The dangers of being vulnerable: Psalm 7
Psalm 7
A psalm of David, which he sang to the Lord concerning Cush of the tribe of Benjamin.
1 I come to you for protection, O Lord my God.
Save me from my persecutors—rescue me!
2 If you don’t, they will maul me like a lion,
tearing me to pieces with no one to rescue me.
3 O Lord my God, if I have done wrong
or am guilty of injustice,
4 if I have betrayed a friend
or plundered my enemy without cause,
5 then let my enemies capture me.
Let them trample me into the ground
and drag my honor in the dust. Interlude
6 Arise, O Lord, in anger!
Stand up against the fury of my enemies!
Wake up, my God, and bring justice!
7 Gather the nations before you.
Rule over them from on high.
8 The Lord judges the nations.
Declare me righteous, O Lord,
for I am innocent, O Most High!
9 End the evil of those who are wicked,
and defend the righteous.
For you look deep within the mind and heart,
O righteous God.
10 God is my shield,
saving those whose hearts are true and right.
11 God is an honest judge.
He is angry with the wicked every day.
12 If a person does not repent,
God[b] will sharpen his sword;
he will bend and string his bow.
13 He will prepare his deadly weapons
and shoot his flaming arrows.
14 The wicked conceive evil;
they are pregnant with trouble
and give birth to lies.
15 They dig a deep pit to trap others,
then fall into it themselves.
16 The trouble they make for others backfires on them.
The violence they plan falls on their own heads.
17 I will thank the Lord because he is just;
I will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High.
We protect our vulnerabilities. Being vulnerable is dangerous. And yet we need to be vulnerable. Our enemies are looking for our weak spots; if our immunity is compromised, we will fall prey to all sorts of disease, sicknesses and germs. Hygiene is a way of keeping healthy and protecting ourselves from things that would make us sick or from spreading microbes and bacterias. If a person is too concerned about hand washing or other hygiene precautions, we would call them a germaphobe and recognise they are out of balance and in fact probably unhealthy.
But if we fear and worry about our vulnerabilities too much, we become germaphobes too. Of course some threats are more deadly than others. You might be able to recover from a flu or a cold, but diseases like rabies and mad cow disease kill between 95% and 100% of the people who contract them ( HEALTH Deadliest infectious diseases in the world, ranked). If you are somewhere where an ebola outbreak is likely, you would be very wise to take serious precautions.
What does a Psalm have to do with hand washing, you might ask? It is a form of protection, it is a defence against death and disease. Human and spiritual enemies are also a threat and they will look for our vulnerable spots and attack there. David is worried about two types of dangers or vulnerabilities. One is external; we all understand that there are Goliaths running around the world threatening everyone. I could name our modern day Goliaths but I think you know them. David wants God to deal with them: v1 “Save me from my persecutors.”
But David is not just afraid of people who are against him, like King Saul or Cush from the tribe of Benjamin, but he looks internally too. I would say from my personal experience that David suffers from the fear that he might have gone wrong or may yet go down the wrong path. And David wants God to deal with his own propensity to expose himself to his own vulnerabilities. v3 “O Lord my God, if I have done wrong or am guilty of injustice….”
You may find this a shocking statement, but not all the Bible is given to us as a prescriptive example. We are not always being encouraged to do or say what the author or subject of the Bible does or says. For instance, was Uriah the Hittite an enemy of David? He could have become an enemy after David committed adultery with his wife. David treated Uriah as an enemy when David arranged to have Uriah killed. Should you take one of your employees' wives (Uriah was a soldier in David’s army)? Should you plot to have your colleague killed by conspiring with another worker in your community? (David sent Uriah’s own death warrant in Uriah’s hand to Joab, David's army commander.) The obvious answers to all these questions are no. David was not providing us an example to follow in those situations. But are all the thoughts and actions in the Psalms prescriptive for us? Are we to think and act like David?
Take for instance, when David says, “Wake up, my God,” in verse 6, is that okay? Is it okay to suggest to God that He is sleeping on the job of protecting you? The same David wrote, “The Lord is my shepherd; I have all that I need… Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.” Psalm 23:1,4. So David, which is it? Does God need you to keep Him on the job of protection or does God protect you?
Uncertainty, balance in vulnerability and taking wise precautions are all areas that can fall out of balance. When they get out of balance we might have a phobia. If we don’t talk to God about things and remain concerned, we might become calloused, cavalier and foolish in our actions and attitudes and wind up dead.
In the area of emotional stability, healthy thought patterns, fear and anxiety, and selfish, prideful actions that threaten others who are innocent, we are always walking on a knife's edge. Finding the path of safety, wisdom and responsible justice is not an easy one, and many people have completely ruined their lives by getting these out of balance.
Does Psalm 7 reflect a healthy pattern we can follow as an example? Do all the Psalms? Are you sure?
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