Psalm 6
Let’s hear God’s word together
as we read from Psalm 6, verses one through 10. This is a Psalm
and it says, to the choir master with stringed instruments, according
to the shemana. And it’s a Psalm of David. It
says, O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me
in your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for
I am languishing. Heal me, O Lord, for my bones
are troubled. My soul also is greatly troubled. But you, O Lord, how long? Turn,
O Lord, and deliver my life. Save me for the sake of your
steadfast love. For in death there is no remembrance
of you. And Sheol, who will give you
praise? I am weary with my moaning. Every night I flood my bed with
tears. I drench my couch with my weeping. My eye wastes away because of
my grief. It grows weak because of all
my foes. Depart from me all you workers
of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. The
Lord has heard my plea, the Lord accepts my prayer, and all my
enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled. They shall
turn back and be put to shame in a moment. This is God’s holy
word for us. Let’s pray for just a moment.
Our God, help us now in these next few moments as we hear your
word, that we might understand it, that we might love it, and
that we might live it. This is by your grace. Pray that
your Holy Spirit would shine in the passage, but also in our
hearts and our minds. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen. The title I’ve given to this
study of Psalm 6 is Worn Out and Weary. That’s a little phrase
that we grew up with in our house and it comes out in our home
from time to time, but maybe after an exhausting day in the
yard or Maybe one of those grocery days or baking days or just a
long day, you just say, I’m worn out and weary. You’ve had those
feelings before, I’m sure, where you got nothing left in you.
I used to work with a guy that he would say, my get up and go
has done got up and gone. We say things like that. And
that can be a physical statement, right? I’m worn out and weary
physically, I got nothing left in me. But it can also be true
emotionally and spiritually. As we’ve made our way through
these early Psalms, beginning at Psalm 3, we started with Psalms
of David, we find David in some sort of difficult circumstance
in each. One case, it’s enemies have surrounded
him. In another case, it’s Absalom, his son, who stirred up a rebellion
against him. In another case, he has people
talking about him and slandering his name. Well, here in this
passage, we find David sorry for his sins. It’s what we call
a penitential psalm, a psalm of repentance. David realizes
that the fix he is in is only because of his own doing, and
it has caused him great trouble. So you can break the psalm in
half, not really half, but in two parts. One through seven,
we see David in great distress, and then in verses eight through
10, we see him aware of God, and we see a bit of light at
the end of the tunnel. But this is a Psalm where David
realizes that his sin has had physical effects on his body,
it’s had spiritual effects on his Christian life, if you will,
and it has really brought him to a place where he is troubled
deeply. And I wonder if you have ever
come to that spot before where you realize it’s your own doing,
you realize it’s your own sin, it’s your own foolhardiness,
it’s your own, Stupidity we might just say I’ve done this to myself. I’ve how do we put it? I’ve shot
myself in the foot I have I have done this it is my doing only
and so we Come to this psalm realizing that we we from time
to time find ourselves in that spot. Well, let me just say it’s
a grace to feel bad about your sins, right? Some people say,
I always feel so free that my sins are not counted against
me. That’s good, right? We’re justified. That’s good.
Our sins are pardoned. That’s good. There is therefore
now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. But
you read passages like in the Proverbs where it speaks of the
wayward lady who sins and she wipes her mouth and says, I have
done no wrong. And as Christians, we never want
to get to that point where we We don’t deal with our sin, we
don’t dwell on it, we don’t die in it, but we at least think
on it, and that leads us to repentance. Also, we recognize, maybe we
don’t, but we should, that sometimes our weaknesses, sometimes our
infirmities, sometimes our hardships are directly related to our sin.
Now, we read the book of Job and what did Job’s friend say?
Job, this all came upon you because of your sin. Well, that wasn’t
exactly right. But we do believe, we do believe
that God chastens us as a father chastens his children. Our sin
still, though ultimately not punished, it still reaps benefits
or bad benefits in this life. So we need to recognize that.
But where does this psalm take us? Well, it takes us into the
life of one who is deeply troubled. Sometimes we may find ourselves
there. And it shows us a great grace. Our sin and our awareness
of it will always, by God’s grace, lead us back to Christ, back
to the fountain of God’s goodness. God disciplines us as sons. He reproves those he loves. So if you ever find yourself
in a place like David here, recognize that as a fatherly grace. I can
remember one time growing up My parents went on a date or
something like that, and they left us at home. We were pretty
trustworthy kids, and we had a sunroom on our house. And we
never went in and out those doors. But for some reason, because
they were gone, I thought I should maybe go in and out those doors. Well,
when I pushed the screen doors open, I heard a crash. And it was one of my parents’
favorite flowerpots. And it was one they bought somewhere
not in Burlington, somewhere not nearby. And it was with money
I couldn’t afford, but I broke it. shut the doors back, and
I went out and tried to fix it as best I could, but I couldn’t
sleep, I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t think, and it took not very long,
but they found out about it, and I got confronted about it.
