"WHAT CAN FLESH DO TO ME?"

Singing: (Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter)
Psalm 35:1,2
Psalm 97:6
Psalm 118:2
Psalm 56:1-5
Psalm 27:1,5,6

Beloved Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ!

"What can flesh do to me?" We understand that David’s question in our text is a rhetorical question, is a question with an obvious answer. The obvious answer David is thinking of is: Nothing, flesh can’t do a thing to me.

With respect to ourselves, we’re certainly not sure that David’s conviction is so true. What flesh can do to us? Our lives are full of examples of what flesh can do to us. Flesh: that’s other people, and other people can be very much a burden, even a pain. Think only of the self-denying care that’s to be given to depressed people, or sick people; it drains of all energy. Or think of the hurt we experience in the face of hard feelings against us. And that’s to say nothing of the troubles we encounter from crooked businessmen, the anxieties we face in our homes. And what shall we say about the way people can talk about us?! What can flesh do to us? We’re sure: people can drag us down, break us. No, the conviction reflected in our text just doesn’t ring true.

David, my beloved, was a man like you and me. He too was hurt be other people’s deeds, other people’s words, other people’s slander. Yet he could speak the words of our text. We today want to know how he could do it.

As it turns out, congregation, David could do it not because he was so tough that he stood above the hurts people could do to him. Rather, David could say what he said because he believed in Christ’s triumph on the cross – and therefore Satan’s defeat.

We use as theme that question of David:

"WHAT CAN FLESH DO TO ME?"

I draw your attention to two thoughts

1 "What can flesh do to me?" Well, beloved, a quick reading of this psalm makes it clear that ‘flesh’ was doing a lot to David. And what was being done to him was not all that pleasant. I read in vs 1 that men would swallow David up, or, as we can better translate: men were hounding David. All day long, day after day, they were oppressing him. So also vss 5 & 6: they twist David’s words, all their thoughts are against him for evil, more, they attack, they lurk, they watch David’s footsteps, lie in wait for David’s life. The net result of all that hounding was that it all became too much for David; the psalm suggests that David cracks under the pressure. Flesh: it’s out to get him, and the tears of David suggest that flesh was quite successful too yet; the killer of Goliath weeps, a broken man.

Yet exactly in that context is the bold exclamation of vs 4: "what can flesh do to me?" And we’re mystified by these words; what does the hounded and broken psalmist mean with such a bold exclamation?!

To understand our text, brothers and sisters, we shall have to answer a number of questions. There is first of all this: what, or who, is meant here by flesh? Who is hounding David? Further, why are they hounding him? What motivates this relentless watching and lurking day after day? And finally: what is David’s response to all this unpleasantness?a. The term ‘flesh’ as we find it in vs 4 will have to be understood to be the ‘men’ of vs 1; it’s people who hound David. Yet it’s not just people in general of whom David speaks; he has in mind specific people who torment him. That’s a conclusion we may draw from the title of this psalm; there we’re told that David wrote this poem at the time when he was arrested by the Philistines in Gath. The details are recorded in I Sam 21 – we read it.

Saul was king over Israel. Saul, though, wasn’t a man after God’s heart; he did not make a point of doing what the Lord demanded. Consequently, the Lord had chosen another to be king over His people, and had him anointed; that other was David.

After David’s anointing by Samuel, David’s life unfolded in what we would consider to be an ideal way. Saul needed a harp-player to soothe the evil spirit in him, and God directed things in such a way that David should be that player. So David has access to the palace, and with that access came exposure to the ins and outs of ruling the nation. When the Philistines attacked Israel and Goliath taunted God’s people, it was David who killed the giant, with as result that he became most popular among the people. They even sang his praise: "Saul has killed his thousands, but David his ten thousands." He became son-in-law to the king, bosom friend to the crown prince. All was going in David’s favour; the crown was laid away for him.

