Your Champion in Court and Combat Text: Psalm 35:1-10
Introduction: A Faith That Fights
We live in an age of effeminate Christianity. It is a soft, sentimental, and ultimately spineless faith that has made its peace with the world by refusing to acknowledge that we are in a war. The modern evangelical impulse, when confronted with a passage like Psalm 35, is to blush. We fidget, we cough, we try to explain it away as some kind of Old Testament relic that Jesus, with his "love your enemies" talk, thankfully did away with. But this is a profound theological error, born not of superior kindness, but of a heart that is colder than David's. Our aversion to the psalms of imprecation has far more to do with our own squeamishness than it does with true biblical piety.
This psalm is a prayer. More than that, it is a song, meant to be sung by the people of God. It is a prayer that asks God to ruin the wicked. It asks God to bring them to shame, to pursue them, to let them fall into their own traps. And the New Testament requires us to sing the psalms. All of them. This means that God intends for His people, in this age, to have this vocabulary of spiritual warfare as part of their regular worship. To refuse to pray this way is to decide you are more spiritual than the Holy Spirit. It is to adopt a posture of ignorant fastidiousness, pretending to be more saintly than the man after God's own heart.
Psalm 35 is a lawsuit and a battle plan rolled into one. David, the Lord's anointed, is being hounded by enemies who are contending with him, fighting him, and seeking his life without cause. And so he does what every righteous man must do: he takes his case to the ultimate Judge and the ultimate Warrior. He appeals to Heaven. This is not carnal vengeance. It is a righteous appeal for God to vindicate His own name by defending His servant. David is not asking for personal satisfaction; he is asking for divine justice. He is asking God to be God. And when God acts, the result is not grim satisfaction for David, but joyful praise in the God of salvation. This is the pattern for us. When the world and its minions come after the Church, we are not to take matters into our own hands, but we are also not to roll over and play dead. We are to appeal to our Champion, our Advocate, our Divine Warrior, and ask Him to plead our cause.
The Text
Contend, O Yahweh, with those who contend with me; Fight against those who fight against me. Take hold of shield and large shield And rise up for my help. Draw also the spear and the battle-axe to meet those who pursue me; Say to my soul, “I am your salvation.” Let those be ashamed and dishonored who seek my life; Let those who devise evil against me be turned back and humiliated. Let them be like chaff before the wind, With the angel of Yahweh driving them on. Let their way be dark and slippery, With the angel of Yahweh pursuing them. For without cause they hid their net for me; Without cause they dug a pit for my soul. Let destruction, which he does not know, come upon him, And let the net, which he hid, catch him; Let him fall into it in destruction. And my soul shall rejoice in Yahweh; It shall be joyful in His salvation. All my bones will say, “Yahweh, who is like You, Who delivers the afflicted from him who is too strong for him, And the afflicted and the needy from him who robs him?”
(Psalm 35:1-10 LSB)
God the Divine Warrior (vv. 1-3)
The psalm opens with a direct appeal, using legal and military language. David is in a fight he cannot win on his own, and he knows it.
"Contend, O Yahweh, with those who contend with me; Fight against those who fight against me. Take hold of shield and large shield And rise up for my help. Draw also the spear and the battle-axe to meet those who pursue me; Say to my soul, 'I am your salvation.'" (Psalm 35:1-3)
The first word, "Contend," is a legal term. David is asking God to be his divine lawyer, to take up his case in the heavenly court. His enemies are his opponents, his accusers. But this is no mere courtroom drama. The legal contention immediately spills onto the battlefield. "Fight against those who fight against me." Our God is not a passive, abstract principle. He is a man of war (Exodus 15:3). David calls upon God to arm Himself. "Take hold of shield and large shield." This is the armor of a divine warrior, rising to defend his own.
The imagery is vivid and personal. God is to draw the spear and battle-axe to intercept David's pursuers. This is not a distant, deistic God winding up the clock and letting it run. This is a God who intervenes, who gets His hands dirty, who fights for His people. This is the God who stood with Joshua, the God who routed the armies of Sisera. And this is the God who, in the fullness of time, would put on flesh and crush the head of the serpent.
But in the midst of this violent, clangorous imagery of battle, there is a moment of tender intimacy. David asks God to speak a word of comfort directly to him: "Say to my soul, 'I am your salvation.'" Before the battle is won, before the enemies are scattered, David needs this assurance. He needs to hear the voice of his Commander. This is a crucial lesson. In the heat of our own spiritual battles, when we are beset by accusations, temptations, and threats, the first thing we need is not a change in our circumstances, but a word from God to our soul. We need to be reminded that our salvation is not a what, but a Who. Salvation is not a thing God gives, but what God is for us. "I AM your salvation." Jesus Christ Himself is our salvation. This is the anchor that holds in the storm.
A Righteous Curse (vv. 4-8)
Having called upon his Champion, David now prays for the utter rout of his enemies. This is the part that makes modern Christians nervous, but it is a prayer that is entirely in line with the justice of God.