And that’s, in a sense, what we need to go through when we
sin. It is wrong. It’s an offense
to someone, and it can be, and must be, and should be repaired.
But we have that feeling. Maybe some of you littler ones
have that feeling when you disobeyed mom and dad. You don’t want dad
to come home or mom to find out. You’d rather maybe the day to
end and night to quickly come and steal you away into sleep
and that the next day would be new and nothing would be said
of it. But here we have King David and he says at the beginning
in verse one, O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger nor discipline
me in your wrath, but be gracious to me for I am languishing. Heal
me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is greatly
troubled. So what does he say about himself?
Well, he knows he’s in hot water because he doesn’t want to rebuke
from God. He doesn’t want discipline or wrath, but he wants grace. Isn’t that what we always want?
We never want what we deserve. We want grace. We want forgiveness.
We want the easy route. But he says, rebuke me not, correct
me not in your anger, or discipline me in your wrath. Now, if God
were to unleash his anger and his wrath, who could stand? Not
even his own son, right? So that is a pretty big prayer
request. Rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your
wrath, and thanks be to God that that has fallen on Christ. That the wrath and curse of God
that was due to us for sin has fallen on Christ. Because that
is a penalty we could not pay. It is a debt that we owe but
could never make good on. But we thank God in Christ that
he has rebuked Christ for our sins and disciplined him in his
wrath. So what does he say? He says,
be gracious for I am languishing. What does it mean to languish?
Is that a prosperous sounding word? How many of you say as
you pass by the ice cream shop, I am languishing and need some
chocolate ice cream. That’s a good persuasive word
kids. I am languishing and unless I
taste that chocolate upon my lips, I will be as though dead
in the pit of Sheol or something of that nature. But he says,
he says, be gracious for I am languishing. He is just flat,
miserable. Okay? His tongue is sticking
to the roof of his mouth. His awareness of his sin is crushing
him. It is killing him. And he says,
be gracious for I am languishing. Heal me. There’s a sense of sickness. Heal me, O Lord, for my bones
are troubled. There’s another place I can’t
remember right off where David says, when I sinned, it was as
if my bones were rotting inside me. Now, generally, we commit
sins, and maybe if we think about it, in a day or two, we repent
of it, when we have a moment of Christianity in prayer, or
read the word. But if you ever sinned, and you
just felt deep down in your bones, I screwed up. This is bad. This
is rough. This is not good. And there are
times where that is necessary. And that is a grace of God at
work in you, showing you your sin that you might run again
to Christ. But he says, I am sick. I am
languishing. Be gracious. Heal me. My bones
are troubled. My soul is greatly troubled.
Where have we heard that phrase before? My soul is greatly troubled. We heard that. Have you ever
Easter in the account of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane?
And what was taking place in the life of Jesus? He was facing
arrest. He was facing betrayal, but he
was facing death. And not just any death, not a
quick bullet, not a lethal injection, but a painful crucifixion. And
what do we read of Jesus suffering in the garden? He sweated. droplets
of blood, and medically speaking, you’ve come to a major point
of trauma, emotionally and physically, even spiritually, when that takes
place. And so we thank God again that the full weight of our sin
is removed from us. Yes, we feel awful for our wickedness,
we feel a measure of the weight of sin, but thanks be to God,
maybe from time to time our soul is troubled, but it is never
troubled to the point of death, as Jesus says, because guess
what? Death for sin has been, the sting has been removed, and
so we thank our God. But he moves on to say, my soul
is greatly troubled. How long, O Lord? There’s a cry
of desperation. How long, O Lord? Turn and deliver
my life. Save me for the sake of your
steadfast love. So you’re thinking of your sin
and you’re thinking of God as holiness, as wrath, as justice.
You hadn’t gotten to Jesus yet. But you say, deliver my life,
save me. And why should God save you? Well, he shouldn’t, except
for Christ. But notice his argument in verse
five, for in death, there is no remembrance of you in Sheol,
who will give you praise? It’s as if he’s saying, and kids,
here’s another good one for you. If you kill me, who’s gonna worship
you? That’s what he’s saying. Maybe
you kids do something really horrible someday. Hey, mom and
dad, if you kill me, there’s nobody to love you. But the grave
cannot praise you. In death, there is no remembrance
of you. And it makes you think back to what is the chief end
of man. It’s to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. And I can’t,
God, do that if you kill me, if I’m dead. And so it helps
us think of our salvation. Why has God saved you? He saved
you for good works. He saved you for good purposes,
but he saved you that you might worship. And so what does a redeemed
person do? A redeemed person worships. But
here he says, in death there is no remembrance. So please
turn, please save, please heal. If you think back to some other
penitential Psalms, maybe particularly Psalm 51, David gives a reason
there why God should forgive him. That’s the Psalm where he’s
confessing his sin for, stealing another man’s wife and committing
adultery, having her husband knocked off at the battlefield,
and doing whatever else, lying about it, shattering the whole
tablet of the commandments. And he says, God save me so that
I can teach others. Those are interesting arguments,
right? I mean, ultimately we ask God to save us for the sake
of Jesus. but save me so I can proclaim or preach to another
generation what obedience looks like, what the Christian life
is like. So here’s David, he’s in great
distress, he’s facing the wrath of God, the disapproval of God.
