My wife and I are reading through the Psalms in our evening reading and occasionally a nugget of the Psalms jumps out of the page. Don’t you love it when, after years of reading the “Old Book” passages become alive, reinforcing old teachings or simply warming your heart.

This is the book of Psalms, and it is rich.

I pray I can communicate a portion of the blessing we receive from this wonderful book.

Psalm 69 is a psalm of sorrow, of apparent defeat and deep emotional stress, of a distress in the heart and of being overwhelmed, of a weariness of soul, and of a waiting for an answer from God. It is a psalm that speaks of loneliness, of disappointment and of extended trials.

As we venture through the psalmist’s deep confession, his pain and his sorrow, we will encounter passages that will be referred to in the New Testament, providing a recounting of the sorrow of Jesus.

Psalm 69:9 For zeal for your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me.
Psalm 69:10 When I wept and humbled my soul with fasting, it became my reproach.
Psalm 69:11 When I made sackcloth my clothing, I became a byword to them.
Psalm 69:12 I am the talk of those who sit in the gate, and the drunkards make songs about me.

Ok who wrote this? I say that sarcastically, for I know King David wrote it, but gosh golly, all I can see in this passage is the New Testament witness of Jesus.

Psalm 69:9 For zeal for your house has consumed me

For David, this phrase described his desire to be close to the tabernacle, to be passionate to see God’s tabernacle become the Temple. It was a distraction of the highest magnitude, a desire that left all other goals in life to be secondary.

Remember my friend, this is the king of Israel, a world power at the time, and David was not consumed with status, power, wealth or image. He was focused on the source of all goodness and righteousness.

Mark 11:15 And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons.
Mark 11:17 And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.”

John 2:16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.”
John 2:17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

For Jesus, this zeal was intensified in His life, but not for some physical representation of God’s temple. (I mean no disrespect to King David in this instance.) Jesus was looking to the Temple of God being the people of God that God would reside in, for that has been the plan all along. A group of people who seek God, who allow God to reside in them (as a group) and exhibit the nature of God to those outside the group.

Jesus passion led Him to the cross. His zeal was all consuming, and for a time in the temple, Jesus passion exploded on the scene, for those in the temple were users of people, profiting off those who seek God, instead of living a life of self sacrifice for others. The very antipathy of God’s desire was being witnessed by the very Son of Man in the Temple of God. How utterly inviting for passion to erupt!

Psalm 69:9B

Psalm 69:9 …and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me.

For the king of Israel to suffer personal reproaches strikes me as odd, for many, if not all kings in the ancient days would not suffer insult or shame from any in their kingdom. Those who verbally attacked a kings person were usually punished, jailed, beaten or worse.

Yet for David, as he followed after God, realizing who God is and what God is like, willingly accepted the shame aimed at God as his own.

His passion, they may say, is extreme, just too much, he has his head in the clouds and is of no earthly good. Hatred – undeserved as mentioned in verse 4 – experienced by David from his enemies, provided for David additional instances where he would bear the burden of being a believer in the midst of unbelief.

Romans 15:3 For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, “The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.”

For Jesus, for Paul to say that He did not please Himself may be one of the greatest understatements written. Going without sleep to be alone with the Father, watching his followers disappoint Him and yet continue to invest time and effort into them, healing and preaching to the masses, knowing they will turn on Him, going for weeks without food, not having anyone but Satan know, performing a baptism ritual in identifying with sinful people, reserving judgement in order to save, turning the cheek for the sake of love.

My friend – He took the hatred and shame the world spewed onto a holy God, He took it Himself, and in the midst of all the injustice. the pain, the loneliness and ingratitude, He continued to love God with all His heart mind and soul, and every neighbor who has ever lived.

How can we truly grasp the width, depth and length of His grace and mercy towards us. It is almost as if the expanse of His grace to us is beyond belief, that is simply can’t be true, it is too good to be true.

But He rose from the grave, with hundreds seeing Him, and His church has marched on, grasping ever so slightly (at least for myself) the tremendous grace He has provided us.

May His name be praised.

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