Psalm 13:1,5, “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?…But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.”
The “but” in verse 5 is an adversative that begins David’s ascent out of the shadows and into the light of hope. Up until this point he has been sincerely pouring out the weariness and anguish of his soul to the Lord….”How long…how long…how long…how long…” the suffering, the sorrow, the night of the soul, the confusion of the mind, the impending victory of malevolent forces (be they—for our application—personal or impersonal, visible or invisible), the hardships of David’s soul seem to be multiplied and extended, and—worst of all—YHWH Himself seems hidden and so there is nowhere for David to flee. What is the heart of the saint to do when darkness has descended and refuses to lift for so long? David’s words in verse 5 are like a match struck to life after weeks in a mine shaft:
“But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.”
He trusts in the steadfast love of the Lord. What does this mean? Well, the Lord’s steadfast love is a rich concept in the OT, but one helpful summary of its range of meanings is that it is God’s gracious, forgiving, immovable commitment to do what He has promised His people; His “covenant commitment.”
Now, to call “steadfast love” “covenant commitment” seems to strip it of something….to remove the affectional side of things, perhaps. But it must be remembered that YHWH didn’t have to make a covenant with humanity in the first place. He decides to do this because He loves the His people (Deut.7:7-8). The impetus for covenant making is not covenant commitment….once the covenant is made, the Lord is unswervingly committed to it, but his unswerving commitment to the covenant is not the source of the covenant, the covenant is made in the first place because of the “great love with which He loved [His people], even when they were dead in their sins” (Eph. 2:4). So, God’s steadfast love manifests in His commitment to the covenant, but even deeper than that it is—I would argue—His unthwartable desire to fold His people into His own knowledge of and joy in Himself through the Son by the Spirit.
THIS, then, is what David trusts in…..He trusts in this fact of God’s character, He trusts in who YHWH has shown Himself to be. He trusts in the love of YHWH, and it is this trust that causes him to hope with confidence that He WILL rejoice in and sing to the Lord. Trust in who YHWH has revealed Himself to be (whether that is His steadfast love, or the fullness of that steadfast love as manifest in Jesus Christ, John 1:14) leads to hope in what He will most surely, therefore, accomplish.
“…I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.”
Oh to trust in the covenant commitment of the Lord! And what does this mean for post-Calvary saints? It means to trust in what God has accomplish–and the Name therein revealed–at the cross of Christ. This is the climax of steadfast love, this is the climax of covenant-keeping faithfulness, this is the climax of all our God has promised…….we trust in Christ….we trust in the heart revealed on Calvary…..we trust in the Son who loves us and gave Himself for us and rose again to newness of life…..yes, this is where we anchor our trust…..and because of Him, we know—even in our darkest night—that our hearts will rejoice in His salvation and we will sing to Him with joy beyond imagination.