God is not present, return to me, he says. He’s facing sleeplessness
and physical fatigue and spiritual fatigue and he needs assurance
of salvation. And he moves on to say in verse
six, I am weary with my moaning. Every night I flood my bed with
tears. I drench my couch with my weeping. My eyes waste away because of
grief, and it grows weak because of my life. His eyes are red,
right? He’s worn out from his tears.
He’s exhausted. Have you ever thought about how
your assurance of salvation kind of goes up and down. Have y’all
gotten to assurance of salvation yet in the confession of faith
class? Next week. Okay, so here’s a little primer
for you, a little prime the pump. If you think of your gas gauge,
it goes up and down. And when does it go up? When
you go to the pump. When does it go down? When you
burned off all your fuel. When assurance of salvation goes
up and down, if you’re in the word, guess what? It goes up. If you’re in worship, guess what?
It goes up. If you’re living a holy life,
praying and walking with God by His grace, it goes up. But
if you’re hard-hearted, and if you’re sinful, if you’re out
of the Word, if you’re out of worship, if you’re out of sync
with who God is and what He gives you to grow in grace, guess what?
It’s going to go down. And maybe even from time to time
you think to yourself, Am I even saved? Now we know ultimately,
right, that once God begins a good work in you, He’s faithful to
complete it. But He will let you fall. He
will let you stumble. He will let you hit your head
to wake you back up and to say once again, I need God. Remember
the story of the prodigal son? Give me what’s coming to me.
I’m going to take it and I’m going to go live the way I want.
So he went and lived the way he wanted. Then he spent all
his money. Then he slopped pigs. And then he got to the point
where The pig food don’t look so bad because I ain’t got nothing
else to eat. Then what did he say? Even the
servants in my father’s house have it better than I. And so
I will arise and I will go and I will say to my father, forgive
me for I have sinned against you. And what did the father
do? He saw him from afar and he ran
to meet him and he put shoes on his feet, a ring on his finger,
a robe on his back and ordered that the calf be killed and that
a feast be prepared. And so we remember, we recognize
that our assurance of salvation may go up and down related to
how we are walking with God or not. But thanks be to God, he
doesn’t leave us wallowing in our misery. And so David continues
his prayer. He moves from distress to his
awareness of God in verse eight. He says, depart from me all you
workers of evil. For why? The Lord has heard the
sound of my weeping. The Lord has heard my plea. The
Lord accepts my prayer. All my enemies shall be ashamed
and greatly troubled. They shall turn back and they
shall be put to shame in a moment. And so we see a little bit of
a turn here in the psalm. It’s not a bright turn. It’s
not a everything’s happy and hunky-dory turn again, but he
recognizes God has heard and that maybe the evil that is in
his life personally, but from his surrounding enemies will
be there. Isn’t it comforting to know in
a strange way that sometimes as Christians, we get worn out
and weary and down in the dumps, but God never leaves us or forsake
us. I can remember a time in my life
where my parents let me go through a hardship and my dad was the
law and mom was the grace, but the law won out. And my mom will
say, speaking of that time, she’ll say, I was so worried that the
weight of your responsibility was going to crush you, but we
knew you had to go through it. And that’s what good parents
do. They don’t take away the hurt. They don’t take away the
pain even from our own foolish mistakes, but they see us through
it. And that’s what we have with God. Okay. He knows we fail. But he knows the consequences
sometimes must be dealt with, at least in a temporal way, not
ultimately. God and Christ has taken care
of that. But think of that when you’re going through hardships.
God is gracious to be a good parent. And sometimes to pop
you on the back of the head and say, you meathead, get through
it. I’ll be here. I’m not going to buy you out
of this trouble, but I’ll be here for you and I will see you
through. And so David is able to say the
Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. He’s heard my plea and
he accepts my prayers. What a tender way to think of
our father, even when he is when he’s hard on us. Let’s pray together. Our God, we thank you for the
grace to live life, even when it gets very hard. You pray that
we would be faithful, that we would be zealous, that we would
be attentive to your word and that we would be gracious and
kind when we are rescued from our own foolhardiness by your
word and by the competent encouragement of others. Help us now as we
go this night into the world where we live. In Jesus’ name,
amen. ♪ In chastening I will stand restrained
♪ ♪ Lord, pity me, for I am weak ♪ ♪ And there my blood shall
flex with pain ♪ ♪ My soul is also sorely wounded ♪ with my growing weary head. Through all the dreary night
I’ve been, I made to swim and My supplication God hath heard,
and will be saved by earnest blood. A shame confess’d below
my foes, and back in Sodom terrified.