“They that multiply gods multiply griefs to themselves.”
–Matthew Henry
David begins Psalm 16 with its only petition and then moves on to a rather unique phrase:
Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge.
I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord;
I have no good apart from you.”
As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones,
in whom is all my delight.
After asking the Lord to preserve or guard him, he declares the Lord to be his refuge and his chief good. What is meant by ‘chief good?’ It is David acknowledging God as the giver of all good things and that all these good gifts pale in comparison to the best and chief gift—knowing God himself. (see John 17:3) And then in a remarkable phrase, he refers to the saints, the excellent ones, as the ones, “in whom is all my delight.”
Why does David refer to God’s people in this manner? Here are three reasons as they were presented in last Sunday’s sermon:
- The people of God were David’s delight because they spoke the truth to one another and the Lord hears those words. (see Malachi 3:16-18 and Ephesians 4:25)
- The people of God were David’s delight because there is a love in the saints that the world has no category for. (see 1 Samuel 18:1-4 and Romans 12:10)
- The people of God were David’s delight because they were a people who had said “no” to the other gods that society had asked them to bow down to.
It is the gospel that creates the people of God. It is the precious truth of God’s redeeming for himself a people through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ that enables truth speaking, transformative loving, and increased affection for Christ which weans us off the foreign gods that the culture offers us. Today, are you delighting in the people of God? Are his faithful ones a source of joy and comfort for you? Have a blessed week and we will see most of you on Sunday.
Love in Christ,
Pastor Dale
