We turn our attention this week to a new ripe field of grain in Psalm 27.  Many believe that David wrote this during the times of I Samuel, Chapter 22.  It was here that Doeg the Edomite saw the priest Ahmelech aid and comfort David.  Saul commands Doeg to fall on the priest and kill him.  David hides his mother and father in the land of Moab and flees in fear for his own life.

In Psalm 27 there is a great contrast between faith and fear.  Oh, how they can often be together even in the same sentence of ones prayer.

Let us draw our attention to verses 1-6 where David gives great truths that uplift our faith.  The text says, “The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell. Though a host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear: though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident. One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to inquire in his temple. For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock. And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me: therefore I will offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy; I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto the LORD.”

David shares in verses 1-3 some ‘Delightful Thoughts’.  In verse 1 he gives us three descriptive pictures of our LORD.  I call them ‘Three Hallowed Thoughts’.  The word LORD is in all caps.  This indicates the word ‘Jehovah’.  He is the great ‘I AM’.  He is not the one who was or who will be but the one who always is.  David says He is the ‘light’.  How in a time of fear it is usually dark or shades of darkness.  The LORD is the light and dispels all darkness.  He is ‘salvation’.  This word means deliverance into liberty.  How often, fear causes a confining and a cramping situation.  David says, He is ‘the strength of my life’.  The word ‘strength’ has the idea of a fortified place of defense.  David doesn’t tell us that the LORD gives light, salvation, and strength, but that He is these things.  David said that these are his personal possessions when he uses the word ‘my’.  Hosea said a threefold cord is not easily broken.  No wonder David asked the question of the present, ‘whom shall I fear’?  He looks in the future and asks, ‘of whom shall I be afraid’?

In verse 2 David shares some ‘Humbling Thoughts’.  He speaks of the ‘wicked’ or his ‘enemies’.  Let us desire the hatred of the wicked more than their love.  He says they have come like cannibals to eat up his flesh.  Oh, what a humbling thought when David says, ‘they stumble and fall’.  When they come to arrest our LORD the mention of His name ‘I AM’ causes them to do a back flip.

In verse 3 David shares a ‘Hopeful Thought’.  David has his thoughts rooted in ‘victory’.  He is not going to fear, he is confident of victory.  He tells us in verses 4-6 what it is that gives him this confidence.

I have entitled verses 4-6 ‘A Desired Tabernacle’.  David says he has desired one thing of the LORD.  Let us remember divided aims tend to distraction, weakness, and disappointment.  Mary, the sister of Lazarus, and Martha were members of the ‘one thing’ club.  Jesus said she found the one needed thing of sitting at His feet most important.  Paul was a member of the ‘one thing’ group.  He said, ‘This one thing I do forgetting that which is behind, I press toward the mark’.  David says he is seeking or panting after this ‘one thing’.  His ‘one thing’ was to dwell in the house of the LORD forever and behold His beauty.  The beauty of the LORD, Isaiah said, was the holiness of the Lord.  David’s desire was to ‘inquire’ of the LORD in His temple.  The word, ‘inquire’, means to gain a deeper insight of knowledge.

David tells us in verse 5 that because of this desire for ‘one thing’ the LORD has hidden him in the ‘secret place’.  He even sat him upon a ‘rock’.  When we were young we played ‘King on the Mountain’.  We would stand on a high place and others would try to pull us down.  Our King has set us up high and none of the fears of this world can cause us to fall.

David says because of this lofty place of faith he will offer in the tabernacle a ‘sacrifice of joy’. (Vs. 6)  He even breaks out in a song of praise to the LORD.  He does not do it at his house or in his banquet hall but in the ‘house of God’.  Giving him praise is the cure for all of our fears.  The next time we are afraid let us seek after Him and break out in songs of praise and see what becomes of your fears.