Psalm 101
Let’s hear God’s word together.
This is Psalm 101, and it says a Psalm of David. And King David
says these words, I will sing of steadfast love and justice. To you, O Lord, I will make music.
I will ponder the way that is blameless. Oh, when will you
come to me? I will walk with integrity of
heart within my house. I will not set before my eyes
anything that is worthless. I hate the work of those who
fall away. It shall not cling to me. Perverse heart shall be
far from me. I will know nothing of evil.
Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly, I will destroy. Whoever
has a haughty look and an arrogant heart, I will not endure. I will
look with favor on the faithful in the land that they may dwell
with me. He who walks in the way that is blameless shall minister
to me. No one who practices deceit shall
dwell in my house. No one who utters lies shall
continue before my eyes. Morning by morning, I will destroy
all the wicked in the land cutting off all the evildoers from the
city of the Lord. Amen. This is God’s holy word.
It’s inspired. It’s without error. It’s for
our instruction and salvation and living. There’s the old saying,
if you aim at nothing, you will hit it. Right? We say that a
lot of times around New Year’s when we’re making resolutions.
We say each year, I’m resolved to eat right. I’m resolved to
lose weight. I’m resolved to get up on time to go to bed early.
I’m resolved to be nice to other people. I’m resolved to take
a walk every day. I’m resolved to, you fill in the blank. So we make these resolutions.
Sometimes when we start a job, a new job, we make a 90 day plan. Sometimes when we embark on a
new endeavor, we have a plan for success. And that’s exactly
what we find in our passage tonight. We have what might be called
David’s pious plan to be an upright king over Israel. David’s pious plan to be an upright
king over Israel. That’s after Saul so wickedly
served God’s people and purposes. And David was chosen as a man
after God’s own heart to serve as king over Israel. I’ve hashed
out some 90-day plans before. I remember the first job I had
out of seminary, I hashed out a 90-day plan, and I think I
accomplished it, but the church was largely unimpressed. I was
just the little young guy, the associate pastor, and they really
didn’t care. In fact, the pastor pulled me aside and said, you
don’t really have to do too much here to impress these folks.
They’re just happy you’re here, and you just make do, get by,
which didn’t really sit well with me. I thought a guy with
plans and accomplishments would be what they wanted. The second
job I had, we hashed out a 90-day plan, and it killed me, because
those 90-day plans took about two more years, and it was a
difficult task. But like King David, like ourselves,
we hash out these plans, and we pave the way with really good
intentions. We think good thoughts, we think
wonderful challenges, wonderful resolutions, wonderful plans
for success. And in our passage tonight, David
gives us a set of resolutions that he wants to see accomplished
in his kingship as king over Israel, David’s pious plan to
be an upright king over Israel. But I want you to understand
something. This is David’s maybe second attempt at a plan to serve
God. And I want to tell you why that’s
probably the case. If you look at Psalm 101 verse 2, there’s
this insertion at the end of verse 2 or middle of verse 2
that says, Oh, when will you come to me? It seems to be a
little bit out of place. And we remember back into the
early portion of David’s kingship when he brought the Ark of the
Covenant, which represented the presence of Almighty God. He
brought the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem, the city of David,
the city of God. Remember, under Saul’s reign,
the Philistines had stolen the Ark. They had stolen the ark
and they had taken it to their own territory and it caused great
pain and suffering upon the Philistines and so they quickly got rid of
the ark and for 20 years it remained in the house of Amenadab. But
do you remember how it got to the house of Amenadab? The Philistines
were told, put the ark on a cart the cows pulling the cart will
know the way home and so as Israel watched and waited and looked
down the road they saw these oxen bringing the cart with the
Ark of the Covenant on it. The priests, the Levites, they
took the cart, they inserted the proper poles as God had instructed
them for carrying the Ark. They lifted the cart, the Ark
off of the cart. They broke the cart into pieces,
burnt it, and offered sacrifices on that wood. And for about 20
years, through the end of Saul’s reign and into the beginning
