DAVID A MAN AFTER GOD'S OWN HEART
A STUDY OF PSALM 63
This is a part of the Senior Sunday School Lesson - The Book of Psalms & A study of Psalm 63 that will be posted in the English Sunday School Lesson Blog https://jacobsladdersundayschool.blogspot.com/
Psalm – 63 (NKJV)
A Psalm of David when he was in the
wilderness of Judah.
1 O God, You are my God;
Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty
land Where there is no water.
2 So I have looked for You in the
sanctuary, To see Your power and Your glory.
3 Because
Your lovingkindness is better than life, My lips shall praise You.
4 Thus
I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name.
5 My
soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness, And my mouth
shall praise You with joyful lips.
6 When I
remember You on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches.
7 Because You
have been my help, Therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice.
8 My
soul follows close behind You; Your right hand upholds me.
9 But
those who seek my life, to destroy it, Shall go into the lower
parts of the earth.
10 They
shall fall by the sword; They shall be a portion for jackals.
Author of the Psalm – King David
Time Period & Historical Background
Many of the psalms contain superscripts, which reveal the context and the historical setting of the psalm. In psalm 63 there are two possible incidents in the life of David that could provide the context for this psalm. The superscript of Psalm 63 mentions “A Psalm of David when he was in the wilderness of Judah”. The first possible setting is when David fled King Saul (I Samuel 23). He spent much time in the Judean wilderness (I Samuel 23:15). But the difficulty with this narrative is that David refers to himself as “king” in this psalm (Psalm 63 - verse 11) but Saul was still the king of Israel during this incident. At the same time, David had already been anointed by Samuel to be King of Israel (1 Samuel 16), and though he had not yet assumed the role of King, the office was already assigned to him.
The second possible context is found in 2
Samuel 15-16, when David fled from Absalom, his son. At this point, David
is the king of Israel and spent time in the wilderness of Benjamin and Judah as
he fled for his life. King David being faint and thirsty are
mentioned in 2 Samuel 16:2 and 17:29. This setting is often considered a better
option to fit the context of the psalm, though both the settings are seen as
possibilities by Biblical scholars. Whichever option is chosen, this psalm
should be studied as a song of hope and trust sung by David, when he was
threatened by his enemies and had to leave the city and flee into the
wilderness.
Exposition of Psalm – 63
To extract the true essence of Psalm 63, we
need to take a journey back to the time when King David lived and walk along
with him in the desert and experience the life he lived during those days. The
deep spiritual connections David had with God to be called “the man after God’s
own heart” and be given the privilege to be one of the ancestors of the Messiah
could be gleaned from this psalm.
Verse 1
1 O God, You are my God; Early
will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty
land Where there is no water.
The magnitude and depth of this verse can be
truly understood by anyone who has lived or travelled in the middle eastern or
any other desert during the intense summer days and has experienced the heat
waves and sunbaked sands. The glorified deserts we see in the modern days are
not the ones experienced by David thousands of years ago. A desert, thousands
of years ago, was a forlorn and forgotten desolate place without any cover from
natural calamities, wild animals, venomous vipers, and poisonous insects.
Gathering food and water in the desert would have been an impossible task in
those days, especially for someone who had chosen it as a hiding place from his
enemy. No one would willfully choose to go and hide in the desert. A desert is
chosen as a hiding place only when the choice is between desert and death.
Coming to the first verse in Psalm – 63, Forced
out of the city of Jerusalem, away from God’s holy sanctuary because of his
enemies, David found himself in the middle of a dry and parched land. David was
thirsty but there was no water anywhere in sight. David was neither the first
one to live in the desert nor the first one to experience thirst in the desert.
There were several instances in the history of Israel connected with the
desert. When the Israelites came out of Egypt and were travelling through the
desert they too experienced thirst (Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 20:10-13). When the
Israelites experienced physical thirst and they could not find any water, it
instigated anger and rebellion against Moses, their leader; they murmured,
complained and even thought of stoning Moses. In Deuteronomy 8:2, Moses told
the Israelites, “And
you shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way
these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test
you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His
commandments or not.” When God tested Israelites in the desert, it revealed the
wicked condition of their heart.
