Psalm 27
In my bible, the title of this Psalm is “An exuberant declaration of faith” by David, which gives a glimpse of the character of David. When David was anointed king over Israel as a young person God had said “The Lord had sought for Himself a man after His own heart, and the Lord has commanded him to be commander over His people”. ( 1 Samuel 13:14) As we look at what David wrote to sing unto the Lord in this psalm we see a man who was passionate about his God. The first verse says: “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life, whom shall I be afraid?” David throughout this Psalm uses the word ‘Lord’ to describe his God. It is extremely important to understand the meaning of the word Lord – it means master and ruler – the one who is in control of one’s life and David unashamedly called his God ‘Lord’. There is a song that I used to sing “He is Lord, He is Lord, He has risen from the dead and He is Lord, every knee shall bow, every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord”. The concept of submitting to someone is foreign to our natural behaviour but this is what we do when we accept Jesus as Lord and Saviour. Jesus warned in Luke 6:46 “But why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do the things which I say?” As I look at this Psalm my life has been impacted over and over again by it and as I look a few incidents in David’s life I see that his Lord was real to him. David made God Lord of his life when he was young and not in the spotlight, while minding his father’s sheep he killed a lion and a bear and did not boast to his brothers because he did it in the strength of his Lord. When he was delivering food for his father to his brothers in Saul’s army when he saw Goliath defy his God he went and killed him with God’s ability. When Saul tried to kill him he escaped to the cave of Adullam and 400 men who were distressed, discontented, and in debt joined him – these unlikely men became David’s mighty men who became the best fighting men in Israel because of David’s Godly influence. When David had the opportunity to kill Saul twice he would not touch the Lord’s anointed. As I look at this Psalm the phrase ‘The Lord is ‘ has challenged me so much, David lived in a ‘now’ experience with his God and this is what living with Jesus is. David said, “The Lord is my light and salvation and the strength of my life”. When Jesus is Lord of my life then I continually walk in His light and can see where I am going. Also, I am safe with Him for He protects me, and He is my strength so nothing can harm me. In the new different season, we find ourselves in we have nothing to fear because ‘The Lord is’.