father. His mother and father may have died by this point, or worse case scenario had sided with Saul (unlikely from what we know about Jesse, David’s dad) so I think he means they are gone he can’t go to them. But he can go to God. Is God your father, can you go to him like you could a good father?
Seven, he’s humble and asks God for direction…teach me your way and lead me. This one comes up so much in the Bible. It’s probably the one prayer I pray more than any other over and over again…Teach me your ways Oh Lord that I may know you and find favor with you. Lead me LORD. Are you humble enough to realize that you need to be taught and led…in life? We all need discipleship.
And eight, he’s up against ungodly evil dudes. The word for will here is literally lust…the lust of my adversaries. And they’re liars, not speaking truth and wanting to inflict harm to a man who love and trusts in God. They’re corrupt. Do you give in too easy or is there some fight in you?
Each of these parts of this prayer are really intimate. You can’t pray this kind of prayer without some deep heartfelt intimacy with God. The answer to each one of these prayers is God giving himself.
God is everywhere-present. It’s one of his core attributes. He is a Spirit and is constantly aware and knowing of everything that happens all the time. What David is after in these prayers is the manifest presence of God, where the affections of the soul and the frame of the mind become aware and confident of God’s full reality.
I’ll quote Tozer again on this, “The Presence [of God] and the manifestation of the Presence are not the same. There can be the one without the other. God is here when we are wholly unaware of it. He is manifest only when and as we are aware of His Presence.”
Often times, what we need most in our lives is to be made aware of the presence of the Lord. prayer, song unto God, God’s word, communion and God’s people are the chief things God seems to most like to use as vessels for his presence to be made known. That’s why you find each of them here each week.
Each week I pray and ask God to manifest himself in a unique way among us as we partake in those thing…I pray that way so that God would be glorified and we would get much joy, confidence and courage.
V. Waiting and the Courage of the LORD (v13-14)
Have you ever noticed something though…have you ever noticed that often God’s presence is not automatic. In fact, as I have got older in my age and in my faith I have found that two things have happened. One, I have to work a lot harder at pressing in, in seeking God. And two, my confidence level in God has multiplied and multiplied.
Which is interesting, because it is both what David describes here and then commands. In this last part, ” Waiting and the Courage of the LORD” David offers a confident confession of faith, saying, “I believe.” And then he switches into preacher mode and commands us to to wait on God and take courage.
Sometimes, in certain situations God is not going to answer your prayer immediately or any time soon, but he wants you to keep waiting on him…allowing him to work in you. For those who have had to really wait on the LORD about some things…you know it’s in those times where God really does a work in you and brands it into your soul. When prayers are answered quickly we tend to forget quickly, but when God takes his time, that when we often really learn and are able to come out of it in confidence saying, “I believe.”
Maybe some of you just need to hear those words spoken directly to you today. Be strong. Take courage. Wait for the LORD. Believe!
Conclusion
I wanted to treat this text fairly before I immediately jumped to the gospel to show how Jesus is all over this Psalm. I guess I’m especially sensitive to that with Old Testament texts since us Reformed dudes are always accused of just reading Jesus into everything without much care.
But it is quite amazing if you look at this Psalm and then look at the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The Lord is my light and my salvation…Jesus said ” I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life (Jn 8:12).”
An army against you…when a small army came to arrest Jesus he said if he wanted he could When Jesus was arrested he said if he wanted he could ask the Father and he would send 12 legions of angels down to fight for him. One legion is 5,000 angels, so twelve is 60,000 and we see in one story in 2 Kings that one warrior angel is able to take out 185,000 human soliders. So you do the math. Jesus knew the fear of the Lord and was able to see what David most likely couldn’t…when you see 60,000 butt kicking angels what’s youre response? Whom shall I fear?
And yet, what was the chief desire of Jesus life? To smite his enemies when they wronged him? No. To please the father. The very first story of Jesus has him 12 years old, inquiring in the temple. And when it came to the end of his life in the Garden of Gesthamane, what was Jesus doing? Seeking the LORD, getting wrapped in his shelter so that he might be lifted high upon a rock.
And what happened on that cross? It wasn’t just another human being crucified like thousand who died on crosses before him. It was the sinless son of God taking on the sin of the world as if it were his own in order to pay the penalty to God for sin and thereby defeat the greatest enemy of all sin, death, and Satan.
Colosssians 2:14-15 says on the cross Jesus cancelled the record of debt that stood against us, “nailing it to the cross” where he “disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.”
Jesus defeated the enemy once and for all on the cross and that’s why he is our song, he is why we sing and make melody to the Lord. In him every one of David’s prayers are answered for us.
In Jesus, God’s face is no longer hidden from us.
On Jesus, God’s anger unleashed in his own son for us.
Through Jesus, God offers us help so that we might not be cast off and forsaken.
By Jesus, God adopts us into his family enabling us to cry out to him Abba Father.
As Jesus, God teaches us and leads us and takes us into the true and better, ultimate land of the living.
This is the promise of the gospel. The one that can stand against all enemies and all oppostion. Jesus Christ, our light and our salvation.
I conclude with the words of Romans 8:35-39 which say it far better than I ever could.
Romans 8:35-39 “Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? …No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Take courage AND believe.
Let’s pray.
