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By: Blake Hiemstra
You may listen to this devotion in audio form via podcast here.
“Though you probe my heart,
though you examine me at night and test me,
you will find that I have planned no evil;
my mouth has not transgressed.
Though people tried to bribe me,
I have kept myself from the ways of the violent
through what your lips have commanded.
My steps have held to your paths;
my feet have not stumbled.”
- Psalm 17:3-5
In what is perhaps stretching this church-read devotional to the brim of taboo-level provocation, let me harken back to the 1990s, to the world of TV advertisements and to the swaggering presence of Mr. Jack Palance, a crusty western actor best-known for portraying tough guys and villains, as well as for being the pitch man for Skin Bracer aftershave. In a memorable commercial, Palance pats his cheeks with his cologne-laden hands, stares into the camera and intones, “Confidence is very _______, don’t you think?” (Fill in the blank with an adjective of a rather risque flavor.) The general message of the clip is that choosing to use Skin Bracer is a choice sure to give you Determination and Tenacity in abundance.
Maybe Palance’s steely-voiced line has a ring of truth to it. Maybe there’s something life-giving and inspiring about someone who’s got confidence in spades.
Someone like a man after God’s own heart.
Someone like David.
Though some of his psalms teem with fervent prayers for deliverance or cries of gut-wrenching lament, Psalm 17 stands as a triumphant anthem of praise for a man confident in his God. Look at David’s humble bravado (if those two words can actually be wed on the page):
Though you probe my heart,
though you examine me at night and test me,
you will find that I have planned no evil;
my mouth has not transgressed.
David grasps the determination of someone resolute in this devotion. He’s solely focused on walking the narrow path.
Though people tried to bribe me,
I have kept myself from the ways of the violent
through what your lips have commanded.
My steps have held to your paths;
my feet have not stumbled.
Here is a man set apart, a man devoted, someone who, despite trial and tribulation, has not succumbed to the powerful temptation to give in, to coast, to waver. He’s steadfast in this devotion, a decision rewarded with the fist-clenching confidence than can only be shown by someone who has faith not in himself, but in his God.
Such confidence inspires boldness, and David goes on to inquire of the Lord, asking God to smite the wicked, in quite poetic yet graphically-violent ways:
May what you have stored up for the wicked fill their bellies;
may their children gorge themselves on it,
and may there be leftovers for their little ones.
So the question is what’s the message for us? What’s our takeaway? More than anything, this Psalm is literary salve to the wounds of those who’ve lined up in the crosshairs of the mockers, of the enemies to the Way. We’ve all been there, wondering whether continued sincere devotion is worth it when the lure of ease and apathy beckon like a siren’s call.
David’s Psalm shows that single-minded devotion to the Lord most definitely results in the fragrant blessing of confident assurance in God as our refuge.
So for the weary, the forlorn, the ones wondering if they’re the only ones still loyal to the cause, the folks utterly devoted but disenfranchised, the marginalized and abused, for the struggling and tired, the ones walking the narrow road with heavily trod steps - for all of us - Psalm 17 stands as a paean of hope and as a song of promise, that our labors are not in vain and that being steadfast results in us being able to voice, like David, these words:
As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face;
when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.