Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the Lord without wavering. Prove me, O Lord, and try me; test my heart and mind. For your steadfast love is before my eyes, and I walk in faithfulness to you. I do not sit with the worthless, nor do I consort with hypocrites; I hate the company of evildoers, and will not sit with the wicked. I wash my hands in innocence, and go around your altar, O Lord, singing aloud a song of thanksgiving, and telling all your wondrous deeds. O Lord, I love the house in which you dwell, and the place where your glory abides. Do not sweep me away with sinners, nor my life with the bloodthirsty, those in whose hands are evil devices, and whose right hands are full of bribes. But as for me, I walk in my integrity; redeem me, and be gracious to me. My foot stands on level ground; in the great congregation I will bless the Lord.
(Psalm 26)
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Whose opinion do you really care about? If there was one person you could name whose opinion of you really counted, who would it be? That strikes me as a relevant question in the world today. People seem to spend a lot of their time these days trying to convince others of how good they are, how successful they are, how talented they are – maybe, when you boil it all down, of how worthy they are to have the respect of others. Some people’s concern about how other people perceive them can make them seem a little desperate. They go so overboard in their desire to be loved that the end result is that others actually look at them with a sort of contempt. It’s too much. And the truth is that you can’t force someone to respect you. They either will or they won’t. But a lot of people try.
I have to confess that the very first verses of Psalm 26 caused me to take a bit of a step back and ponder. It sounds as if the author is guilty of some of what I just mentioned. It sounds as if he’s trying just a little too hard to say how great he was. In a way, he reminded me a bit of Judge Kavanaugh – who you’ve probably heard of from Senate confirmation hearings in the United States – who gave an interview to Fox news in which he painted an altogether too virtuous picture of himself. In Psalm 26, it sounds as if the author is boasting about the depth and intimacy of the relationship he’s established with God; even being prideful of how obedient he’s been to God’s will. “I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the Lord without wavering,” the author says. Those are bold words. How many of us here today would be able to say that we’ve never (not even for a moment) wavered in our trust in God? I can’t honestly make that claim for myself. But the author of Psalm 26 does.
In the opening words of the Psalm, the author opens himself to God. He’s almost challenging God with some of his words: vindicate me, prove me, test me. There’s a sense in which he sounds self-righteous, but a self-righteous person is either showing off to themselves – trying to convince themselves of their own goodness, or they’re showing off to others to convince them of their own goodness. And once I get through the first few verses of the Psalm, I start to realize that this is not a self-righteous person who’s showing off; this is a person who’s confident in their faith and who’s convinced of the love of Good. The author of the Psalm isn’t self-righteous; they’re “righteous.” And there’s a big difference between those two things. A truly righteous person opens is willing to open themselves to God’s scrutiny, because they’re certain that they’ll be found acceptable in God’s sight. I thought the Psalm gave us an opportunity to understand righteousness and how righteousness is different from self-righteousness
The first point I might make is that a truly righteous person understands God’s judgment; they understand what it is that God is looking for from us. So the author of the Psalm invited God to “test my heart and mind.” That’s important. Think for a moment about what the author didn’t say. He didn’t say “look at all my good deeds.” He didn’t say “look at all the money I’ve given to charity.” It’s too easy for our actions to be for show. – the basis of God’s judgement isn’t our actions or appearances - it’s what’s in our heart.
Second, a righteous person understands God’s love. “Your steadfast love is always before my eyes,” the author said. That’s a way for the author to say that we are never – even for a moment – separated from God’s love. As Paul would later write in Romans nothing in all creation can ever separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. Sometimes we may feel very distant from God’s love. Sometimes we may feel as if something we’ve said or done has made us either unworthy or unlovable in God’s eyes. The author of this Psalm reminds us that isn’t true. God’s love is always before us. God love is with us now and God’s love is our destiny.– that God is always yearning for us to come closer.
And third, a righteous person understands God’s welcome – that God is always willing to accept us. “I walk in faithfulness to you.” At least in English there’s a potential double entendre to this verse. “I walk in faithfulness to you” might be a statement of the author’s faith – or it might be a statement that the author knows he is being welcomed by God – I’m walking “to you.” And either way, the emphasis on faith is the author’s way of showing that his trust in God is deep and abiding and will not be shaken.
All that points out the main difference between righteousness and self-righteousness – it’s the audience. A truly righteous person is focused on God and on what God sees in us and is simply thankful to God for the opportunity to serve as they serve. A self-righteous person is concerned about others – how they’re perceived by others; whether they get credit or thanks for all that they do. So after being jarred a bit by the opening words of the Psalm, I came to the conclusion that the author wasn’t engaging in an orgy of self-righteous arrogance. Instead, this was an expression of humble righteousness. And in a way that’s a key question for us today: Are we most concerned with what God sees in us or with what others think of us? I liked the way that question was framed by Rev. Kevin De Young, whose words I cited in today’s bulletin: “I try to keep in mind the simple question: Am I trying to do good or make myself look good?” That strikes me as a good question on a Communion Sunday.
Verses 6-7 of Psalm 23 struck me as what I’d call a Communion moment: they tell us that we approach the altar (the Lord’s table) thankfully and remembering the work of God within us and around us. We enter God’s presence not so that others can see how good we are, but because we know how good God is. When I served in Central Newfoundland many years ago I always found a Communion service to be a strange service indeed. There was the same phenomenon in every one of my three congregations: almost all the women would come forward to receive Communion, while all the men (except for one) would remain noticeably in their seats. I finally got so confused that I asked about this and was told by one man “I’m not worthy.” I told him that the table was for all Christians, and didn’t he think he was a Christian? “Yes, boy, but I know I’m too much of a sinner to take Communion.” And yet the looks on at least some of the men’s faces wasn’t a look of shame over some past sin; it was almost a look of pride; as if they were showing off. As they sat steadfastly in their pew while others came forward it was almost as if at least some were saying “Look at me. I’m so good I know how bad I am.” At least that’s how it often came across to me.
Today is Thanksgiving Sunday. Today is also World Communion Sunday. The point of receiving Communion isn’t to show others how good or worthy we are, or even to make a show of letting people know that we know how bad we are. The purpose of receiving Communion is simply to gratefully accept that which God has done for us. “My foot stands on level ground,” the author said as he finished the Psalm. “In the great congregation I will bless the Lord.” In this great congregation, may we all approach the Lord’s table with humble righteousness today, thankful to God for welcoming us, even if it might be in spite of ourselves.
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