It all changed when Saul became jealous of David’s popularity. Twice Saul threw his spear at David, trying to pin him to the wall. He surrounded the house in which David lived in an effort to catch him. He pursued David across the hills and forests of Judah. Birds had nests and foxes had homes, but the anointed of the Lord in Israel had no place to lay his head. He was a hunted vagabond, a fugitive on the earth, wandering hither and thither in search of relief from his relentless pursuer. It’s as David says in vs 1 of this psalm: "men hound me." They’re always watching, laying in wait to take David’s life.

And it wasn’t only Saul that was pursuing him. Scriptures tell us that even his own countrymen, his own tribesmen did not give him refuge. Everywhere was the danger of Saul, was the real threat that someone would turn him in to the man who sought to kill him.

So in desperation, as a final last resort, David sought his refuge among the sworn enemies of Saul, the Philistines. Possibly, just possibly, Saul might not find him there, might not dare to send his men to kill the Lord’s anointed; possibly, just possibly, he might enjoy here a moment to catch his breath.

But it wasn’t to be. Even in Gath, David was hounded. For the advisers to king Achish reminded their king of who this broken fugitive actually is; say they: "Is not this David the king of the land?" And they remind their master of the song that was sung in Israel after Goliath was slain: "Saul has killed his thousands, but David his 10,000’s." And the answer of Achish turns out to be that his men should go and arrest this slayer of Goliath, this would-be king of Israel. So David must fear for his life once again... (I S 21:12).

Saul, Achish – the Israelites, the Philistines: that, specifically, is what is meant by the word "flesh" in our text. It’s these two groups –the believers and the unbelievers, God’s people and God’s enemies- that hound the poet, that band themselves together, that watch for David’s life, that seek all day long to injure his cause. That’s what’s meant by the word "men" in vs 1 and by the word "flesh" in our text.b. That brings us to the next question: Why should these two kings pursue David with such fervour? Why hound him, watch for his life?

With regards to Saul, the reason is evident: Saul was jealous. He understood full well that God was going to take the kingdom away from him and would give it to David. And for Achish too the reason is evident: the Philistines were at war with Israel. And David was an Israelite, was even said to be in line for the throne. Besides, he had killed their hero Goliath. Enough reason for Achish and the Philistines to hound David.

Yet, beloved, the motivation behind the action of these kings in hounding David lies much deeper. We are to remember that David had been anointed to be king, in fact, was anointed by God to be king. That was something that Saul knew (cf 20:14,31). That means, then, that by attempting to kill David –despite his divine anointing- Saul consciously set himself up against the plan of the Lord to make David king. By pursuing the anointed of the Lord, Saul was fighting against God.

That a person fights against God is one thing. That the king of Israel should fight against God is quite another. That king should know Who God is. For Israel has that rich history of being God’s people, with the countless examples of God’s power and His holiness and His jealousy. On top of that, the king of Israel sat on the throne very much by God’s grace, had even the specific task to rule God’s people for God. And that people over which he was ruler on God’s behalf was to be a blessing for the nations. Israel should demonstrate how men were to live together in harmony, how to take care of God’s world. Israel should be the people from which the Saviour would be born, the one who was to crush the head of the serpent. By refusing to recognise his position as representative of God, by refusing to understand that Israel had a special place in this world, Saul undermined Israel’s ability to be a blessing, Saul threatened the coming of Jesus Christ. In a word: this was an attack prompted by hell – Satan vs God, the antithesis!

That same Satan was also behind the danger that confronted David in Gath. Think on it: David was no danger to Achish at all. Sure, Achish had heard that David was to be the next king in Israel. But given the way David came to Achish, kingship was hardly possible for David. A broken man he was, hunted by Saul, with no support among his own people, no followers with him. No, David was no danger to Achish at all. Yet Achish ordered David to be arrested. Here again, congregation, just as with Saul, we need to see an attempt from Satan to get rid of the anointed of the Lord. Now that the prey had escaped the hands of his servant Saul, Satan uses the possibilities that be in Gath to reach his desired goal.

