Psalm 55 - Confuse the Wicked

Read: Psalm 55 vs 1-23

Do you ever pick up a book and start by turning to the last page, wanting to start, by seeing how things finish? Psalm 55 is one of the longer Psalms that we have been reading. It ends with the words ‘I trust in you’ (vs 23).

However even though this is where this Psalm ends, it is not where it begins, nor is it where it spends most of its time. David begins in vs 1 with an impassioned plea to God that He will listen and not ignore His plea. David needs to know that he is heard. He is ‘troubled’ and ‘distraught’ (vs 2), he is surrounded by enemies (vs 3). David’s heart in anguish, in fact the ‘terrors of death’ haven fallen upon him (vs 4). This is fairly full on stuff. Again what you see is that these Psalms don’t rush through to the end. Yes there is a statement of trust, but it’s only after all this other stuff gets aired and voiced. 

David imagines being able to fly away like a dove (vs 6), he pictures himself fleeing away and staying in a desert (vs 7). But these things of course aren’t real options to him. The real world that David is living in is a world of pressures and stresses that aren’t going away (vs 10-11).

The hardest thing in this Psalm is that there is a particular person threatening David at this moment, and it’s somebody who David knows, someone who has been a close friend to him (vs 13). So at the heart of this story lies a tale of betrayal. Again this theme points us forward, to Jesus, who enters the story of the Bible to take our pain, our sin. He experiences the worst of Psalm 55 (the betrayal of a close friend) so that He can win for us the best of this Psalm (the rescue of God, vs 18). Ultimately it is this Lord who the Psalms lead us to. David’s words become words for us today:

‘Cast your cares on he LORD and He will sustain you;

He will never let the righteous be shaken …

… as for me, I will trust in you.’ (vs 22-23).

Prayer: Lord Jesus you were betrayed by a close friend so that you could save and rescue me. You know there are times I would love to run away, but this is where you have called me to live. Help me to cast my cares on you. Help me today to trust in You.