of David’s reign, the Ark remained in the house of Amenadab. But
David wanting the presence of God in Jerusalem, oh, he says
in verse two, when will you come to me? He wanted the ark presence. So he took up 30,000 men. They
went to the house of Amenadab, a brand new cart was made, the
ark was placed on that cart, and when the cart was on the
way to Jerusalem, the oxen slipped, the cart seemed to stumble, and
that’s when Uzzah put out his hand to steady the ark, and God
struck him dead. And it angered David. It made
him so mad. But David was reminded, of course,
as we are, that God does not play games. He wants to be approached. He wants to be handled. He wants
to be worshipped. He wants to be revered as the
Holy One of Israel. And he doesn’t play games. He
had told Israelites how to handle the Ark. It was not to be touched
by human hands, but to be carried by certain people with poles
that had been inserted into its handles. And so for Uzzah to
mean well and to reach out and touch that Ark was not being
as careful as God had wanted. And David said at that time,
how can the ark come to me? And so the ark for several months,
maybe three months, remained in the house of Obed-Edom. And
David saw how the ark brought blessing upon the house of Obed-Edom
that he says in this psalm, oh, when will you come to me? So
maybe the psalm was written, we’re not 100% sure, but it’s
a pretty good guess, between the two accounts of the ark coming
back to Jerusalem. Sometime after Uzzah had been
struck dead and the house of Obed-Edom kept the ark and until
the three-month time period when it was brought to Jerusalem,
this psalm may have been written. But can’t you imagine David’s
resolutions as the new king over Israel, his pious plan to be
an upright king over Israel, they got a little sharper after
the Uzzah event. Don’t you imagine he was scared
out of his wits and said, I do not want to be a bad king. I
mean, after all, he heard a count of Saul hanging in a tree, didn’t
he? After all, he saw what happened
to Saul’s house after they had unfaithfully and wickedly served
the people of God. And so David puts these resolutions,
this pious plan to be an upright king over Israel into writing.
And we have it in our Psalm today, Psalm 101. And you could say,
yes, this is a, Psalm exclusive to Israel and
the kingship. You might could say, oh, it translates
directly into what kind of president we want. You could say it translate
directly into what kind of pastor we want, what kind of father
of a home we should have. It translates directly into what
kind of leadership resolutions a person in charge of others
should have. And those are good ways to think. But we want to first think of
how it applies to King David and then make its way into our
modern context, our personal context. But there’s three major
sections to the psalm we want to consider. The first is love
and justice. You see it in verse one. David
says, I will sing of steadfast love and justice. To you, O Lord, I will make music. I will ponder the way that is
blameless. So love and justice. If you’re in the people business,
if you’re an administrator, if you’re a king, a pastor, a teacher,
a parent, if you’re a neighbor, If you’re in the people business,
you understand love and justice are these twin qualities that
really go hand in hand. They serve as a check and balance.
Our culture does not want justice, but they do want love. And what
do we do when justice is needed? We say, well, we’ll just love,
love, love, and we get taken advantage of. Or what about a
culture that’s justice only? The people are afraid of their
king. They’re under great tyranny. And so love and justice, when
done well, is a balance that’s not too harsh, and it’s not,
believe it or not, too loving. People are of the flesh. They
fall short of the glory of God. And yes, they need love when
they fail and when they slip. That’s the way God treats us.
But we also need justice. Rights and wrongs need to be
upheld. And so as parents, as pastors,
as teachers, as leaders and administrators, and even kings over nations,
we need love. And we need justice. And these
are a set of ideals that David wants to uphold in his kingdom
as he seeks to have a pious plan to be an upright king over Israel. You know how it goes. If you
give people an inch, they’ll take a mile. And so we need justice. People are of the flesh. They
fall short. And we know that love covers a multitude of sins. And so a righteous leader is
one who loves. Love covers a multitude of sins,
but a righteous leader is also one who will put a stop to injustice
or wrong, or to quote the famous theologian Barney Fife, he’ll
nip it in the bud. So there’s love and justice.
