There is some very good contrast in Psalm 71. First with verse 2, where David asks God to bring confusion and shame to his enemies, May those who seek my life be put to shame and confusion; may all who desire my ruin be turned back in disgrace. Then in verse 4, where David now asks God to bring joy to those who seek Him, But may all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you; may those who love your salvation always say, “Let God be exalted!”
2012 Day 129 – Psalm 70, 71
08 Tuesday May 2012
Posted in Daily Reading
Daily Devotion 
In Chapter 71 verse 7: “Many gasp in alarm when they see me, but you take me in stride.” What a beautiful picture. When no one understands us, God does. He gets us. And he takes us in stride. It was Psalms like these that I clung to when I was a teen, because of the intense upheaval of that time of life.
David understood God’s grace. He understood that only God could rescue him from himself. He understood that he was a man in need of a Savior. He did not rely on his moralism, partly because he didn’t have such a good track record:)! But his bad track record did not establish a pattern or a path of a continued journey away from God, but allowed it to make him rely completely on God. Yes, David had anything and everything money could buy. Though he acknowledged that God supplied and allowed him his wealth, he didn’t need to rely on God for his physical needs – as in a hand to mouth existence. But just because his physical needs were met, did not mean he didn’t have to completely rely on God. See, here in the west, we face the same situation. We have all we need, so we don’t have to rely on God to bring a deer across our path that we can kill so we have dinner. And because we don’t have to rely on him for that, many of us start to feel guilty for having what we have or for thinking that it’s sinful to not rely on God for our daily needs. But who said we only have physical needs?! When we only focus on the fact that we have all our physical needs met by the work of our hands, and then feel guilty about the fact, it sucks all our energy away from actually relying on God! It becomes another form of self worship in a weird, negative, self deprecating way! Get your eyes off yourself! We have so many needs beyond physical that we can’t meet! David was completely aware of this! He knew that only God could rescue him from the hole he’d dug for himself. He knew that only God could rescue him from his spiritual depravity. He knew how easy it was to fall back into it if he did not rely 100% on God for spiritual strength. David was not oblivious to what a screwed up family he had…and I’m sure he wasn’t oblivious to the fact that his behavior was the reason it was so screwed up. He knew he had to rely on God for his family issues. Every Psalm he wrote, it is clear that he knew he had to rely on God, period. You know, I think the physical needs thing is such a hang up for us because it’s so obvious when someone isn’t making it. Physical poverty is easy to see. But emotional and spiritual poverty is just as much as issue as physical, and it’s not easy to see. It’s actually one of the things that often times only you and God know about. And we often want to act like the older son in the Prodigal Son parable, thinking that our moralism will save us. Or we think that if we ignore our spiritual brokeness, if we keep it hidden from ourselves and from others then it doesn’t exist. If only you and God know about it, then it’s not so bad. Oh how wrong we are. And oh how prideful. And oh how self-reliant. That type of thinking will come back and bite you in the butt big time down the road. And it won’t allow you to rely on God. And it will blind you to the fact that you do indeed have need of a Savior.