Psalm 12. To the choir master, according to the Sheminith, a Psalm of David. Save, O Lord, for the godly one is gone. For the faithful have vanished from among the children of men. Everyone utters lies to his neighbor with flattering lips and a double heart they speak. May the Lord cut off all flattering lips. the tongue that makes great boasts. Those who say with our tongue we will prevail, our lips are with us. Who is master over us? Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan, I will now arise, says the Lord. I will place him in the safety for which he longs. The words of the Lord are pure words. like silver refined in a furnace on the ground purified seven times. You, O Lord, will keep them. You will guard us from this generation forever. On every side, the wicked prowl, as vileness is exalted among the children of men." So we have a psalm before us that is a psalm that is quite heavy, speaking of the way in which the wicked use their mouths and their tongue. We know that the testimony of the scriptures is that the mouth and the tongue are instruments that expose the heart. So from the heart, we utter these things that are here in this psalm considered vile and flattering and part of double speak. So let's look at this. It begins to the choir master, according to the Shemineth, a psalm of David. So this is a Davidic psalm. The word the Hebrew word that's not translated there means upon the eighth so you know that that some sort of musical score in In Hebrew probably different from what we would understand that to mean of course But the psalm begins as we get into the body of the psalm with verses 1 through 4 And in verses one through four, we see the flattering lips. Notice how the psalmist began, Save, O Lord, for the godly one is gone, or the godly man ceases. He's just stopped. For the faithful have vanished from among the children of men. Everyone utters lies with flattering lips and a double heart. May the Lord cut off all flattering lips. tongue that makes great boasts, those who say with our tongue we will prevail, our lips are with us, who is master over us." So we see that in this opening section, as David talks about the flattering lips, he talks about what the lips do, and then he asks God to respond to those. And the psalm, as it begins and as it talks about the flattering lips, it begins with really one of the shortest prayers in all of the Bible. You can see those first three words in English, save O Lord. This could also be help Lord or deliver Lord. And you can think about how convenient such a short prayer is, but at the same time, how often do we pray that prayer? You know, as we think about areas of life or things that are coming towards us, we ask God for help or deliverance or to save from the midst of things. And David really shows his humility here as he begins. Just save, save, O Lord. You know, here is really what is at the heart of so many of the requests that we are making known unto God, asking that God would deliver us from certain things. So it is a precious prayer. And in this psalm, it is David who is suffering alone. I want you to notice that he says, the godly one is gone. The faithful have vanished from among the children of men. There is a sense in which David here suffers alone. He's not suffering. with others in the covenant community that are suffering. He's not suffering with his family and saying outside of our family, things are fine. He's saying the godly man ceases. The faithful have vanished from around us. And there is an isolation and a loneliness that David has as he suffers at the hands of these vile men. It reminded me of a very famous John Knox quote, where John Knox said, a man with God is always in the majority. When we're alone and suffering alone for righteousness sake, we're not alone. The Lord is with us. The Lord is by our side. That's the testimony of scripture from other parts of the word of God. Now, of course, we can Believe that we're suffering for righteousness sake and be isolated and say well a man with God is always in the majority But we're not really suffering for the Lord. We're suffering maybe for our own personality or other things but it's worth noting that this at times is the experience of the Christian that it seems as though there is isolation or loneliness as faithfulness and around us vanishes. So we also need to look beyond David and beyond John Knox as well, of course, and think of the Lord Jesus Christ. How often in the ministry of Jesus Christ, who was called the man of sorrows, how often in his ministry and in his life did he suffer alone? Many of Jesus's darkest moments are moments of isolation, aren't they? So we see this psalm, Psalm 12, and we can really get a sense of Jesus singing this psalm in isolation, maybe in the garden of Gethsemane or on the cross or other times, times when his family had said that he'd gone insane and he suffered alone. So it really helps us to see something of the heart of Christ as well as the Psalms often do. Now David says that these ones are, they are in verse two, uttering lies, they have flattering lips, and they have a double heart. Now the lies, uttering lies, that's the word for vanity or emptiness. It's not as though the ones that are speaking are saying things that are purposefully untrue. That's often what we think of when we think of lies. The sky is blue and somebody says, well, no, the sky is actually green, and they try to convince you that it's green. Or gray is what it is at the moment. But let's say they're lying to you and trying to convince you of something other than what it is. That's often what we think of when we think of the word lies. But the Hebrew word here is that word for vanity or emptiness. You can think of those that you don't have to name names, but when they speak, it seems as though it is just breath coming out. There's nothing. It's emptiness of words. And these empty words are intended to maybe comfort David or to have him go in a different direction. But David understands that These words are empty. They're vain. There's nothing here from those that are speaking. It's really a cheapening of communication to the point where there's only insincerity and there is nothing that's said. You know, nothing that's said. And he then calls this flattering lips. flattering lips, we might say smooth talk, saying only what tickles the ear or causes someone to hear what they want to hear, no matter who it is. And that's the flattering lips, just saying what is going to be received well and appreciated. And then he says, double heart. And a double heart is a Hebrew idea of someone that is speaking out of both sides of their mouths. They're playing both sides, so to speak. James would call this the double-minded man. Someone who seems fully convinced in one way and yet fully convinced in another and is unable to land on any sort of position. And David prays against them, this group of people, because he understands that with the vanity and the flattery and the boasting and the double-heartedness, the only thing that they want to do is to do evil. They are violent in their reactions towards the people of God and violent against King