The second thing this passage shows us is the blameless way. David wants to live in a way,
he wants to rule in a way that is blameless, and he says as
much in verse two, I will ponder the way that is blameless. And
then skip over his little prayer there. Then he says, I will walk
with integrity of heart within my house. He seeks to live in
a way that is blameless. How would we love it if we had
a presidential candidate, particularly on this season where the Democratic
primary is coming up maybe in a year and a half. Well, no,
it’s in about nine months, isn’t it? Next summer. It seems like
this has been going on forever. We could lose our sense of time,
but wouldn’t we love it if a Democratic candidate or even a Republican
said, I will walk, I will ponder the way that is blameless and
I will walk with integrity of my heart. We would all jump to
that candidate and say, you’ve got my vote. Don’t care what
your fiscal policy is. Don’t care what your foreign
policy is. Don’t care what your view on Education is, if that
were their main standard, we would hug and kiss and probably
vote for them. But as it is, we usually have
to hold our nose and vote for someone who’s at least at a minimum
somewhat pro-life is usually the way it goes. But wouldn’t
we love it to be ruled by someone who said, I will ponder the way
that is blameless and I will walk with integrity of heart,
a heart that is shaped by God’s law, a heart that’s informed
by God’s standards, a heart that Seeks first God’s kingdom. There’s
a test case in verse 3 He says I will not set before my eyes
anything that is worthless And then he says I hate the work
of those who who follow away, it shall not cling to me.” You
know, we say in the South, we don’t drink, cuss, smoke, or
chew or hang out with those that do. And that’s, in a sense, what
David is saying here is, I’m going to keep away from evil.
I’m going to keep away from its influence and I’m going to keep
away from the people who do it because it will not help. It will not bless. It will not
shape. my life as a person of a child of God or as a king in
a good way. And so he gives us this little
test case. If I’m going to love the way that’s blameless, if
I’m going to ponder it, if I’m going to walk with integrity
of heart in my house, then I’m going to be careful little eyes
what I see. We think that song is a little
ditty, but oh, wouldn’t it help us in the day of images. It’s just in our lifetime that
TV has become so big. It’s just in our lifetime that
we have these little screens we carry in our pockets and they
are a window into everything. And with King David here, we
ought to say, I will sit before my eyes. no thing that is worthless. I remember about 10 years ago
preaching this passage on a Wednesday night in my church. And we had
a number of young people, mostly middle school and high schoolers,
and they were getting into these violent video games. It’s when,
I don’t know what they’re called, but these war games came out
after the Gulf War. And these young people were all
playing games. And now, you know, now we’re
on like tour of duty 19 or something like that. But just the amount
of violence that they’re seeing, the amount of images that are
coming into their minds and their hearts. And I made the application
that we ought to be careful what goes into our windows here, our
eyes, because it goes right into our hearts, it goes right into
our minds, and it makes us tick in a different way. And I can’t
tell you, sadly, not to their credit, how many parents came
up to me afterwards and said, that’s just legalism. That’s
just legalism. I said, come back to me in 10
years when your child has a history of violence or when they can’t
function because these video games have shaped them in such
a way. And I’m not saying no video games. I grew up on Pac-Man,
which is probably a little more benign. But these things do affect
us. The movies we watch, the things
we see on TV, we think, oh, it’s not harmless. I read my Bible
this morning. But images are a significant
way into our hearts and our lives. And so King David is professing
a way that’s blameless. Now remember, he didn’t do so
great, did he? Images got him in big trouble.
We know of his sin and his hardship from it. Here’s a what if. We have King David here saying,
I’ll love, love, and justice. It’ll be big part of my kingship. He says, I’ll ponder the way
that’s blameless and I’ll live a way that’s blameless. What
if every school teacher our children had? What if every presidential
candidate, we just, hopefully some of you voted for our mayoral
candidates in the primary this week. We got the presidential
candidates, we got all this. What if all these candidates
for office, school teachers and mayors and governors and presidents
or pastors or elders, what if all of them said, I want to be
like the qualifications of Elder and First Timothy? What if we
had a presidential candidate that said he wanted to be above
reproach? He wanted to be a one-woman man. Well, we’d drop our teeth,
wouldn’t we? But wouldn’t it be a wonderful society if the
qualities of godliness and blamelessness made their way into other offices
beside the King of Israel? Maybe y’all notice how the media
ridicules Mike Pence. I think if they could get rid
of Trump, that would be one thing, but they definitely don’t want
Mike Pence and his godly ways. You know, the man won’t be in
a room with another woman unless his wife is present. That’s a
good thing, but he gets ridiculed for it. In a sense, he said,
like King David here, I want to be a pious king, a pious ruler. I want to ponder the way that’s
blameless and walk in it in my house. Wouldn’t we be so blessed
if we were a scandal-free nation, and every government we had,
every administration we had was scandal-free, no messes, only
honor. Well, the final thing this passage
shows us, in addition to love and justice and a blameless way,
is a summary of rejections. David’s given us two ideals here,
but now he gives us six or seven things that he rejects. And if
you’ll just look at the latter half of Psalm 101, you’ll see
them with me. Just to summarize though, and
maybe to use a modern political phrase, David is going to drain
the swamp. And he’s gonna drain the swamp
from people who are contract breakers, people with evil intent,
people who have malicious tongues and who are arrogant. So begin
in verse three, he says, I hate the work of those who fall away.
