this is a really short psalm and i don’t have a lot to say about it… seems like another bad day in the office for David, starting with:

‘The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good.’ [verse 1]

i mean, come on now David, that seems a little overly dramatic… and are you including yourself in that or is this another typical everyone-else-sucks-but-I’m-good that we’ve seen so much of?

but the first line is at least true. i’ve said this before and i will probably say it again – i believe that it takes a lot more faith to not believe in God, than to believe in God.

i get this from looking at my little finger. just stop and look at yours for a second. now bend it. i mean that’s a little finger and it freakingly amazingly brilliantly designed. creation speaks of a creator. to think an explosion happened and somehow that resulted. now add in your whole body. now look at it under a microscope and start thinking about atoms and DNA and smaller and more intricate and you have to go WOW, something is happening. something has happened here. the fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’

you can come up with the conclusion that it’s not the same God i believe in, but there has to be something. and that’s a start.

and he continues with this:

‘God looks down from heaven on all mankind
to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God.
Everyone has turned away, all have become corrupt;
there is no one who does good, not even one.’ [verse 2,3]

this reminds me of the story of Elijah, who after seeing God pour fire from heaven on his water-drenched sacrifice in 1 Kings 18 and the death of hundreds of Baal worshipers, ends up fleeing from one woman and alone and depressed in a cave:

‘He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”

The Lord said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu. Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not kissed him.”’ [1 Kings 19, 14-18]

woe is me, it’s just me, i’m the only one who gets this… No, you’re not David. No, you’re not Elijah. No, you’re not [insert your name here]. I have this. It is My kingdom and I care about it more than you do. That person you are so concerned about, I love them more than you do.

Trust Me. Give me your hand, get up off your face and let’s do this thing…

[To return to the Intro page and be connected to any of the other Psalms i have walked through before now, click here]