Psalm 39 GW

Is it irony?

I feel like I have not mastered this psalm. There are mysteries here to me that I have not yet plumbed.

David purposed to follow a strategy when the wicked were in his presence. Not a word to those guys. The psalmist, though, like the prophet later, grows tired of holding in the word of God. It is like a fire within him, and he is weary of holding it in. When he at last speaks, he asks God to help him remember that he is nothing, that his days are short, and that the same is true of all mankind. Fleeting. Shadowlike. Unseeing and unknowing of the future.

I am waiting on the Lord, but it seems likely to me that fools are going to mock me. Please do not let that happen, Lord!

The psalmist feels like the Lord has him in the stocks and is laying the whip to him, that the Lord is hostile toward him. The Lord consumes that which is dear to him. And he repeats as a refrain, “surely all mankind is a mere breath!”

Lord, please, hear my prayer. I am just a guest here, like all my fathers were, this is your place. Have mercy. And then, the crown jewel of his complaint, “Look away from me, that I may smile again, before I depart and am no more.” Lord you are great, but you are altogether too much for me. Walking with you is going to kill me.

The psalmist repeats a description of himself; he is mute. He does not open his mouth. And he says the Lord has made him so. This has a correspondence in Christ before Pilate, when, like a lamb before his shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.

Lest I be tempted to say that neither the Messiah nor the people of God should express the idea that life was better before Jesus came along (vs.13), the heading of this psalm identifies it as directed to one of David’s music men, Jeduthun, and that it is for the choir to sing. God wants his people to sing this. Maybe this is a case of, “the Lord disciplines those he loves”. That did not happen before, and now it does. I face a trial, and it feels to me like a stroke from God’s whip, but God has kind intentions toward me. I bear burdens, and it feels to me like the Lord has weighed me down with them, but the Lord tells me his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

And in Christ, I will NEVER depart and be no more, in the grand scheme of things. He has promised to raise me from my grave at the end. He is with me now, and so shall I ever be with the Lord. Blessed be the Lord, who has shown us his glory in the face of Jesus Christ my Lord.

I wonder if this psalm needs to be sung ironically…

Here are the lyrics.

Psalm 39 Gw Lyrics

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What Is the Measure of My Days?

To the choirmaster: to Jeduthun. A Psalm of David.

39 I said, “I will guard my ways, that I may not sin with my tongue;

I will guard my mouth with a muzzle, so long as the wicked are in my presence.”

² I was mute and silent; I held my peace to no avail, and my distress grew worse.

³ My heart became hot within me.

As I mused, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue:

⁴ “O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days;

let me know how fleeting I am!

⁵ Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths,

and my lifetime is as nothing before you.

Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah

⁶ Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil;

man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather!

⁷ “And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you.

⁸ Deliver me from all my transgressions. Do not make me the scorn of the fool!

⁹ I am mute; I do not open my mouth, for it is you who have done it.

¹⁰ Remove your stroke from me; I am spent by the hostility of your hand.

¹¹ When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin,

you consume like a moth what is dear to him;

surely all mankind is a mere breath! Selah

¹² “Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to my cry; hold not your peace at my tears!

For I am a sojourner with you, a guest, like all my fathers.

¹³ Look away from me, that I may smile again, before I depart and am no more!”