SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/9/2012 9:02:37 AM
My Worship Time Focus: “Prepare for Battle”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm 20:1-8
Message
of the verses: “1 For the choir director. A Psalm of David: May the LORD answer you in the day of
trouble! May the
name of the God of Jacob set you securely on high! 2 May He send you help from the sanctuary And
support you from Zion! 3 May
He remember all your meal offerings And find your burnt offering acceptable! Selah.
4 May He grant you
your heart’s desire And fulfill all your counsel! 5 We will sing for joy over
your victory, And in the name of our God we will set up our banners. May the LORD fulfill all
your petitions.
“6 Now I know that the LORD saves His anointed; He will answer him from
His holy heaven With the saving strength of His right hand. 7 Some boast in
chariots and some in horses, But we will boast in the name of the LORD, our
God. 8 They have bowed down and fallen, But we have risen and stood upright. 9
Save, O LORD; May the King answer us in the day we call.”
This psalm is a prayer to the Lord
for victory over the enemy before the battle, and Psalm 21 is a psalm of praise
after the battle. In verses 1-5 the
people are praying for the king and in verses 6-8 David the king encourages the
people and then in verse 9 both the king and the people are speaking and the
King there is Jehovah God.
There are some who read the OT
having trouble with all of the blood and battles that are found in there, but
when we look at David and the battles that he fought he fought against those
who had invaded the land that the Lord had given to Israel and so these were
just wars. Dr. Wiersbe writes: “In this regard, David is a picture of our
Lord Jesus Christ, the Commander of the Lord’s armies (Joshua 5:14-15), who one
day will ride in victory against the armies of the world (Ps. 45:3-7; Rev 3:14;
17:14; 19:11-21). Just as physicians fight a
battle against disease and death, so our Lord wages a war against sin and
evil.” “This psalm describes
three essentials for victory as God’s people fight against the forces of evil.”
A
Praying People (vv.1-5): “1 For the choir
director. A Psalm of David: May the LORD answer you
in the day of trouble! May
the name of the God of Jacob set you securely on high! 2 May He send you help
from the sanctuary And support you from Zion! 3 May He remember all your meal
offerings And find your burnt offering acceptable! Selah. 4 May He grant you
your heart’s desire And fulfill all your counsel! 5 We will sing for joy over
your victory, And in the name of our God we will set up our banners. May the LORD fulfill all
your petitions.”
1
"When you go out to battle against your enemies and see horses and
chariots and people more numerous than you, do not be afraid of them; for the
LORD your God, who brought you up from the land of Egypt, is with you. 2 “When
you are approaching the battle, the priest shall come near and speak to the
people. 3 “He shall say to them, ’Hear, O Israel, you are approaching the
battle against your enemies today. Do not be fainthearted. Do not be afraid, or
panic, or tremble before them, 4 for the LORD your God is the one who goes with
you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.’” (Deu. 20:1-4) In these verses we see that before a battle
against the enemies of Israel there was to be a time when the soldiers were to
dedicate themselves to the Lord and in Psalm 20 we can see such a service of
dedication.
I have highlighted the word “may”
the six times that it is used in verses 1-5 of Psalm 20. This word is used to ask the Lord in prayer
what the petitions of those who were praying this prayer and so they were
asking for six different things from the Lord and these were requests from the
people for the king as he went into battle.
It was not only the lives of the king and his soldiers that were
involved here but also the glory of the Lord as seen in verses 5-7.
We see in verse one that the people
were praying that God would answer the king’s prayers and that he would lift
him above his enemies. We also see that
this verse speaks of a day of trouble.
Psalm 46:1 reads as follows, “God
is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble.” Psalm 46 is the psalm that inspired Martin
Luther to write “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.”
The prayer is to the “God of Jacob”
and this is a very familiar way to pray to the Lord in the psalms and according
to my concordance it is used fourteen times in the book of Psalms. Dr. Wiersbe writes about this, “It suggests that God works on
behalf of those who are weak and in special need (see Genesis 35:1-3)” “1 Then
God said to Jacob, "Arise, go up to Bethel and live there, and make an
altar there to God, who appeared to you when you fled from your brother
Esau." 2 So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him,
"Put away the foreign gods which are among you, and purify yourselves and
change your garments; 3 and let us arise and go up to Bethel, and I will make
an altar there to God, who
answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me wherever I
have gone.’”
