Psalm 59 - For God is My Defense
By Bunni Pounds
*This blog is part of our weekly, virtual Bible Study through the book of Psalms. For information on how to participate, please visit this page.
Can you imagine having men watching your house “in order to kill” you?
This is the horrible situation that David finds himself in when he wrote Psalm 59 to the Chief Musician.
This seems to be a similar refrain and experience that David keeps having in one setting or another. How does he endure? How does he live through it all?
Instead of focusing on the enemies surrounding David – let’s focus on the truth that he sings over his life. Let’s go straight to the end and focus most of our time on this section.
“But I will sing of Your power;
Yes, I will sing aloud of Your mercy in the morning;
For You have been my defense
And refuge in the day of my trouble.
To You, O my Strength, I will sing praises;
For God is my defense,
My God of mercy.” (verse 16-17)
It is the MORNING!
In the morning is where His mercies are new, and His faithfulness is shown. In this place is where singing and praise brings strength. It is where we remember that God is our defense and that He is a God of mercy.
Lamentations 3:22-24 says,
“Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed,
Because His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“Therefore I hope in Him!”
We are all going through a time of shaking right now, but this Psalm speaks loudly to us that God sees, and cares and it is not shaken by it.
“But You, O Lord, shall laugh at them;
You shall have all the nations in derision.I will wait for You, O You his Strength;
For God is my defense.My God of mercy shall come to meet me;
God shall let me see my desire on my enemies.” (verses 8-10)
This part of Psalm 59 sounds like Psalm 2 where God the King over all the earth is laughing. He is not afraid.
Why?
Because He knows what is coming.
And He can be a God of Strength and comfort for us as we wait on Him.
“He who sits in the heavens shall laugh;
The Lord shall hold them in derision.
Then He shall speak to them in His wrath,
And distress them in His deep displeasure:
‘Yet I have set My King
On My holy hill of Zion.’” - Psalm 2:4-6
God knows that His SON – JESUS – will be set on His holy hill from the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, and the kings of the earth will bow down to Him.
The secret to not fearing in this time in history is to see God as our defense. He will defend us if we put our trust in Him.
I have been reading the story of Corrie Ten Boom again called “The Hiding Place”.
The strength of Corrie and her sister Betsie to endure such hardship in prison is unbelievable. Because of their underground efforts to save hundreds of Jews during the German occupation of Holland – they were put in solitary confinement, stuck into a box car for 4 days with no food and no sanitation, and forced to work picking up rocks and Betsie eventually died in the concentration camp.
Betsie kept taking her sister Corrie back to the simplicity of the Word of God and God’s love for them even in their imprisonment.
She valued the simple little Bible that she read out loud to the other women as they sat on their bunk beds in filthy conditions. She looked for ways to minister to the prison guards instead of looking at them as animals. She thanked God for trees in the horizon after getting out of a boxcar of filth and starving women.
God was truly Betsie’s defense in a horrific situation and taught her sister Corrie how to walk with God and cling to the simplicity of the gospel in one of the worst times in history. (Read the Hiding Place with us this month)
In my time of trouble – do I look for the Lord to be my refuge?
Reading the Hiding Place again puts my life in perspective. Even though I might be struggling to pay the bills some months, though I might have disagreements with my husband from time to time, or have a small quibble with a friend – are those really “troubles”?
God is with us every day to be our refuge in the middle of trouble. He will never leave us or forsake us.
Simplicity of faith and contentment are somethings we greatly lack in these days. Nothing is ever enough. We need more food, clothes, travel, better furniture, more friends, great careers, more, more, and more.
But God calls us to live differently in simplicity and gladness of heart knowing that He will never leave us.
Hebrews 13:5 –
“Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
My prayer this week meditating on Psalm 59 is that I would see God as One who laughs over the troubles of this life because He is SO above it all and that He would truly be my defense.
What do I have to fear? What do we have to fear?
“For God is my defense,
My God of mercy!” (verse 17)
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