David’s Psalms: Praising the Creator

David wrote many of the psalms preserved in Scripture. A careful examination of their contents can tell us a lot about his faith and about what made him a man after God’s own heart.

David’s life was not easy. He was hunted by Saul’s men—and later in life, by those loyal to his rebel son Absalom. Sometimes his own sin caused God to painfully discipline him. David’s psalms reveal that he spent substantial portions of his life in fear, sorrow, anger against his enemies, and seeking justice. In all these circumstances, he refrains from blaming God but instead pleads for God to save him, to restore him, and to return him to a peaceful relationship with God and man.

David spent substantial time in the revealed Word of God, which at that time would have most likely been the Torah, the first five books of our modern Old Testament. David would have been intimately familiar with the narrative of the creation, fall, and flood and how God created the Hebrew nation from the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. His psalms indicate that he spent time meditating on God’s revelation of his glory to Moses in Exodus 33; the attributes God declares of himself appear over and over in the book of Psalms.

The psalms are wonderful, both as elements to use in worship and prayer and for models for our worship and prayer. Christians have the full revealed Word of God, and our meditation on Scripture and application of its teachings to our lives can spur us on to richer worship and a deeper prayer life.

One way in which the book of Psalms can help us is by showing us how to deal with negative emotions in the context of our prayer life.

One way in which the book of Psalms can help us is by showing us how to deal with negative emotions in the context of our prayer life. David’s prayers encompass anger, despair, deep sorrow, and fear. Yet even when he experiences these feelings, he ultimately places his trust in God. And the reason he can have such firm hope in God is that God is the all-powerful, loving Creator.

Suggestion for Prayer: How does the fact that God is the Creator help us to trust him during hard times?

Questions for Discussion/Reflection: Pray about a negative situation you or a loved one is going through and entrust it to God.