“Psa. 38:0       A PSALM OF DAVID, FOR THE MEMORIAL OFFERING.

Psa. 38:1         O LORD, rebuke me not in your anger,

                        nor discipline me in your wrath!

²           For your arrows have sunk into me,

                        and your hand has come down on me.

Psa. 38:3         There is no soundness in my flesh

                        because of your indignation;

             there is no health in my bones

                        because of my sin.

⁴           For my iniquities have gone over my head;

                        like a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me.

Psa. 38:5         My wounds stink and fester

                        because of my foolishness,

⁶           I am utterly bowed down and prostrate;

                        all the day I go about mourning.

⁷           For my sides are filled with burning,

                        and there is no soundness in my flesh.

⁸           I am feeble and crushed;

                        I groan because of the tumult of my heart.

Psa. 38:9         O Lord, all my longing is before you;

                        my sighing is not hidden from you.

¹⁰         My heart throbs; my strength fails me,

                        and the light of my eyes—it also has gone from me.

¹¹         My friends and companions stand aloof from my plague,

                        and my nearest kin stand far off.

Psa. 38:12       Those who seek my life lay their snares;

                        those who seek my hurt speak of ruin

                        and meditate treachery all day long.

Psa. 38:13       But I am like a deaf man; I do not hear,

                        like a mute man who does not open his mouth.

¹⁴         I have become like a man who does not hear,

                        and in whose mouth are no rebukes.

Psa. 38:15       But for you, O LORD, do I wait;

                        it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer.

¹⁶         For I said, “Only let them not rejoice over me,

                        who boast against me when my foot slips!”

Psa. 38:17       For I am ready to fall,

                        and my pain is ever before me.

¹⁸         I confess my iniquity;

                        I am sorry for my sin.

¹⁹         But my foes are vigorous, they are mighty,

                        and many are those who hate me wrongfully.

²⁰         Those who render me evil for good

                        accuse me because I follow after good.

Psa. 38:21       Do not forsake me, O LORD!

                        O my God, be not far from me!

²²         Make haste to help me,

                        O Lord, my salvation!” (English Standard Version)

Psalm 38 is a penitential psalm.  That basically means that it is the prayer of a person who has messed up and is aware of it.  Such a person is either feeling really messed up inside, or the person is experiencing the external consequences of his wrong-doing.  Often, it is both.

Sin is not a popular word these days, but the consequences of it are very much still with us.  You can put lipstick on the pig, you can even pretend the pig doesn’t exist, but you can’t get away from the stench.  I grew up on a farm, and I can assure you that this is true.

And yet, toward the end of the psalm (verse 20), the psalmist makes the astonishing claim, “Those who render me evil for good accuse me because I follow after good.”

The other day, when I was listening to this psalm on my You Version app, I suddenly heard this strangely out-of-place part of the prayer.  How on earth can the psalmist be confessing his sins, and yet claim to be pursuing what was good?!!

Apparently, my surprise (if not shock) was shared by Derek Kidner, who wrote the following:

“After the penitence of verse 18 (in which concern or anxiety is implied in the word for I am sorry; cf. NEB), the claim of wrongful attack in 19f. may seem surprising. But David’s sins, however serious, were those of a man whose fundamental choice was to follow after good, and it is this choice that always rankles with the unbeliever (cf. John 15:18f.).”^[1]

Sometimes, those of us who are aware of our sins need to be reminded that we are pursuing good.  The Hebrew word translated “pursue” or “follow after” (radaf in transliteration) is a word that often has a negative connotation.  It is used of robbers stalking their victim.  It always has the idea of single-minded pursuit.

But here, radaf is a positive word.  The psalmist, despite his sins, claims to be suffering because he is pursuing what is good.

And sometimes it is that way.  We not only suffer for our sins.  Sometimes, we suffer for our pursuit of what is good.

Sin is bad—very bad.  It severely damages us, other people, and even the world in which we live.  We dare not try to minimize it by saying that we are “fundamentally” pursuing what is good.

However, just as we dare not minimize our mess-ups, we dare not minimize our pursuit of goodness.  To play down either one is refusing to play according to the rules.

^[1]Derek Kidner, Psalms 1–72: An Introduction and Commentary, TOTC 15; IVP/Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1973), 173.