David’s life had turned upside down. He went
from being a respected leader to an insulted individual, from comfort to
discomfort, from safety to danger. But when David passed through the same
desert test as that of his ancestors, even though he was thirsty in a dry and
parched land, his response was contrary to that of his ancestors. David’s
hunger and thirst for God, his spiritual thirst overpowered his physical thirst
for water. Not only was his soul longing for God, even his flesh, his physical
faculties and organs joined along with his soul in seeking God, His power and
His glory. When David passed through the “desert test” it did not bring out
bitterness, anger, range or disappointment from his heart but brought out the true
intentions and proclivities of his heart, his one desire and intense longing
for God. The very first statement “O God, You are my God” indicates
the personal relationship David had with God. It is no wonder that God found
David as a man after his own heart.
Verses 2 – 6
2 So I have looked for You in the
sanctuary, To see Your power and Your glory. 3 Because Your
lovingkindness is better than life, My lips shall praise You.
4 Thus I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your
name. 5 My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness,
And my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips. 6 When I
remember You on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches.
David lived during the Old Testament days, the act of worship during those days involved going to the Holy place, God’s sanctuary setup at Jerusalem, performing rituals and offering sacrifices. The religious life of the ancient Israelites revolved around Jerusalem. David was not an exception. His yearning and love for God’s sanctuary and Jerusalem can be seen in Psalms 122. But at this point in his life, physically he was away from God’s sanctuary, out of Jerusalem in a faraway desert. Yet David decided to look for God in the desert, making it his sanctuary to experience the power and glory of God.
Verses 3 – 6 clearly reveals to us that David
experienced the divine presence, loving kindness and goodness of God in the
desert. This is the worship Jesus Christ taught the Samaritan woman near the
well. Jesus Christ told the Samaritan woman, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is
coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship
the Father…. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers
will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is
seeking such to worship Him.” (John 4:21-24). Even though David was faraway in
the desert, unable to fulfill the ritualistic expectations dictated in the Old
Testament worship, he offered to God something higher and better. David
worshipped God in spirit and in truth.
David knew that the prayers he offered in the desert, far away from the
Sanctuary would rise up before God as an incense; when he lifted up his hands
in reverence, standing on the parched land, it would be like offering a
fattened calf as an evening sacrifice (Psalm 141:2). The loving kindness of God
that David experienced in the forlorn desert was much better than all the
temporal and carnal pleasures of his royal life in the luxurious palace. David
was overflowed with the fullness of joy found in the presence of God and the
unending pleasures found at the right hand of God (Psalm 16:11). He could not
stop meditating about God even through the dark and dreadful nights in the
desert. David proved to be more of a New Testament worshipper than many who
lived and live in the New Testament days. When the mystery of true worship was
revealed to David, he could not contain his joy. David’s soul was satisfied as
though fed with marrow and fatness.
Verses 7 –11
7 Because You have been my help, Therefore
in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice. 8 My soul follows close behind
You; Your right hand upholds me. 9 But those who seek my life,
to destroy it, Shall go into the lower parts of the earth. 10 They
shall fall by the sword; They shall be a portion for jackals.
11 But the king shall rejoice in God; Everyone who swears by Him shall
glory; But the mouth of those who speak lies shall be stopped.
"My soul follows close behind you" - This statement could be used as the summary of David's life. When David assumed kingship, he wanted to build a permanent dwelling place for the Ark of God, a magnificent Temple of God, so that God's presence could permanently dwell among his people. Even though God did not permit him to build the Temple, He accepted David's desires and intentions and made an everlasting covenant with him. David's desire was realized when the son of David came to this world as Immanuel "God with us" to dwell among us and within us through his Holy Spirit.
When David experienced the presence of God, he was assured of help from God. David’s assertion “You have been my help” indicates God had helped David from the hands of many evil people and brought him out of life-threatening situations previously. And remembering those instances built up his faith. God could do this again. David felt safe in the shadow of God’s presence. That is the place where no enemy could penetrate. The phrase, “the shadow of your wings” is the portrayal of baby chicks being protected by a mother bird under her wings when there is danger. David was rejuvenated and his faith renewed. God’s right hand was upholding him. David proclaimed that he would rejoice in God in the desert because he was upheld by God’s right hand and his life was safe but his enemies who were prowling to destroy him would be judged by God. We know from the Holy Bible that, David was in fact restored to power and his enemies were destroyed.
