The Song of the Surrounded

Psalm 3 is a psalm that David wrote when his son Absalom formed a conspiracy and took the throne of Israel away from his father. David was forced to flee from his own son. You can read the story in 2 Samuel 15. Given this context, it makes sense that the psalm is about the protection of God in the midst of many, many enemies. David felt betrayed, surrounded. It’s how the prayer begins, with the repetition of that word, “many.” “How many are my foes! Many are rising against me; many are saying of my soul, “There is no salvation for him in God.”  The camera pans around David, and all he sees are foes. Psalm 3 is often identified as a psalm of individual lament, a personal cry for help in a crisis. There’s a lot more we could say about this idea of lament, but suffice it to say now that David is crying out to God because of persecution, accusations, enemies that are relentless and merciless. But despite these multiplying hordes of opposition, David had one ally, and that makes all the difference. He prays in verse 3, “But you, O LORD, are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.” Those images are powerful. The shield is not in front of David but “about” or “around” him, like a Spartan shield wall or suit of armor or a modern tank. David calls God his “glory and the lifter of [his] head,” images of elevation and being lifted out of despair and lament into community, recognition, and strength. Later he portrays himself as falling asleep right in the middle of thousands of surrounding, swarming armies. The noose is tightening, the trap is set, and there’s no escape… except for one crucial detail: God protects his people. One commentator puts it this way:  “Ultimately the situation is not what it appears to be. He who is regarded as abandoned by God is actually the one who has God at his side.”

This is the first psalm attributed to David; there are at least 73 that are attributed to him or reference him in some way. It is also the first of thirteen psalms with an opening title that describes a historical situation. (And by the way, we should take these titles as part of the original text of the Hebrew Bible, especially because both Jesus and the apostles took them to be authentic.) But even though David is writing about himself and his son, we should not read a psalm like an autobiography: we don’t need to read everything through the limited lens of the specific historical event. The Psalms are the hymnbook of God’s people, and so they are written for us to use in all the various situations of our lives. A biblical scholar named Tremper Longman wrote,  “Although the psalm’s content and attitude are perfectly appropriate for the time, at least according to the portrait of David in the historical books, the purpose of the psalm is not to memorialize the event, but to provide a model for those who find themselves in similar, though not necessarily identical, situations.” The point is that Psalm 3 was written when David was fleeing from his son, but David wrote it with the intention that it would become part of our prayerbook. Even though this is a very personal psalm about David’s own life, the last verse of the psalm makes the turn from an individual lament toward experiences of the corporate people of God: “Salvation belongs to the LORD; your blessing be on your people! This psalm is a reminder that those who follow God are not isolated individuals suffering alone in a cruel world but that we are part of a family that bears one another’s burdens. We own each other’s troubles as ours, we join with one another in bringing these troubles before the Lord, and we rejoice with one another when God answers.

Psalm 3 moves through David’s internal experience of betrayal stanza by stanza, and it can be illuminating for us to think about that progression. Verses 1-2 are the cry for help, “God, I’m surrounded by people who dismiss your salvation, who say that you can’t rescue.” It’s a plea in the midst of dismay. Verses 3-6 is the statement of confidence in the Lord’s protection. “Yes, many are against me and that fills me with distress, but I come back to the ultimate reality: God is my shield, my sustainer.” It’s like David is reassuring himself about who God really is, not what people say about him. Finally, verses 7-8 are the actual prayer for God to move and work: “Arise, O Lord! Save me! Defeat my enemies and bring blessing to your people!” Crisis, confidence, and calling on God. That structure could be a framework for our own prayers. We begin with the crisis, where we are at, the feelings and the situations that overwhelm us. We cry out for help. Then we remind ourselves of truth, of the character of God, of his power, of his goodness, of his kindness. We trust in those realities above our emotions or senses. Finally, from a place of confidence, we shape our request to God, not ignoring the fact that circumstances are still bad but asking God to intervene. It’s living in the tension of sin and redemption: the world is broken, but God is remaking the world little by little. Notice how David does not move quickly through this progression. Scattered throughout the psalm is the ever-mysterious word “selah.” Scholars have debated endlessly about its meaning, but one common view is that it functions as a pause, an interlude, a liturgical sign to reflect and breathe. It’s like the musical breaks in this podcast. Selah provides space for our soul to carry heavy things and lift them up to the Lord in reverent prayer.