Where does the line between innocence and guilt lie? In some regards, we’re all complicit in this interwoven world, where a bargain buy at Target is made by sweat shop labor in Cambodia. And in some regards, we’re all victims, shaped by systems and institutions and parents who have failed us.
Our best storytellers have told tales that have exposed the hypocrisies of assumed heroes and that have generated sympathy for assumed villains.
In the movie Avengers: Age of Ultron, the sinister Ultron is actually the invention of Tony Stark (aka Iron Man), showing how easily our desires to do good end up making us complicit with evil.
When I watched the original Star Wars movie back in 1978, I shuddered the first time I saw Darth Vader. Here was evil incarnate. But then we got the end of Return of the Jedi and the three prequels and all of a sudden Darth Vader was humanized and rehabilitated.
In one case, good becomes evil. In the other, evil becomes good. The lines have gone all fuzzy on us.
In this era of the triumph of the therapeutic, we have been so psychologized that we no longer know the difference between good and evil. We delve the psyche to find the good inside of the villain and the bad inside of the hero. And somehow, we’ve lost the ability to tell the difference between heroes and villains.
This makes prayers like Psalm 17 difficult for us to swallow. To have David boldly proclaim his innocence sounds absurdly naive to our sophisticated minds. And for him to request judgment on those whom he claims are guilty sounds childishly arrogant. How do we know he’s the good guy? How do we know they’re the bad guys? Might he be somewhat guilty himself? Might there be valid reasons for the behavior he rejects out of hand as bad?
Maybe it’s because of this confusion that the Lord of the Rings movies were such a breath of fresh air in the early 2000s. The trilogy made strong, defined lines between good and evil while acknowledging that even those on the side of good are tainted by evil. But that taint didn’t muddy the waters. Good was still good and evil was still evil.
There is a place for ambiguity — things just aren’t as cut and dried as we’d like them to be. But there is also a place for naming right and naming wrong. That place is with God. He is the Judge. He is the one we bring our pleas to.
And that’s where Psalm 17 begins. David stands before the Judge and in the first two verses asks the Judge to hear his case.
Hear me, LORD, my plea is just;
listen to my cry.
Hear my prayer—
it does not rise from deceitful lips.
Let my vindication come from you;
may your eyes see what is right (Ps. 17:1-2).
This is legal language. But it’s prayer all the same. And maybe it’s time we started combining the two in our own praying. There are numerous biblical examples of laying our cases before God the Judge and it’s time we considered setting aside cozy prayers for courtroom prayers.
Having addressed the Judge, David begins to make his case by proclaiming his innocence.
Though you probe my heart,
though you examine me at night and test me,
you will find that I have planned no evil;
my mouth has not transgressed.
Though people tried to bribe me,
I have kept myself from the ways of the violent
through what your lips have commanded.
My steps have held to your paths;
my feet have not stumbled (Ps. 17:3-5).
A lie detector test is child’s play compared to what David offers to prove his innocence. He offers to have his very heart laid bare during his most defenseless time. Night is the time when the filter of rational thought is removed. Our dreams are far more honest than our daytime thoughts. Our souls are defenseless at night.
And what is revealed? No intentions to do evil. No bad talk. No bribes received. No violence. Only stedfast loyalty.
Frankly, there’s a boldness here that I lack. I strive for integrity, but I blanch at unfiltered access to my heart. For even I see bad intentions and bad talk. But as I pray along with Psalm 17, I find myself urged to let my guard down.
Having proclaimed innocence, David makes his request of the Judge.
I call on you, my God, for you will answer me;
turn your ear to me and hear my prayer.
Show me the wonders of your great love,
you who save by your right hand
those who take refuge in you from their foes.
Keep me as the apple of your eye;
hide me in the shadow of your wings
from the wicked who are out to destroy me,
from my mortal enemies who surround me (Ps 17:6-9).
The request is in the verbs: Answer me. Show me. Keep me. Hide me.
Part of this request is the simple but often unasked prayer: Love me. That’s what “Show me the wonders of your great love” means. That’s what “Keep me as the apple of your eye” means.
After years of being told not to be selfish, it’s an awkward-sounding request. But this is yet another place where the Psalms teach me honesty in my praying.
This is no manipulative narcissism, trying to weasel love out of God. This is a child holding his arms up to his Papa.
He wants the Judge to become the Savior. He wants God to be moved to action by his great love and to save him like he’s saved others who have taken refuge with him in the past.
The section ends with a request to be hidden from his mortal enemies which transitions into the next section about their predatory nature. They have closed hearts and open mouths as they prowl.
They close up their callous hearts,
and their mouths speak with arrogance.
They have tracked me down, they now surround me,
with eyes alert, to throw me to the ground.
They are like a lion hungry for prey,
like a fierce lion crouching in cover (Ps. 17:10-12).
This next section is a final plea. But it is notoriously difficult to translate. What the NIV translates as “the wicked” (underlined below) has been translated by some scholars as “your treasured ones,” which sends the passage in vastly different directions. Either God is shoving judgment down the throats of the wicked or he is providing for the needs of his treasured ones.
Poetry is the most difficult form of language to translate. In fact, the word “translate” doesn’t really apply to poetry, since poetry has less to do with the literal meaning of words than it does with the feelings and senses they convey. Poetry plays with images and sounds, making puns and plays off of words that can only have their desired effect in the original language. And sometimes, maybe even in this case, the poet has a double meaning in mind.
Translation issues like this remind us to remain humble before the Scriptures. We are entering into a large world here — a world defined by God, not by our reasoning minds — and so we refuse to make definitive statements about what we really can’t know.
Rise up, LORD, confront them, bring them down;
with your sword rescue me from the wicked.
By your hand save me from such people, LORD,
from those of this world whose reward is in this life.
May what you have stored up for the wicked fill their bellies;
may their children gorge themselves on it,
and may there be leftovers for their little ones (Ps. 17:13-14).
Whether it’s the wicked who eat their just desserts or it’s the treasured ones of God who finally eat their fill, justice is done. The Judge has vindicated the innocent and implicated the guilty.
But then in a surprising departure from courtroom language, vindicated David wants one more thing: To see God face to face.
As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face;
when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness (Ps. 17:15).
What adds to the surprise as this prayer ends is its reference to “when I awake.” What is this awakening? Is it waking up to a new day of justice after the nightmare just passed through? Is it a rare hint in the Hebrew Bible of resurrection from the dead?
Again, the poetic prayer refuses to be pinned down and scholarly opinion is divided. And so, I default to hearing both.
But for me, matters of injustice in my life fall away if I can only see my Judge face to face. I can put up with all manner of mistreatment as long as I can look my Lord in the eye and know as I am known.
This is the hope of poorly treated servants in 1 Peter 2 who are beaten for doing nothing wrong. They look to the crucified Jesus and entrust themselves to the Shepherd and Overseer of their souls.
Catching his gaze is enough.
In some regards, this final verse wipes away the previous 14 verses of Psalm 17. The plea. The defense. The accusation. The request for retribution. All of it falls to the wayside with the satisfaction of seeing Yahweh face to face. And yet, it is necessary to pray through all of that in order to come to the conclusion that regardless of what happens, “I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.”
Only after our pain has been thoroughly prayed do we know that the joy of seeing our Lord is the only answer to what we’ve suffered.
All of us are both the innocent and the guilty. And only God’s face brings satisfaction.