Introduction
We are studying the Psalms to learn how to pray more effectively. We began by noting that the first two psalms are not prayers; rather, they provide us with two foundations of effective prayer (GATEWAY SLIDE).
Ps. 1 emphasizes meditating on God's Word (read 1:1,2). As we memorize and ponder passages of scripture, they change our thinking and values and inform our prayers to be in accordance with who He is and with His will (vs. using prayer to get God to do our will).
Ps. 2 emphasizes God's sovereign rulership over human history (read 2:6-8). God's plan is to install His Son, the Messiah, as King over all the earth – and no human adversary, no matter how powerful, can thwart His plan. Because God is sovereign, He can also intervene to uphold and deliver those who trust Him. This is why Ps. 2 ends with an invitation to "take refuge in Him" (read 2:12).
Ps. 3 (along with Ps. 4-7 [see 5:11; 7:1] and many other Psalms) applies this theme of taking refuge in God during personal periods of adversity (circumstantial, physical, relational, spiritual). The collector of Psalms tells us that this is "a Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son" (see 2 Sam. 15-18).
Absalom was embittered toward his father David, gathered thousands of Israelites to himself, and launched a coup against David. As David wrote this psalm, he had fled Jerusalem and Absalom's troops were pursuing him to kill him. So, he is experiencing all four kinds of the above adversities!
David prays to God in three ways, and in this order: supplication, affirmation, and request. This order and content has been a great help to me over the years, and I hope it will be helpful for you.
Supplication
This background helps us to understand why David opens this psalm (read 3:1,2). This kind of prayer is supplication: taking our adversities and the pain they cause directly to God in childlike prayer and pouring them out to Him, raw and unvarnished (read Ps. 142:1-4 as another example and which uses "supplication" to describe this kind of prayer). If you are fortunate, you have memories of supplication as a young child to your parents (ME WITH MOM IN CANADA). We don't do this to inform God; we do it as the first step of taking refuge in Him. Supplication is the most basic way that we express trust that God cares and is able to help.
Notice the two different kinds of adversity that David is pouring out to God. 3:1 speaks of his fears for his own physical safety because of how many people are trying to kill him. 3:2 speaks of his depression over his enemies' spiritual accusations that God has abandoned him. (Possibly: "David is getting what he deserves his adultery with Bathsheba and his murder of Uriah.").
I have never been a king, or had a coup launched against my kingdom, or had family members trying to kill me – but several times a year I am (like many of you) seized by crippling grief and anxieties and accusations. How can we take refuge in God when this happens to us? The first step is supplication. Repression, isolation, distraction, anger, etc. are "survival strategies" that we learned before we met God (because of parental neglect/abuse; machismo [ME WITH CRYING]) – but they do not lead to experiencing refuge in God. When was the last time you prayed this way? You can ask God to teach/help you to pray this way.
But David doesn't stop with supplication. Having verbalized his anxiety and depression to God, he now moves in prayer to the second way that he takes refuge in God . . .
Affirmation
Read 3:3. Notice the "but You" – this is one of dozens of "but You's" in Psalms/the Bible. David honestly acknowledges his dilemma and how it is affecting him. Then he pivots with a "but You" to tell affirm to God what he knows about Him that counteracts his current adversity. (Such knowledge comes from biblical meditation.)
David is afraid of his many adversaries – "but You, O Lord, are a shield about me." Shields were the main form of body-armor at this time. A full-length shield protected the soldier from all frontal assaults. But David affirms that God is his 360-shield ("about me").[1] In other words, David affirms that nothing can get to him from any direction without first coming through God's protective presence. What a beautiful way to personalize what the Bible affirms about God's protection of His people! God does not promise to deliver us from all suffering, but He does promise that He will not allow any adversity to go beyond our faith-capacity, and that He will always provide us with a way through the adversity (1 Cor. 10:13). So in the midst of his anxiety, David affirms his trust in God's power as his Shield.
