Weds 12 May - Psalm 101
Psalm 101
1 I will sing of your love and justice;
to you, Lord, I will sing praise.
2 I will be careful to lead a blameless life –
when will you come to me?I will conduct the affairs of my house
with a blameless heart.
3 I will not look with approval
on anything that is vile.I hate what faithless people do;
I will have no part in it.
4 The perverse of heart shall be far from me;
I will have nothing to do with what is evil.5 Whoever slanders their neighbour in secret,
I will put to silence;
whoever has haughty eyes and a proud heart,
I will not tolerate.6 My eyes will be on the faithful in the land,
that they may dwell with me;
the one whose way of life is blameless
will minister to me.7 No one who practises deceit
will dwell in my house;
no one who speaks falsely
will stand in my presence.8 Every morning I will put to silence
all the wicked in the land;
I will cut off every evildoer
from the city of the Lord.
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Meditation on Psalm 101
When you first read through this Psalm, it seems very focused on me. How many times does the ‘I’ appear?
Reading it through again, it becomes clear that the Psalmist is talking about relationships…
- between him and God
- in the home
- in the workplace
- in the community
Although the Psalm has the title ‘of David’ this could refer to David himself or one of his sons, grandsons or further down the family tree. Remember that God had said to David that “your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; our throne will be established forever.” (2 Kings 7:16)Although the kingdom was divided after Solomon’s death, we know that every king that followed was from the line of David and when we come to the genealogy in Matthew 1, we see that Jesus, the King of kings, is born from the direct line of King David.
As James Montgomery said in the hymn, ‘Hail to the Lord’s Anointed, great David’s greater Son’.
And we know that Jesus was concerned about relationships with God, relationships in the home, in the workplace and in the community.
Love and Justice are the twin themes of the king’s opening song to God. How can these two go together?
Knowing what we are like, if we just focus on the love of God, we wouldn’t know how serious sin is.
If we only focus on the justice of God, we wouldn’t know what true love is.
In God’s justice, we are condemned because of our sin.
In God’s love, we can know the forgiveness of those sins.
As the two are intertwined, so we praise Him.
This leads to our being careful as to how we live. ‘I will be careful to live a blameless life.’
’Blameless’ is NOT sinless perfection.
One commentary says this, "Blameless" people are those who cannot be accused of wrongdoing before people or God ( Psalm 15:2 ; 18:23 ). Read David’s prayer in Psalm 19:13 ).
When we come into the New Testament, we see this characteristic of being blameless in Jesus. The writer to the Hebrews reminds us that ‘such a High Priest truly meets our need – one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.’
As followers of Jesus we are encouraged in our relationship with God, as Paul says to the Ephesians in Chapter 1:4.
Paul encourages the Christians in Colossae – Colossians 1:22.
But we must play our part, as Peter says in 2 Peter 3:14.
Our relationship with God will affect every other relationship. The Psalmist wants nothing to do with evil practices.
He wants to keep his vison clear so that he can have fellowship with the faithful.
He wants to be nurtured in his faith by those who are ‘blameless’.
He doesn’t want to get involved with the faithless or perverse, lest he gets drawn into their net.
He recognises that the tongue can be very dangerous when it tells lies and slanders others.
He sees himself as the judge in acting quickly to silence the wicked and to give them no place in the Lord’s dwelling place.
This is a challenge for us who are ‘in the world but not of the world.’
No wonder the Psalmist, prays, “when will you come to me?” He is totally dependent on the LORD.
We, too, are totally dependent on the Lord in our commitment to Him and in living out His values and purposes in our lives.
(Roger Purdom)
Daily Readings
Thursday 13 May - Psalm 102
Friday 14 May - Psalm 103
Saturday 15 May - Psalm 104
Sunday 16 May - Psalm 105
Monday 17 May - Psalm 106
Tuesday 18 May - Psalm 107