Talks

Psalm 73 (Listen)

Book Three

God Is My Strength and Portion Forever

A Psalm of Asaph.

73:1   Truly God is good to Israel,
    to those who are pure in heart.
2   But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled,
    my steps had nearly slipped.
3   For I was envious of the arrogant
    when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
4   For they have no pangs until death;
    their bodies are fat and sleek.
5   They are not in trouble as others are;
    they are not stricken like the rest of mankind.
6   Therefore pride is their necklace;
    violence covers them as a garment.
7   Their eyes swell out through fatness;
    their hearts overflow with follies.
8   They scoff and speak with malice;
    loftily they threaten oppression.
9   They set their mouths against the heavens,
    and their tongue struts through the earth.
10   Therefore his people turn back to them,
    and find no fault in them.¹
11   And they say, “How can God know?
    Is there knowledge in the Most High?”
12   Behold, these are the wicked;
    always at ease, they increase in riches.
13   All in vain have I kept my heart clean
    and washed my hands in innocence.
14   For all the day long I have been stricken
    and rebuked every morning.
15   If I had said, “I will speak thus,”
    I would have betrayed the generation of your children.
16   But when I thought how to understand this,
    it seemed to me a wearisome task,
17   until I went into the sanctuary of God;
    then I discerned their end.
18   Truly you set them in slippery places;
    you make them fall to ruin.
19   How they are destroyed in a moment,
    swept away utterly by terrors!
20   Like a dream when one awakes,
    O Lord, when you rouse yourself, you despise them as phantoms.
21   When my soul was embittered,
    when I was pricked in heart,
22   I was brutish and ignorant;
    I was like a beast toward you.
23   Nevertheless, I am continually with you;
    you hold my right hand.
24   You guide me with your counsel,
    and afterward you will receive me to glory.
25   Whom have I in heaven but you?
    And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
26   My flesh and my heart may fail,
    but God is the strength² of my heart and my portion forever.
27   For behold, those who are far from you shall perish;
    you put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you.
28   But for me it is good to be near God;
    I have made the Lord GOD my refuge,
    that I may tell of all your works.

(ESV)