it shall not cling to me. So if he’s going to be a king
whose reign is one of love and justice, if he’s going to be
a king whose walk is in blameless ways, the first rejection is
to be against those, to get rid of those, to drain the swamp,
as it were, to hate the work of those who fall away at the
end of verse three. And then he moves on in verse
four to another rejection. A perverse heart shall be far
from me. I will know nothing of evil. And then it’s verse five, his
third rejection. Whoever slanders his neighbor
secretly, him I will destroy. And there’s a fourth rejection
in verse five. Whoever has a haughty look or
an arrogant heart, I will not endure. And then he picks up
in verse seven, no one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house.
No one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes. And
then the last rejection is in verse eight, morning by morning,
I will destroy all the wicked in the land, cutting off all
the evildoers from the city of the Lord. Think of King David
here. He’s presenting to us his pious plan to be an upright king
over Israel. He wants to be a king who’s characterized
by love and justice and for walking in a way that’s blameless. And
he is going to rid his kingdom, rid his house, rid his administration. He’s going to drain the swamp
of contract breakers, people with evil intent, people with
malicious tongues and arrogance. Worthy goals, right? Good ideals,
high ideals. This is the kind of king that
everybody who loves God, would be looking for. And he moves
on in verse six, backtrack a little bit verses, but he says, I will
look with favor on the faithful in the land that they may dwell
with me. He who walks blameless in the
way that is blameless shall minister to me. He’s rejecting a certain
kind of people, but he will surround himself with godly men and women
and subjects of his kingdom who will serve his purpose. Remember
this about Israel. Israel was a nation of people
called by God out of the nations, first with Abraham. Abraham gathered
in number. The people ended up in Egypt
under the famine. Joseph, who was sold into slavery
by his brothers, was raised up as a sort of redeemer, a type
of Jesus to redeem his people. by saving them from the famine. They left Egypt, they entered
the promised land, and God was building for himself there a
kingdom of people so that the other nations of the world would
look in and see what godliness looked like. And so you see why
David is saying, I will clean house. Because if you don’t clean
house, guess what? Israel is just like every other
nation. And it’s the same principle in
the church, isn’t it? God wants people in his church
who know their need of Jesus, who know their sinners, who are
endeavoring to live a faithful Christian life. He wants people
who have high ideals like King David. We know the reality of
King David. We know the reality of our own
hearts, that we can never live up to our ideals. We can never
live up to God’s ideals. Only one has done that. Our spirits are willing, but
our flesh is weak. And we know that Adam failed.
We know that David failed, but we know that the second Adam
or David’s greater son did not fail. And so we know that by
faith, when we come to the Lord Jesus, Jesus’ perfect obedience
is second Adam and is David’s greater son. Jesus’ perfect obedience
is ours. God sees us as if we’ve never
sinned and he sees us as if we have always obeyed. We’ll fall
flat on our faces like King David. Sometimes we say something like
this, oh, to have a king like David. And then we break into
a rousing rendition of God bless the USA and we think, We think
God’s intention on earth is to build a wonderful nation, even
one like Israel or one like the United States. But we need to
think a bit bigger than that. God’s kingdom is not localized
in North America or on a little strip of land in the Middle East. We have a king who is greater
than David and his kingdom is far more reaching than that little
strip of land in the Middle East or this place we call home here
in North America. And so what we ought to long
for is to live mind, heart, and hands for the King of Kings and
the Lord of Lords. And wherever we live, whether
it’s America, could be in the UK, it could be in the Middle
East, could be in China, it could be in Iran, it could be in any
foreign soil, if we live these high ideals, like King David,
but most of all, like Jesus, it will bless the society we
are in and give people a glimpse of godliness. Let’s look to God
in prayer. Lord, we pray that our vision
for life would be great like David, that we would want to
please you and live for you, that we would want to serve others
in such a way that they are loved, they are shown mercy, the way
of blamelessness, brings about the beauty of the values of your
kingdom on this earth. We want your help and blessing
to do that. So let us, by your spirit, live
by faith, serving you. And we pray that you give us
strength to make strong resolutions to live in a way that’s pleasing
and a way that’s a witness. And we ask for your help and
grace in Christ’s name. Amen.