David had brought the Ark of the
Covenant into Jerusalem which meant that God was enthroned among His people and
He would help them. David had also
brought sacrifices to the altar and had dedicated himself to the Lord (burnt
offerings) and given thanks to the Lord.
(1Sam. 7:9ff and 13:9ff).
We see in verse four that the prayer
is to answer the heart’s desire of David and we know that David was a man after
God’s own heart, but this is also the way that we should pray to the Lord. Prayer is lining up the desires of my heart
with the desires of God’s heart and so that I am so in tuned with what the Lord
wants me to do that I am praying about it back to the Lord. In this way I will receive the answer from
the Lord along with bringing glory to the Lord.
As I was reading in the book of Genesis yesterday God had come to Jacob
in a dream and told him to go back to the Promised Land with his wives and
children and the Lord told Jacob that He would be with him and would bless
him. Jacob was fearful of his brother
Esau and so Jacob began to pray back to the Lord the promises that God had
given to him. This was the desire of
Jacob’s heart that God would bring him and his family back into the land where
he was born.
Verse five is a prayer for victory and this shows
that David had spoken to the Lord about the strategy of how he would fight this
battle. The people were praying that God
would bless these plans. Looking at
1Samuel 23 we see how this strategy for the battle worked in the life of David.
Dr. Wiersbe writes about “Jehovah
our banner and says that it “was one of God’s special names (Ex. 17:15-17). The theme of salvation (victory) is repeated
in verses 6 and 9.”
A Confident Leader (vv. 6-8): “6 Now
I know that the LORD saves His anointed; He will answer him from His holy
heaven With the saving strength of His right hand. 7 Some boast in chariots and
some in horses, But we will boast in the name of the LORD, our God. 8 They have
bowed down and fallen, But we have risen and stood upright.”
David
is praying in this section and he is assured that God will answer the people’s
prayer of verse one which was “May the
Lord answer you in the day of trouble.”
David was the anointed of the Lord, the one that the Lord had chosen to
be on the throne of Israel and therefore David had confidence in the Lord that
He would give victory to Israel in the upcoming battle.
We see in verse seven that others
boasted in the armies that they had, that had many horses and chariots, but
David and the people of Israel boasted in the name of the Lord who was their
God. I see in this verse the attributes
of being all powerful and also judgment which belong to God. This verse also reminds me of when David
defeated Goliath for David knew that Goliath was more powerful that he was, but
not more powerful than God, and Goliath was defying the name of the Lord and
this greatly offended David. Goliath was
like this army that David was leading his army out to fight against in that
they were boasting in their strength because of their horses and chariots,
while David and his army were boasting in the name of the Lord.
A Sovereign Lord (v.9): “9
Save, O LORD; May the King answer us in the day we call.”
There
is a division as to whether the “King” in this verse is David or the Lord, but
the NASB and many other versions show that it is the Lord who is spoken
of. Either way verse nine affirms that
the Lord is sovereign because He hears prayer and is able to answer.
Dr. Wiersbe writes this as he
concludes his commentary on Psalm 20: “David plans his strategy (v.4),
but the Lord alone can determine the outcome.”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: I find it
interesting that while in church yesterday that our Pastor spoke on prayer in
the morning service and in the evening service he spoke about plans that we may
have for the New Year and Psalm 20 is about prayer and also we see that David
trusted the Lord with the plans that He made for the battle, however David knew
that the Lord would determine the outcome, and that is what I have to do when I
make plans. I have to first of all pray
about those plans, and prayer is difficult work, and I want also to be sure
that these plans and prayers are the desire of my heart. I want to align my will with God’s will for
His is perfect. I need to then trust the
Lord with these plans and prayers, but also I need to be willing to have the
Lord change or alter these if it is His will to do so. Then after that I will need to do as Psalm 21
speaks of and that is praise the Lord after the victory.
My Steps of Faith for Today:
1.
Psalm 130:23-24.
2.
Romans 12:1-2.
3.
Ephesians 6:10-18.
4.
Proverbs 3:5-6.
5.
1Cor. 10:13.
6.
Philippians 4:11b.
1/9/2012
10:43:43 AM
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