It is in that light, beloved, that we are to read Ps 56. David complains that men hound him, that they watch his steps. But behind these enemies of David was the arch-enemy of God – Satan himself. These men, Saul and Achish, were motivated by hell to destroy God’s redeeming work among men.c. And that’s why David responds as he does. Under the pressure of hellish attacks, he breaks down in tears, he cries out to God. And he says: ‘men pursue me, O God. False men who hate You, men motivated by hell, hound me to destroy me. Yet, Lord, it’s not just me they attack, me they hound; they know of Your decree that I should be king over Your people, and they don’t want that, and so they reject You.’ That is why, congregation, David prays as He does. Vs 7: "in anger cast down the peoples, O God!" To say it in the words of LD 48: "destroy, O God, these works of the devil, every power that raises itself against You, every conspiracy against Your holy Word." That’s David’s prayer in the face of the pressures around him: ‘do not let Satan, O God, do not let Satan destroy Your plan of salvation; for Christ’s sake don’t let ME perish!’

David cries. But we understand that his tears are not tears of personal hurt as such; it’s not David’s own skin he’s worried about. These are the tears of a man who is hurt because he sees God being hurt. These are the tears of the man who understands the battle of the spirits, who understands what is at stake in that battle: not his own skin, his own comfort, his own future is at stake, but God’s honour, God’s redeeming work – that’s what’s at stake! That’s why he weeps, and that’s why he asks God to bottle up his tears, to record them. For God’s Name’s sake!2 But if that is the bottom line here, beloved –that God’s glory is at stake- surely God is going to do something about it. Flesh, men, hell can attack, can hound, can make life difficult for the child of God. But there must be a limit to what God will allow flesh, men, hell to do. That’s the promise God has given: He will not sit idly by while men defame His name, while they sabotage the coming of His kingdom, prevent the salvation of His children. That’s a lesson that David has learned so well from the Word which God has revealed in Israel’s history to date. Pharaoh never got away with trying to destroy God’s people. Neither did the Amalekites nor the Midianites nor the Canaanites; each and every time God rose up in defence of His people, in defence ultimately of His own name. That’s why David has every confidence in the world that God is going to do the same thing now too. God will remember all the tears spilt over the defamation of God’s name, and God will arise and put all those enemies to flight. David has no doubt; vs 9: "when I cry to You, Then my enemies will turn back." I know, says David, I know it shall be, because "God is for me." God is on my side, or better, I am on God’s side, and therefore against us shall be none (Rom 8:31). Because God is God, is God going to rise to the defence of His people, to the defence of Himself.

It’s awareness of that reality that prompts David’s statement of faith as we find it in our text and as it is repeated in vs 11. God, he says, I trust in Him. I trust in Him, because He is God. And the word which David uses here for God implies God in all His majesty, His power. David speaks of the almighty God. And over against this Almighty God is flesh, man, that created, frail, limited being. Behind frail flesh may stand Satan, but Satan too is a creature, once created by God the Almighty. And consequently is Satan also limited.

Flesh: that may do much to harm David, to hunt him, to hound him. But it’s only flesh. David had received a word from God – he would be king. And Saul –flesh- is contending against that God. So the contest between God and flesh is unevenly matched. Almighty God vs finite flesh – the outcome is clear. Then David may be caught in the middle, but despite how great the pressure mounts, he can always trust in that God who shall rise to defend His own glorious name. The mouth of the Lord has issued that Word: Israel shall be a blessing to the nations. And David shall be king. And the Christ shall come. And therefore David need not be alarmed; it shall come to pass as God has spoken regardless of the ragings of a Saul or an Achish. Flesh cannot stop God from carrying out His plan of salvation through Jesus Christ. "What can flesh do to me?!"

That’s David’s conviction. And that is why he can speak about paying vows and praises to God in vs 12. Though now seized by the Philistines in Gath, David is convinced that Achish cannot ultimately harm him; deliverance must come, both from Achish and from Saul.

