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Psalm 25 reads as follows from the New King James version of the Bible: 1 To You, O LORD, I lift up my soul. 2 O my God, I trust in You; Let me not be ashamed; Let not my enemies triumph over me. 3 Indeed, let no one who waits on You be ashamed; Let those be ashamed who deal treacherously without cause. 4 Show me Your ways, O LORD; Teach me Your paths. 5 Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day. 6 Remember, O LORD, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, For they are from of old. 7 Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; According to Your mercy remember me, For Your goodness’ sake, O LORD. 8 Good and upright is the LORD; Therefore He teaches sinners in the way. 9 The humble He guides in justice, And the humble He teaches His way. 10 All the paths of the LORD are mercy and truth, To such as keep His covenant and His testimonies. 11 For Your name’s sake, O LORD, Pardon my iniquity, for it is great. 12 Who is the man that fears the LORD? Him shall He[a] teach in the way He[chooses. 13 He himself shall dwell in prosperity, And his descendants shall inherit the earth. 14 The secret of the LORD is with those who fear Him, And He will show them His covenant. 15 My eyes are ever toward the LORD, For He shall pluck my feet out of the net. 16 Turn Yourself to me, and have mercy on me, For I am desolate and afflicted. 17 The troubles of my heart have enlarged; Bring me out of my distresses! 18 Look on my affliction and my pain, And forgive all my sins. 19 Consider my enemies, for they are many; And they hate me with cruel hatred. 20 Keep my soul, and deliver me; Let me not be ashamed, for I put my trust in You. 21 Let integrity and uprightness preserve me, For I wait for You. 22 Redeem Israel, O God, Out of all their troubles! What is particularly startling about this psalm, is that you can see some of the closeness and depth of the relationship between the Lord and David in the writing of this psalm where he bares his soul. In verse 1 he says” to you oh Lord I lift up my soul.” He asks the Lord to look deeply into his pain and affliction and you can see in the words of this that there was a deep back and forth relationship between David and the Lord even from the rocky ground that David was sometimes finding himself upon.. The troubles of his heart have enlarged and his distresses have increased to the point where they are overwhelming his soul, like giant waves rocking a ship to an uncertain end. Part of this is troubles from without and part of this is his great sins which is it speculated by those who have studied this psalm could have been the Bathsheba situation where he deeply offended the Lord. It can be seen that David is calling upon the tender mercy of the Lord which is described as the mercy of old. This is a mercy that David pondered deeply and which has a timeless nature as it precedes even the dawn of time. We can see in scenes in movies, how distressed individuals will seek the timeless beauty and timeless scenes in nature as they look for a sense of relief from their own pressing and overwhelming distresses whether it be the mountains or woodlands or any other of the wonderful scenes of nature. Mercy of old indicates the expanse of God’s mercy is limitless, matchless, unlimited like looking into the horizon. Giving troubles to God they lose their size and power. In the context of God they are small. You and God against troubles is a big advantage In the movie Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennet played by Keira Knightley begins to feel the pressure of realizing that she might have brushed away her soul mate and the now fleeting chance for love of her lifetime may be missed and she is also feeling a deepening aloneness which is facing off with her soul and then she seeks solace in nature and in scenes overlooking the vast and timeless coastlines and behind that really is a hope in the timeless love and mercy of the Lord somehow reaching into her present reality and also in this moment seeing the mercy present in herself and to herself. In the book of Jeremiah Chapter 31 it says I have loved you with an everlasting love and this is really a timeless love and at the level of the soul that is so clearly unveiled in this psalm. The verse from chapter 31 verse 3 reads as follows, 3 The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying “ Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with loving-kindness I have drawn you. Here we see again mention of old which indicates that there is a timeless nature to this love and presence to the individual soul. The key part in understanding this psalm comes from a related verse in psalm 79 where is says to send your tender mercies and this is something to ask for in prayer and also to know that as part of the Lord’s everlasting mercy and love, he has very specific tender mercies and tender loving kindnesses to give for specific temporal realities that you are facing right now. Psalm 79 verse 8 says, 8 Oh, do not remember former iniquities against us! Let Your tender mercies come speedily to meet us, For we have been brought very low. These mercies even though they are eternal, meet us in the present in speedy fashion and can be called upon. Part of the tender mercies does include the presence of swift angels. The mercy meets those even who have been brought low, in whatever ways it is possible to be brought low. The mercy meets them right where they are and in the deepest of trouble and in the deepest mire of sin. This everlasting love and nature draws us, just like the timeless and seemingly endless beauty of nature, the woodlands, the coastlines draw us. That the Lord is drawn to a particular soul, shows the between the Lord and me nature of the relationship as His loving-kindness is drawn toward a particular soul, and if today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts as it says in psalm 95. We are drawn to the mercy of Lord just as we are drawn towards nature as deep troubles begin to unfold yet we can grasp that the depths and wonders of nature outlast fleeting troubles and have a greater presence than our troubles. Someone who might say be having a particularly difficult time at work just be drawn to looking a say a flower as giving a sense of abiding relief and in the same way as trouble dawns the draw it towards the mercy of the Lord, timeless and of old and every present into the far future. The mercy of the Lord is an infinitely greater Presence. This mercy and grace is something that is made available. In psalm 89 it says in verses 1 and 2, “1 I will sing of the mercies of the LORD forever; With my mouth will I make known Your faithfulness to all generations. 2 For I have said, “Mercy shall be built up forever; Your faithfulness You shall establish in the very heavens “ The mercy of old is part of the faithfulness of the Lord to his people. It builds up, even forever. Mercy is for the building up of the individual and to all individuals even throughout the generations and is part of the faithfulness of the Lord that is established to the very heavens yet meets with the soul of cne person as it does here between David and the Lord and reveals secrets to the soul of David which indeed are further revealed in a special way in the psalms. And a call can be made to these mercies of old even from the very present moment within distresses that indeed are real . These timeless mercies can indeed be called upon, that they appear to the specific troubles that you may have right now, troubles indeed that David was facing off with and squaring up with in this psalm in his present realities as he wrote this psalm. Even as troubles mount, the Lord will visit you with mercy. The troubles that never did arrive are also part of the mercy that has been made available to you. The square off, the face off, would be David against his troubles but with the Lord and his mercy and loving-kindness of old, the match takes and different proportion where it is the Lord and David against his troubles. Any trouble, no matter how enlarged it becomes to the soul, is small or minuscule in the overshadowing presence of the almighty Lord and his tender mercies and loving- kindnesses.
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