David is depressed because of his enemies' accusation that God had abandoned him – "but You, O Lord . . . are my glory, the One who lifts up my head." When you feel overwhelmed by your sins and failures, when you feel like God is no longer for you, your head/countenance falls down. But David, perhaps glancing at the sun, affirms that God is his "glory" (shining One). In Ps. 84:11, the psalmist speaks of God as "a sun and a shield." So in the midst of his depression, David affirms his trust in God's love as his Sun who restores his slumping countenance. "The sun is a (picture) of God's love, which is steady toward us, no matter how violent the storms of affliction around us. The sun still shines even when clouds obscure it, just as we know God loves us even when we can't feel that love (Rom. 8:38,39)."[2]
Notice the result of this prayer (read 3:4-6) – perhaps written the next morning. David had cried to God in supplication and affirmation (3:1-3). God answered David's supplication and affirmation in a way that did not take his enemies or accusations away, but which guarded his heart and mind, so that he was able to go to sleep and awake to face the next day with a restored confidence in God's sustenance and protection. He will do this with us (Phil. 4:6,7).
I strongly urge you to memorize 3:3-6, and to pray it to God when you are facing extreme adversity. It is not a magic incantation; it is an affirmation of trust in your God that you can pray despite your feelings – an affirmation that your God is powerful enough to protect you, and loving enough to lift your head. Many times over the past 5 decades, I have been so fearful and/or depressed that I could not find my own words to pray. So I have clung to these inspired words, praying them over and over again until I fell asleep or until my countenance has been lifted up. They have been my life-line, and they can be your life-line.
Request
Notice that David's prayer ends with requests (read 3:7,8). We are inclined to begin with requests, but beginning with supplication and affirmation often changes the motive and/or content of our requests.
David makes three God-centered requests.
First, he asks God to rescue him – to deliver him from Absalom's coup (3:7a). This is exactly what his enemies were denying (3:2 – "There is no deliverance for him in God"). He asks this not selfishly or vengefully, but as God's chosen servant-king: "Save me, Lord, as You have in the past – so that I may re-assume my servant responsibilities to Your people." And we can ask God to deliver/strengthen us, and to strengthen us to stay at our posts in the meantime.
Second, he asks God to bless the Israelites who have not joined in Absalom's rebellion (3:8). "May they not suffer at his hands. Lift up Your people in the wake of this terrible event." And we can ask God to somehow work through our adversity to ultimately benefit those within our spheres of influence.
Third, he (implicitly) asks God to defeat his enemies (3:7b). This is not motivated by a desire for personal vengeance (David loved Absalom); it is motivated by a desire that God demonstrate His reality to a watching world by defeating His unrepentant enemies. We will learn more about this kind of request when we study Ps. 58.
This is the final prayer-step in taking refuge in God. My supplications focus on my adversities and pain, which is legitimate. My affirmations focus on God, who reveals Himself as my Shield and Sun. Now my requests focus on God's reputation and will. If I have poured out my fears and depression to God, and if I have affirmed my trust that God is bigger than my dilemma, then it makes sense that I would focus on this. And David trusts God to answer him in his way and timing (vs. dictating the way, setting deadlines, delivering ultimatums).
Conclusion
GOSPEL: If this prayer sounds utterly foreign to you, it may because you are personally separated from God. The Bible says that we are born into this world estranged from God, as orphans. But Jesus came to reconcile us to God, to give us the right to be His children and experience His love (read Jn. 1:12). Simply entrust yourself to Jesus and receive/welcome Him into your heart. Then, as God's child, He will teach you how to pray like David prays in Ps. 3.
[1] "About" (ba'ad) in vs. 3 corresponds to the many enemies (vs. 6) who have "set themselves against me round about (cabiyb – "surrounding me" or "on every side")."
[2] Gerald McDermott, Everyday Glory (Baker Academic), p. 186.