Mensa Otabil - Hear My Prayer
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Welcome to a brand new week, and we are going to continue our study of the Psalms. As you know, we’ve done Psalm 1, 2, and 3, and today we do the fourth Psalm, Psalm number 4, and we’ll be studying it throughout this week. Psalm 4, verse 1: «Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have relieved me in my distress; have mercy on me and hear my prayer.»
Psalm 4 and Psalm 3 have some commonality. If you look at the structure of the two Psalms, they have a similar structure because historically, they are part of each other. Psalm 3 and Psalm 4 were both written at a time when David was dealing with the rebellion of Absalom, when most of his people had abandoned him. He starts by asking the Lord to hear him when he calls because, at this moment in his life, he is praying for God to hear him. He asks God to listen to him when he calls, and I think the reason why he is saying that is that he felt as if God was not listening to him.
All of us go through that situation where we pray and pray and pray but feel God is not hearing us. So we make a special appeal and say, «Lord, this time you have to hear me.» That’s what David is saying: «Hear me when I call.» Then he calls God, «O God of my righteousness,» so David’s confidence in prayer is because of God’s righteousness. He says, «God, I know you will hear me because you are the God of righteousness; you will do right.» But not only that, God hears us because our cause is right. You can’t come to God asking him to hear your prayer when the case you have put before God is a bad case. You want him to do something against his nature or something that does not conform to his will, and just because you’re praying about it, you think it should happen. It’s like people who pray to curse others or pray for bad things to happen to other people. You may pray all you want, but if it’s not part of God’s righteousness, it won’t happen.
So he says, «God, hear me because you are a God of righteousness, and my cause is right. I am in the right in this matter.» That is what David believes-that when we pray, we must present a righteous cause to God. Then in that prayer, he says, «Lord, you have given me relief from my distress.» In other words, «Lord, in the past, when I called on you, you helped me.» It’s always good when we’re praying to remember what God has done for us in the past. David was always careful; we find that in earlier Psalms that when he prayed, he would always remember what God had done for him in the past.
Don’t just allow the present circumstance to dictate your attitude about everything. Even if you don’t feel God is hearing you now, has He heard you in the past? Did He answer your prayer? Did He do something good for you? Remember what He has done as you present your righteous cause before the Lord, and He will hear you.
But in the end, David says, " Lord, have mercy on me,» because he knew that even if his cause was righteous and God was righteous, the reason why God answers our prayer is not because our case is the right case or because we are living righteously, but it’s because of God’s mercy. Every answer to prayer is an extension of God’s mercy. Don’t count on your own righteousness; don’t count on your own goodness as the basis for which God should answer your prayer. There are people who talk to God and make a case: «Lord, you know I tithe, and I do this and I do that,» and because of that, «hear me.» That is the way the Pharisees used to pray, and Jesus says that’s not how we pray. God answers our prayer not because we’ve done so right in the past. He answers our prayer because of His grace and His mercy, and out of His grace and mercy, He answers our prayer.
David concludes verse 1 of the fourth Psalm with «Lord, hear me again.» So there’s so much packed in verse 1 of the fourth Psalm, and as we look at the other verses in this Psalm, we come to understand how to pray properly and how to present our case before the Lord.
Alright, so let’s share a word of prayer. Say with me: «Heavenly Father, have mercy on me; hear me when I call, and deliver me from every distress. In Jesus' name, Amen and Amen.»