Psalm 5, in the view of some commentators, continues in poetic form the description of David’s flight from his son Absalom. If this is correct, he’s now spent two nights in the desert.
David is awake and ready to begin another day. He’s still on the run and still in danger.
The Psalm alternates between paragraphs about those who seek God, morning by morning, and those who reject God. It’s almost an application of Psalm 1 (the “two ways”) to David’s situation. The Psalm can be diagrammed like this:
| Confidence in the Lord (vv 1-3) | The Lord’s rejection of the wicked (vv 4-7) |
| Commitment to the Lord’s righteous way (vv 7-8) |
The Lord’s response to the wicked (vv 9-10) |
| Joy in the Lord’s protective care (vv 11-12) |
David, in his “groaning” (lit. sighing), cries out to God in prayer at the start of the day (vs 1-2). Then he waits and watches, expectantly, to see how God will answer his prayer (vs 3).
I love the vivid, descriptive way David prays at the end of the Psalm (vv 11-12). He speaks of God as our “refuge” (Ps 5:11) or “place of shelter.” The term “take refuge” used here occurs 35x in Scripture and refers to:
A place where one will find safety, rest, or comfort, implying the place of refuge is a place to be trusted to keep one safe (Jdg 9:15; 2Sa 22:3) (Swanson, Dictionary of Biblical Languages).
As we enter another day, not knowing what is ahead, we begin the day with prayer, crying out to him. David’s “morning prayer” is a great pattern for us.
- We begin the day knowing that God “hears our cry.
- We pray, laying our needs before him.
- We watch, and wait, as we begin the day, looking to see what God will do.
- As we go through the day, we continually ask God to “lead us and “make our paths straight.”
- We turn to God during the day our refuge, our shelter and our trusted place of rest.
- Experiences of God’s favor and blessing during the day cause us to respond with joyful praise and singing
