"To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.
I waited patiently for the Lord;
he inclined to me and heard my cry.
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction,
out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
making my steps secure.
3 He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear,
and put their trust in the Lord.
4 Blessed is the man who makes
the Lord his trust,
who does not turn to the proud,
to those who go astray after a lie!
5 You have multiplied, O Lord my God,
your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us;
none can compare with you!
I will proclaim and tell of them,
yet they are more than can be told.
6 In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted,
but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
7 Then I said, “Behold, I have come;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
8 I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”
9 I have told the glad news of deliverance
in the great congregation;
behold, I have not restrained my lips,
as you know, O Lord.
10 I have not hidden your deliverance within my heart;
I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation;
I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness
from the great congregation.
11 As for you, O Lord, you will not restrain
your mercy from me;
your steadfast love and your faithfulness will
ever preserve me!
12 For evils have encompassed me
beyond number;
my iniquities have overtaken me,
and I cannot see;
they are more than the hairs of my head;
my heart fails me.
13 Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me!
O Lord, make haste to help me!
14 Let those be put to shame and disappointed altogether
who seek to snatch away my life;
let those be turned back and brought to dishonor
who delight in my hurt!
15 Let those be appalled because of their shame
who say to me, “Aha, Aha!”
16 But may all who seek you
rejoice and be glad in you;
may those who love your salvation
say continually, “Great is the Lord!”
17 As for me, I am poor and needy,
but the Lord takes thought for me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
do not delay, O my God!"
Psalm 40
This is one of the high mountain peaks of the Psalter, and the Church has made it its own in its worship, and countless individuals have used it to express their glad experience of the grace of God. There are different ways of interpreting this great song. Spurgeon takes it almost exclusively as prefiguring the experience of Christ - in this he follows many of the old Puritans - and we can scarcely doubt that there are rich insights here when we apply the words to our Lord's experience of suffering and victory (cf Hebrews 10:5-9). All the same, we should not on that account neglect the fact that David spoke these words of his own experience as a spiritual man, and it is in this respect that we should first look at the Psalm, as holding many enriching, encouraging and challenging lessons for us. The two halves of the Psalm (1-10 and 11-17) are very different in tone, the former filled with exultant joy and praise, the latter with a sense of fear and concern as innumerable evils surround the Psalmist (13-17 reappear almost verbatim as a separate Psalm 70). The lesson this great change of mood teaches us is that there is no deliverance we can know in spiritual life so complete that it excludes the possibility of future difficulties and hazards. Furthermore, the resurrection of dead fears is not a thing unknown even at the height of spiritual exhortation. This is simply part and parcel of true Christian experience. But the great lesson is: in time of trouble, the memory of past deliverances such as this will garrison the heart and provide a bulwark that no stormy seas will ever finally shake.