Psalm 25
Lesson Focus
Psalm 25 shows us that no matter our age or stage in life, we always need God's instruction, guidance, and steadfast love as we navigate life's challenges.
Lesson Outcomes
By the end of this lesson, students should:
Understand the importance of continually seeking God's instruction throughout all stages of life.
Explore the concept of God's steadfast love and its impact on our trust and dependence on God.
Reflect on how Psalm 25’s themes of surrender and seeking God’s guidance can be applied to their circumstances.
Catching Up on the Story
Psalm 25 is attributed to Israel’s greatest king, David. While many of the songs attributed to David occur in his youth, Psalm 25 was likely penned when David reached an advanced age. The content of this psalm leads us to believe that David is not only elderly but also alone and afflicted (Konrad, 62). As David has done so many times, he calls God for help in a time of trouble. The nature of Psalm 25, however, is flavored by a request for continued instructions in the ways of God. The psalmist understands his place relative to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, a state of ignorance. This is contrary to our often common inclination to believe that in our old age, we have attained a significant enough level of knowledge about the world and God’s work in it not to need further instruction. The psalmist shows us that regardless of our station in life, young or old, ignorant or knowledgeable, we all need continued and consistent instruction in the ways of God.
Our need for instruction will not cease until we find ourselves safe in Jesus’s arms at the end of time. May our hearts and minds be continually open to the guidance, correction, and companionship that come with our faith-filled relationship with the God of the universe.
I Lift Up My Soul!
The psalm begins with a declaration of trust in God mixed with an entreaty for protection from the psalmist’s enemies. It might be helpful if we seek to place ourselves in the psalmist’s shoes and imagine the setting and situation behind the words. The first verse offers our first clue as to the psalmist’s situation. In my mind, the psalmist is standing, or possibly kneeling, with his hands outstretched toward the sky. The phrase, “I lift up my soul,” is a metaphor for the outstretched arms gestures. “The metaphor portrays prayer as an act in which individuals hold their conscious identity, their life, in hands stretched out to God as a way of saying that their life depends completely and only on the help of God” (Mays, 124). In other words, a posture of outstretched hands is a physical act of surrender.
The second and third verses make explicit what the first verse describes. As the psalmist stands with arms held toward heaven, enemies abound who wish to bring shame, disgrace, and possibly bodily harm to the psalmist. We don’t know the exact situation surrounding this psalm. Shame, however, was a constant theme in Israel’s time and context. The threat to the psalmist need not be physical to pose a significant threat. Even today, lives are destroyed by less than physical violence. Words, rumors, and accusations of all kinds hold the power to bring down prominent and upright people. Who among us has not lifted our souls to God (physically or metaphorically), seeking help amid situations that threaten to cause significant disruption of our daily lives?
When we stop to engage the emotions of the psalm, we get the sense that the danger the psalmist faces has not yet materialized. The psalmist is waiting in two ways. First, he waits for the trouble to start. Perhaps the psalmist knows what’s coming from his enemies, and the anticipation is difficult to handle. On the other hand, perhaps the trouble has started, but a brief interlude leaves the psalmist with a sense of dread regarding its resumption. At times, the lead-up to a difficult conversation, a conflict, an interaction, or a meeting can be similar to, if not worse than, the actual trouble one faces. The other shoe can take a long time to drop.
Make Me to Know Your Ways…
The tone of the psalm turns with verse four. The psalmist now calls upon God for instruction. Note that the request for instruction is nonspecific. The psalmist does not articulate the nature of the trouble faced, nor is there a plea for help to address what to do next. Instead, the psalmist desires to be taught God’s ways and paths (v. 4) and God’s truth (v. 5). At the risk of making too much of the generic nature of the psalmist’s request, I wonder if Christians today would not benefit from a form of prayer more in the vein of Psalm 25? As the church, would we be more open to hearing and understanding what God is calling us to if we consistently prayed that God would make us know God’s ways, lead us in the correct paths, and instruct us in the ways of truth, instead of asking God to bless our schemes and plans? That’s not to say we should not pray for specific plans or ministries; we should. Would our plans and schemes be more fruitful and faithful if we listened and waited more?
When we consider the likely context of the psalm, it might seem odd that an elderly person would focus so intently on gaining knowledge in the way of God. If David, a man after God’s heart, is indeed the author of Psalm 25, would he not already possess a significant amount of knowledge and Godly wisdom to navigate whatever trouble he now faces? Perhaps. It is more likely that the psalmist “knows what he doesn’t know,” as the expression goes. He is aware of the finite nature of his knowledge and wisdom. He knows that there is always more to be known regardless of the situation. He knows that as hard as he tries, he never gets things exactly right. He knows he can be more faithful to the “God of my salvation.”
So often, we want to distill the truth of God’s love and law down to a set of timeless principles. In our search for a neat and orderly life and faith, we deduce sequential steps toward holiness and ethical living in our time and place. These ideas would have been foreign to David, his contemporaries, and those who came after him. In our quest for certainty in life and faith, we forget the basis of Israel’s (and our) historic faith: God’s steadfast love and faithfulness, which forgets our transgressions so that we might continually learn to walk in paths of righteousness.
