Saturday, August 12, 2023  

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Today’s Scripture Reading 
Psalm 26

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. (NRSV)

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Reflection

Presbyterians are comfortable with confession. Attend a traditional Presbyterian liturgy and you will be asked to participate in a prayer of confession, typically prayed in unison by the congregation, naming before God those ways in which we fall short of God’s standards and asking forgiveness. My favorite formulation of confession names “the wrong we have done and the good we have left undone.”

The psalmist we read here is not confessing but rather insisting on their innocence. At first glance, this reads a little boastful, and it rings a very different note from a later psalm, 52, that admits “I was born guilty.” So which is it? Confession or defense?

It’s not a choice. Understanding ourselves to be “totally depraved” (to employ an unfortunate phrase from Reformed theology) does not mean that we are always in the wrong. It means only that there is no part of our life that is free from the impulse toward self-preservation and self-promotion. In concrete circumstances, we can feel emboldened — like this psalmist — to insist that we indeed are in the right and have done right, even if other people see it differently.

This is a plea for God’s judgment, and it is made in the confidence that God, who knows our hearts and minds better than even we do, will vindicate our integrity. The evidence for the psalmist’s integrity is their participation in corporate worship — washing hands, singing songs, testifying — conforming to their “walk” outside of worship. Who they are away from church is the same as who they are in church. God knows that even if their haters don’t.

God is right.

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Prayer
Search us, O God, our hearts and our minds, and find us faithful. Place our feet on level ground as we go out into the world in peace, to have courage and to hold on to what is good; to return no one evil for evil; to support the weak and help the suffering; to honor all people as we love and serve you. Amen.

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Written by Rocky Supinger, Associate Pastor for Youth Ministry and Worship

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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