David’s expectations were not disappointed. As we know from other parts of God’s revelation, David became king of Israel – the houndings of Saul etc came to nothing. And the promises of God to David came to pass also; despite all the ragings of hell by means of various people, Satan could not prevent that Christ was born, could not prevent either that the Christ atone for sin on the cross, ransom God’s own from the power of the devil, defeat and bind the Evil One. O yes, Christ in His day was hounded far worse than David had ever been – misunderstood He was by His own family, rejected He was by His own people, betrayed by His own disciple. As Isaiah would one day say: "He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief" (53:3). To David the hurts and the taunts he experienced at the hand of Israelites and Philistines alike were searing barbs sufficient to break any man, but they were in effect a dim foretaste of the piercing hurts and the cutting taunts experienced by the Christ. And what fell upon the Christ as He hung upon that cross was more than the sneers and the jeers of men, was more than the hurts that hell could cast; what fell upon the Christ as He hung upon the cross was the wrath of God, a wrath directed against the sins –your sins and mine- piled onto Jesus Christ. It’s anguish, pain, agony, that David experienced at the hand of men, but it wasn’t near the hellish anguish, the unspeakable terror and agony that Christ experienced. For the Christ was rejected by God, and David was not. David in his troubles could say in vs 9 of his psalm that "God is for me," but Christ on the cross could not say it; all Christ could say was, "My God, My God, why have You rejected Me?"

And we know why the Christ was so utterly rejected by God. He was rejected, He experienced in body and soul that unspeakable anguish, pain, terror and agony of the cross so that David might not have to endure the anguish and torment of hell (LD 16). Yes, God saw to it that David was not be destroyed by the pains and the hurts directed to him by flesh, by the people around him, because Christ would one day not be spared those hurts and torments. Jesus Christ experienced that utter rejection so that David might not, Jesus experienced it so that David might one day be freed from every pain, from every tear, from every barb and hurt that men might fling at him. As David himself already says in Ps 56: "I shall walk before God in the light of life" (vs 13). Flesh can today not ultimately hurt me!

But that’s then the gospel for us too, beloved! It was in the midst of David’s concrete troubles –harassments that drew tears from David- that this Old Testament saint could cry out his conviction: flesh cannot hurt me! Let them talk, let them gloat, let them point their finger, let them chase me and hound me and laugh at me and do what they will; flesh cannot hurt me for my Saviour shall be rejected by God so that I may never be rejected by Him! If that, my beloved, could be the confidence of this Old Testament believer in the midst of his strife, how much more can we cry out this same conviction in the age of Christ’s triumph! For since the days of David’s anguish, Christ has received a throne at God’s right hand, has been made Lord supreme over all the earth, yes, principalities and authorities and Satan included are today subject to Jesus Christ. "What can flesh do to me?" O yes, flesh can attack, people can hurt me, even brothers and sisters of the same faith, in the same congregation, can pain me with deeds as well as with words. And certainly, that Satan who tried so hard in the days of Ps 56 to prevent God’s work of salvation through David, tries equally hard today to prevent us from knowing ourselves completely safe in the hands of the God Who gave up His Son for our salvation. But safe with this God we always are, for this God is God, is God almighty, and neither Satan nor a demon nor a business man nor a politician nor a family member can today do a thing unless my God and Saviour permit. What can flesh do to you? What, for that matter, can Satan do to you? Nothing, beloved, nothing, unless your sovereign Father in Jesus Christ permit!

In this broken life, thoughtless, kindless, merciless words continue to be spoken to each of us. So do words that are purposefully meant to hurt us, to cut us to the quick. It gives sleeplessness, anxiety, discomfort; it makes us feel disliked, rejected, despised. But the words of David stand, my beloved: flesh can ultimately do me no harm. Christ has triumphed, Satan is bound. And God is merciful to me His sinful child. And works all things to my good and His greater glory. In this God –my Father for Christ’s sake- in this God whose word I praise, Him I trust without a fear. Amen.