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Central to this psalm is the theme of reliance on God. The psalmist David, has apparently been chased to the hither lands of the earth and while we don’t have a precise map as to where he was, he was as far away as possible. Verse 2 says, “From the ends of the earth I call you, I call as my heart grows faint, lead me to the rock that is higher than I, For you have been my refuge, a strong tower against the foe." His outer circumstances weren’t the best. His was fainting and his own personal strength had a fading reliability for him. At this point, he is talking about a strong tower but there is no strong tower physically present anywhere for him to go, and he is saying that his refuge has been and will be the presence of God for him. Perhaps there once was a strong tower back in Jerusalem but by now it had been ransacked and there was no actual strong tower for him to ever get back to, and only God could represent a strong tower for him and was the only remaining source of refuge. If there had been a strong tower, then he might had hoped to return to it, and some of his reliance could have been in that idea, but now his reliance was fully upon God, as there physically was no strong tower left, and only God was his reliance, God was his strong tower. I would imagine him somewhere on the high long plains with mountains in the distance, surrounding by an open sky, in his armor with the sky brightening on all sides for him with a low rumbling in of the distance, as he marched alone. And as he listens to the softening rumble of nature in the distance, he could feel God's eyes upon him. He could see the outline of these big mountains in the distance, but there was no way he could climb them or get to the top of these rocky mountains. When he talks of God leading him to a rock higher than I, he is talking about an advantageous place that would afford him a view of escape and maybe a way back, a high point where he could see the bigger picture of where he actually was and how he could get back from there. This place was out of reach without God’s help, yet he wouldn’t have asked for it if he hadn’t believed in its existence as a place he could get to with God’s leadership. Really what he was asking for and ultimately relying on was God’s eyes for the situation working for his advantage and comforting him. The rock was not him physically being in a higher part of the earth or on top of a rock like mountain, but the rock was God’s eyes directly on him from a higher and infinitely expanded viewpoint and intervening in nature itself for him as he walked the high distant plains perhaps alone with his few remaining men following far behind him. God's watchful eye for him including even brightening and illuminating the sky for him then and there as he watched David in his solo journey and letting the sky rumble in the distance to relay the sounds of His presence to him. Despite once the king, now alone on the high plains, God's presenting eyes for him included as far as David could see with his own eyes and everything in his sight was covered by God's presence for him, God's eyes for him. Correlated with someone praying in the present days, would be asking God what his eye is towards a given situation as to what is best for all concerned. Peter Gabriel has a song called," In your eyes." It would be a good song to listen to for meditating on how God’s eyes do follow us and why and how we can ask for God to show us his eyes for us. Reverting to verse 1, it says, “Hear my cry of Lord, and listen to my prayer." He refers to a type of fainting in verse 2, perhaps partly physical, partly mental or partly of the soul. But the end he is speaking of might be what is starting to be the end of hope for him, the end of the line for him. There must have been a felt distance from God within all this. In verse 5 it says, For you have heard my vows oh God, you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name." From this, we find that his prayer in verse 1 contained a vow. He was certain God heard his vow, and it was part of the heritage of the believers to be able to make a vow or deal with God. In all this his reliance was towards praying to God and God hearing him. Everything else that he might have been able to rely on had collapsed. Considering his initial distress, this psalm shows a great deal of certitude in God’s presence. Verses 6 thru 9 say," Increase the day’s of the kings life, his years for many generations, May he be enthroned in God’s presence forever, appoint your love and faithfulness to protect him, Then will I ever sing praise to your name, and fulfill my vows day after day.’ Here we learn what the vow was. Reliance was to be on God’s forever presence and the appointment of his love and faithfulness. David would sing praises to God every day, and it is interesting to see that now that he had God’s ear on this vow, he was looking to expand it, in so many words asking for a longer life and the certainty of salvation and be eternally present with the Lord, and protection sourced from God’s personal love and faithfulness for him and more days for him meant more days that he would sing praises to God. David must have had an awesome voice for song and we know in part he was a great composer from the psalms he did write, and maybe one of the ways he had drifted from God was not singing to him as he once did. He would probably top the charts today with his albums. The vow closed the gap, of the distance initially referred to in verse 2 of the psalm. What this also says is he had gotten away from singing to the Lord and was probably doing it only once in a while, certainly not daily. And maybe this was the reason God allowed him to have all these troubles and he came back to the realization that this is what God wanted from him to make amends. A corollary today might be someone drifting from what was a good prayer life, just not doing it enough and all of the sudden God lets things go array a bit, more as a call back to prayer. This is flattering on one hand, that God gives the personal call back but it can be taken that troubles arising can be a matter of getting back to prayer, basically God is getting your attention again. David is recognizing as well that a true increase can only come from God. Today, people are looking for increases in for example wealth as a dominating theme. But they may be taking there eye of the ball to do this. David, says, lead me to a rock higher than I, meaning that he was also aware of and watching for God and his leadership. He was looking for God’s eyes upon him for presence and action, with his eyes also looking towards God’s view, metaphorically expressed as the rock higher than I. While it is okay to have goals like wealth accumulation, just be careful about extending the goal past what is most important and also that God is the source of true increase. How this psalm also relates to personal prayer is that David, finding himself maybe lost on the ends of the earth, and a bit faint from the situation, was still able to hurl his prayers at the Goliath aspects of this situation. We can intercede for ourselves and others from the faintness of feeling distant from God and from being physically distant from our normal location on the earth or just feeling distance from our better selves that we had once known. David had been the reigning King, now banished to the ends of the earth, yet God's eyes were still keenly upon him and for David, he was the rock higher than I. So we can pray for friends faraway from us physically as God’s eyes reach towards them as well as us. Also there is a certain logic presented here. David reads the acceptance of his vow as an opening to other blessings related to the vow, such as increased days where he could extend the duration of his vow and the related blessings involved. See Judges," Chapter 13 verses 22 and 23" where Samson's father to be misinterprets the visitation of the angel relating a vow as pertaining to his personal doom and he wife says logically, in verse 23, that the Lord would not have done these things if he meant harm and they couldn't actually keep the vows if they were harmed. There are certain extensions to what needs to happen around the vow. This is an aspect to consider in any answered prayer as to what the logical ramifications need to be around the answer. David, was not afraid to continue communications around the vow, instead of just crossing his fingers and counting his lucky stars and keeping quiet, he boldly went into the vow and discussed what he needed to keep it going. He wasn’t shy with God, and for him, he kept referring this all to what was he was thinking was best for the relationship between him and God.
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