David. And what David says is, may the Lord cut off these lips. Again, that's very strong language. May he cut out the tongue that boasts great things. Now, when David says these things, he is confessing in his reaction that the tongue is a creative weapon. David's saying that this is why this needs to end. These lips need to be stopped. This tongue needs to be stopped because the tongue is a creative weapon. And you may know that, or you may not know that, but your tongue is able to build up or to tear down. Your tongue is able to do great things or great damage. And And that's what David is understanding here. This creative weapon that is being used to destroy the godly and to overthrow the one who is on Messiah's throne, they need to stop. And that's why David speaks as strongly as he does, because it is a direct assault against the coming Christ, because it's a direct assault against the throne of David. we see the flattering lips, and that's verses one through four. And then it transitions in five through six. And what I want you to notice there, and it is connected, maybe we could have had a rolling text, but it is connected in verses five through six. We see the power of the word, the power of the word. It says, because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan, I will now arise, says the Lord, I will place him in the safety for which he longs. The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times." Now, you might read those two verses and think that they have nothing to do with what has gone before. Or you say, where's the connection, Pastor Nathan, between the poor being plundered and those that are speaking evil against David and against his reign? Well, first off, in the scriptures, the poor and the marginalized are often the litmus test for how well the nation of Israel is doing in obedience to the Lord. And I think that's really important. We struggle with that. I think there's sort of an American individualism taught, you know, pick yourself up by the bootstraps mentality that is pervasive in our culture, but there is in the Scriptures a call for the poor and the marginalized to be cared for in great ways. And we don't need to sidetrack into what the best way for that to happen is. That's where the difficulty arises often. But we at least need to be on the same page that the poor and the marginalized are to be cared for according to the Scriptures, and they become something of an outward symbol of how one's heart is in relationship with God. They become something of that outward. Now, another reason that the poor and the marginalized or the poor and the needy are mentioned here is because David himself as the king has a direct responsibility for their care in the Old Testament. And when the king is cut off, when the king is put away, those of whom the king cares are also put away. So in other words, if David goes, the poor don't have someone to take care of them, someone to be their defender, and that is Christ towards us as well. Christians being hated in the world is a common New Testament theme, but they don't hate us because of us. We mean little to them. It's because of Christ. Christ is the one that they would seek to overthrow. That's Psalm 2. And in this same way, it's not the poor and the marginalized that are being assaulted because they're poor and marginalized. It's because David is the one, the King is the one that takes care of them. So there's this litmus test. You cannot keep the first table of the law and neglect the second table of the law, something important to remember. And again, this is true in the church today, we could ask the question, how How does Christ, through his bride, take care of the poor and the marginalized? It says, the poor are plundered and the needy grown, and the Lord says, I will arise. Now, why does the Lord say he will arise? Again, what's the connection between all of this? The connection is that the Lord has said, what He will do. The Word of the Lord is pure. That's verse 6. The words are pure, and as if purified in a furnace. So all of those things that the Word of God says are going to come to pass, are going to come to pass. That's the connection. Thomas Manton, I've been reading a lot of him lately. He He commented and said, the infallible certainty of the word as gold endures in the fire when the dross is consumed, pure gold suffers no loss by fire. So the promises suffer no loss when they are tried, but stand to us in our greatest troubles. So David is saying, take all of these great promises from the word of God, put them there in the fire. and what's going to happen, the promises still stand because the word is like gold tried in a fire. The gold doesn't go away when you put it in the fire. Only the dross goes away. And David is saying, even though he's isolated and he's being assaulted and he is alone as the godly one and he's thinking of big picture promises made to David or to Abraham before him, that his children would be as the stars and as the sand. And that promise renewed in David, pointing ahead to the mediator. And here David's alone. You know, the promise is there's going to be X amount of us. And here I'm standing alone. But he says, those promises I still trust. I still believe those promises. And that brings us into verses 7 and 8. Notice verse 7 you O Lord will keep them Who is the them? You know, this is a this is In the Hebrew Bible it There is some ambiguity. You do have to interpret the them if if this were an essay that an English professor got the English professor would say give more clarity on who is the them and And here, the them is the promises of God. It's the word of God in those promises that have been tried in the fire. You can see that connection. The words of the Lord are pure like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times. You, O Lord, will keep them. you will keep these promises." So, it's not just a keeping of the people or keeping of David and those that would trust in them, but it's a keeping of the word that God has promised. Some have brought, protect us in. You, O Lord, will protect us. That's the way the Greek Septuagint translated the Hebrew here. But I think it's best, I think our translation does a good job because it doesn't interpret the text, it just translates the text. It goes back to this word that is perfect. Keep your promises, O Lord. God's promises are that which guard us from the wickedness of the generation that is around us. And that's another question. What generation is this? Is this David's generation? Is this Jesus's generation? It's every generation. Perpetual problems within the church of Jesus Christ. The wicked surround her on every side. That was David's experience. That was Jesus's experience. It was the experience of all the prophets. And it is the experience of the church of Jesus Christ today. the wicked prowl, vileness is exalted among the children of men. And even as vileness is exalted, we're reminded that the word of God is pure and the promises within the word of God stand. And there's a lot of hope in that because we know that finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ, the one to whom we look.