Buried within David’s prayer of Psalm 86, sit two verses that speak to the very essence of our human condition and response to God. David, like many of us, lived a life packed with complexity and change. Both he and those who surrounded him, were inconsistent and unreliable in their day to day living towards God and one another. Those who hated David treated him poorly, while he often didn’t respond well. Many of David’s relationships were messy for all kinds of reasons. The understandable consequence of this for David, as it is often for us also, is that our inner hearts and minds become perplexed and confused.
Unable to make sense of the clashes of life, we can become inwardly splintered. It’s the conflict between what we believe and expect of God, plus what we experience in relationships and circumstances, with our inability to match or align those two aspects in a way that makes sense or gives hope of a good outcome.
David experienced this same dilemma. And while feeling exasperated he turns to the Lord, praying his thoughts simply as they rolled out of his mind. Within this honest dialogue with God, David says; Teach me your way, O LORD, that I may walk in your truth; unite my heart to fear your name. I give thanks to you, O Lord my God, with my whole heart, and I will glorify your name forever (Psalm 86:11-12).
Here we see some of David’s admirable qualities within his weaknesses. Not trusting his ability to correctly process the messiness of life, David says in effect, Lord you need to teach me how to live in this mess while being aligned with your truth, because I just don’t get it. Then David makes this remarkable request of God which strikes to the very heart of his inner conflict, “unite my heart to fear your name.”
Not wanting life’s painful circumstances to grow unbelief, or even to subdue his existing belief towards the Lord, David confesses that God is going to have to be the One who pulls it all together. All his fragmented thoughts, damaged feelings, doubting beliefs, and failed expectations, all required uniting into cohesive and respectful trust in God.
David invites the Lord to do the very thing he knew he could not do for himself. God stitching back together that which people had torn apart was going to be no small task, and only the Almighty could do it. Specifically, David knew that God had to persist at this task until his heart really did fully fear God again. His heart, which comprised of all his thoughts, feelings, and beliefs about God needed to function in a single and cohesive attitude which feared Yahweh without compromise.
Only God can do this within a person’s broken heart. And the starting point is precisely here, where David began, calling upon the Lord to do a spiritual work that only God can do. It would require unnatural responses by David, and trust in his God who is larger than the damage caused by life. It would require stubborn faith in the God of truth who does not want His people to compromise. This would take time, patience, and much humility. But David had got off to a great start by recognising his inner most need and inviting the Lord to heal his heart.
While in hindsight we know that God did answer David’s prayer by growing him to be a man after God’s own heart, we need to know how God accomplished this. So, next week we shall consider some of the tools used by the Lord in achieving a God honouring result through this mission.