In verse six, the psalmist calls upon God to be mindful and remember the nature of God’s posture toward creation: God’s steadfast love. The steadfast love that Israel so often confesses is God’s nature, which leads God to instruct sinners in “all the paths of the Lord” (v. 10). What is so striking is what compels God to answer the psalmist’s prayer for instruction and education is the same thing that characterizes the paths we need to learn. As we learn and grow into steadfast love and faithfulness toward God and others, we’ll find that we are indeed keeping God’s covenant.
With this psalm, we get the sense that David and Israel later understand that God desires to be known to creation in the fullest possible way. It has been and always will be God’s intention to enter into a faithful covenant relationship with us in a way that allows for a mutual form of knowledge. Of course, our knowledge of God will not be complete until Christ returns in final victory. God is ready and willing to give us what we need so that we might fully enter into that mutual relationship.
My Eyes…
The psalm shifts a bit at verse 15. Here, the psalmist confesses his need for salvation in the present moment, “My eyes are ever toward the Lord.” Again, let’s put ourselves in this psalm. Whether you have witnessed it as a parent or as a viewer of plays, movies, or TV, we understand what it means to turn your eyes toward someone with hopeful expectations. When words do not suffice to communicate the depth of our fear or hurt, the facial features of a family member or even a pet, which centers on the eyes, can carry significant communicative weight. It’s the look your child gives you when, after a freak tricycle accident, their head becomes stuck between the bars of a gate (true story!), and they desperately long to be set free. It’s the look a cherished pet gives you when they get tangled up in wire or bushes. Even now, words fail to effectively communicate the look that might be on the psalmist’s face or the deep anxiety and fear behind that face. One commentator notes, “In a tender moment the poet declares, “My eyes are ever toward the LORD” (v. 15), and then prays to God, “Turn to me” or “Look at me” (v. 16). The eyes fixed on God expresses hope and longing. One prays with the eyes because the feet are knotted in the net (v. 15). May God turn his face to the psalmist’s upturned face” (Konrad, 63).
The eyes turned toward God, and the hope embodied in those eyes and face characterize the rest of the psalm. The psalmist knows that if he is ever to be free and whole again, it will be because God has turned to look toward the psalmist. When we are on the receiving end of a look like the one we have attempted to describe, we are moved to action because of our love and faithful commitment to the one who seeks our help. The psalmist is convinced, and so are we, that when we turn our eyes toward God, God is moved by his steadfast love and faithfulness to redeem us from our trouble.
The final verse turns the psalm from a private prayer into a corporate one. The psalmist calls out to God to redeem Israel.
So What?
What is true for the psalmist is true for us as Christ’s church. We stand together with arms raised to the heavens, confessing our trust in the God who created and now saves us. We stand and confess that we are small and insignificant. We stand and confess that our knowledge of things is inadequate to live lives marked by steadfast love and faithfulness. With those confessions, however, comes a longing for and receptivity to God, teaching us the paths of righteousness, truth, and mercy.
With our hands lifted toward the heavens, our faces are also turned toward God. The look that comes from our faces and eyes conveys a sense of desperate urgency for God to enter into our broken situations to set us free, restoring us to wholeness. We long for God’s face to turn towards ours because we know that we are beloved by God. In the same way that a parent rushes to the upturned face of their child, God has come to us, too.
We must not forget that God’s offer of rescue and redemption includes an invitation to learn and be instructed. What God longs to teach us, and what we should be hungry to learn, is not facts and bits of trivia about the Bible but the very nature and character of the God who has come to save us. Knowing the story is not enough, and memorizing scripture is not enough, as helpful as both those endeavors are. We must allow God to imprint the likeness of Jesus of Nazareth upon our hearts, minds, and bodies so that we can walk in all the paths of God, which are, as the psalmist says, steadfast love and faithfulness.
Discussion Questions
Read the text aloud. Then, read the text to yourself quietly. Read it slowly, as if you were very unfamiliar with the story.
How do you interpret the phrase "I lift up my soul" in your own words, and what does this kind of surrender look like in your life?
Why do you think the psalmist, likely an elderly King David, still feels the need to ask God for guidance and instruction? What can we learn from this?
Have you ever been in a situation where you felt like you were "waiting for the other shoe to drop," as the psalmist might have felt? How did you handle it?
How often do your prayers include a request for God to "make you know His ways" rather than asking for specific outcomes? Why might this kind of prayer be challenging
How does understanding God's steadfast love influence how you approach times of trouble or uncertainty?
How do you relate to the idea of shame, as discussed in Psalm 25? In what ways do you think shame plays a role in your spiritual life today?
What are some practical ways we can remain open to God’s instruction, especially when we feel like we already know what’s best?
When was a time you had to completely trust God in a difficult situation? How did that experience shape your faith? What was the outcome?
What does it mean for us to keep our "eyes ever toward the Lord" in daily life? How might this affect our mindset and actions?
How does the psalm's ending, which shifts from personal to communal prayer, challenge or encourage the way we might think about praying for others?
Works Cited
Mays, James Luther. Psalms. Interpretation, a Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching. Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 1994.
Schaefer, Konrad. Psalms. Edited by David W. Cotter, Jerome T. Walsh, and Chris Franke. Berit Olam Studies in Hebrew Narrative and Poetry. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2001.
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