Psalm 5: Straight

I find comfort in the Psalms of David that were written in lament and distress. It’s probably because I tend to write more in my seasons of distress than I do in my times of peace. While I certainly don’t always identify with what David was writing, I do find a connection in the heart and mindset that he seems to be writing from. Stress, grief, disappointment, discouragement all seem to create introspection for me, I tend to go inside and when I do, I write as an effort to sort out and speak to what’s going on in my heart much more than what’s happening in my life. We know that Psalm 3 was written when David was being betrayed by his son Absalom. We don’t know the circumstances from which Psalm 5 was written, but it’s clear that David still or once again felt betrayed and under fire, surrounded by false accusations and unjust attacks.

He began by nearly pleading with God. Asking God to hear him, to respond to him. David appealed to God’s character, reminding Him that He is a God that doesn’t delight in wickedness, dwell in evil and even look at the arrogant and boastful. David’s writing was not at all unlike my thought process. He started from his anxiety and distress, then turned to God’s good character and unfailing love, started to deal with his own heart, but then bounced back to his troubles before finally concluding by reminding himself of the heart of the One he was talking to.

When I’m in a conversation that is geared toward finding peace in the midst of turmoil and the promise of peace is countered with the words “yeah, but”, I know we are in trouble. There are points in my life, I’d venture to say, in all our lives, in which the idea of hope seems foolish, the promise of peace empty and the will to do anything other than complain disinteresting. There are times when I don’t want to be encouraged. Times when I want to identify with the woe. There are times when I choose to be uncomforted because I believe I deserve to express the angst that I feel. There are times when I want God and the world to know I’ve been done wrong and I’ve deserved better, but at the same time, I won’t allow there to be room to get past the wrong so I can move on to the better.

I’m not sure if David is flip-flopping here, but I believe I can hear the struggle to get out of his feelings so that he can get into God’s heart. In verse 8 David prayed, “Lead me, O LORD, in your righteousness because of my enemies; make your way straight before me.” David still couldn’t get away from his enemies, he couldn’t get them out of his mind, he couldn’t get the words out of his ears or the images out of his heart, but he knew he must get in God’s “way”. The leadership he asked for was not about getting out of trouble, it was about getting into God’s protection, it was not about getting rid of his enemies but looking to his Savior. The word that most strikes my heart is “straight”. David asked for God to make His way straight for him. Notice, David didn’t write, “make my way straight”, he asked for the straightness of God’s way to be made clear to him. This means that David stopped pleading for an intervention of circumstances and started praying for a clear path to his own transformation. David stopped asking God to change how he felt about his trouble and asked God to return and restore him to joy, even if the trouble never changed. God’s paths are straight, but our ways are often crooked.

What are our crooked places? For me, it’s allowing familiar feelings to take me back to discouraging places. I struggle with allowing similar circumstances to set me back to faithless responses. God’s ways are straight, but my thinking is often crooked. Just so we understand, straight doesn’t mean easy and it doesn’t mean fast, but, in this instance, it does mean right. In fact, the Hebrew word used in verse 8 is translated as right, pleasing or good more often than its translated as straight. Here’s the problem, I don’t always know what straight or right or good is, but I know how I think it should feel. And once again I discover that God has created or allowed tension so that He could teach me to trust His ways more than I honor my emotions.

To be completely vulnerable with you, I’m writing today from a crooked place. I’ve been in my feelings, in my grief, in my discouragement and in my circumstances even while I’ve been in God’s Word. But David has reminded me to stop creating curves and pray for God’s way to be made straight before me. It’s not my job to figure it out and this isn’t about having God take the feelings away or to make the circumstances better, it’s me learning to truly believe that if I will “Trust in the LORD with all my heart”, if I will lean on His faithfulness even when my life seems chaotic, if I will depend upon His character even when my circumstances are detrimental, if I will believe that He loves me even when I feel rejected and unworthy, then I’ll be walking in the path that He has made straight. Straight won’t always get me where I want to go, and it will rarely get me there in the time I’d like it to take, but it will always keep my heart in God’s hands and His joy in my heart. If you are living in a crooked place, you can’t straighten it, but I’d invite you to pray with David and I, that God will make His way straight before you.