"Let those be ashamed and dishonored who seek my life; Let those who devise evil against me be turned back and humiliated. Let them be like chaff before the wind, With the angel of Yahweh driving them on. Let their way be dark and slippery, With the angel of Yahweh pursuing them." (Psalm 35:4-6)
David prays for their public disgrace. "Let them be ashamed and dishonored." This isn't petty spite. It's a desire for the truth to be seen. Those who fight against God's anointed are fighting against God, and their rebellion ought to be exposed for the shameful, foolish thing it is. He prays that their plans be turned back on them, that they be humiliated.
The imagery intensifies. "Let them be like chaff before the wind." Chaff is worthless, weightless, and rootless. It is easily scattered by the judgment of God (Psalm 1:4). But here, there is an active agent driving them on: "the angel of Yahweh." This is no ordinary angel. This is a recurring figure in the Old Testament who is identified with God Himself, the pre-incarnate Christ. The Son of God is the one who drives the wicked away. He is not just our Savior; He is the terror of His enemies.
Then the scene shifts to a terrifying picture of flight. "Let their way be dark and slippery, with the angel of Yahweh pursuing them." Imagine running for your life down a steep, muddy path in the dead of night, with no light to see by. Now imagine that the ultimate warrior, the Angel of the Lord, is hot on your heels. There is no escape. This is a picture of relentless, inescapable, terrifying judgment. This is what it means to fall into the hands of the living God. And this is what David asks for. Why? The next verses tell us.
The basis for this prayer is the injustice of the attack.
"For without cause they hid their net for me; Without cause they dug a pit for my soul. Let destruction, which he does not know, come upon him, And let the net, which he hid, catch him; Let him fall into it in destruction." (Psalm 35:7-8)
Twice David emphasizes that their hostility is "without cause." This is not a personal squabble where both sides are at fault. This is a case of the wicked persecuting the righteous precisely because he is righteous. They are not just David's enemies; they are God's enemies. They have set a trap, a net, a pit. This is the classic biblical principle of lex talionis, the law of retribution. The punishment should fit the crime. David prays that they would be caught in their own trap. Let the destruction they planned for another boomerang back onto their own heads. This is not vindictiveness; it is a prayer for poetic justice, a prayer for God's righteous order to be demonstrated in the world. Haman built a gallows for Mordecai, and it was Haman who ended up swinging from it. This is how God works.
The Result: Joy in God (vv. 9-10)
The psalm does not end with the destruction of the wicked. It ends with the joyful worship of the righteous. The goal of imprecation is not the enemy's downfall, but God's glory.
"And my soul shall rejoice in Yahweh; It shall be joyful in His salvation. All my bones will say, 'Yahweh, who is like You, Who delivers the afflicted from him who is too strong for him, And the afflicted and the needy from him who robs him?'" (Genesis 35:9-10)
Notice where the joy is located. "My soul shall rejoice in Yahweh." Not "in their destruction," but "in Yahweh." The deliverance is the occasion, but God Himself is the object of the joy. The salvation He brings causes exultation. This is a deep, full-bodied joy. "All my bones will say, 'Yahweh, who is like You...'" This is not just an intellectual assent. It is a visceral, physical response to the mighty deliverance of God. When you have been in a desperate situation, and God pulls you out, your very bones feel the relief and sing His praise.
The song his bones sing is a song of God's uniqueness. "Who is like You?" This is the constant refrain of the redeemed. The gods of the pagans are weak, capricious, and cruel. But Yahweh is the one who delivers the afflicted and the needy from those who are too strong for them. He is the defender of the helpless. He is the champion of the weak. This is His character. And when He acts according to His character, His people erupt in praise.
Loving Enemies and Praying Psalms
So how do we square this with Jesus' command to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us? First, we must recognize that David often showed personal mercy to his enemies, like Saul. These prayers are not a license for personal bitterness or road rage. They are official, covenantal prayers against the enemies of God's kingdom. Second, one of the primary ways God destroys an enemy is by turning him into a friend. The greatest imprecation ever answered was at the conversion of Saul of Tarsus. God took the chief persecutor of the church, the one breathing out threats and murder, and turned him into the chief apostle. God threw him to the ground on the Damascus road, blinded him, and remade him. That is a glorious way for God to answer a prayer to "turn back" those who devise evil.
So we pray these psalms. We pray them against the principalities and powers, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. We pray them against the godless ideologies that seek to destroy the family, murder the unborn, and silence the church. We pray, "Father, let them be ashamed and dishonored. Let their way be dark and slippery." And we pray with the hope that this divine pressure might, by God's grace, bring them to "shame of face, so that they might turn back to You and seek Your name."
But if they will not repent, if they harden their hearts and continue their war against the King of kings, then we pray for their nets to catch them and for their pits to swallow them. We pray for the victory of Christ's kingdom. And when that victory comes, whether through conversion or through confusion, our souls will rejoice, not in their ruin, but in Yahweh. Our very bones will declare, "Who is like you, O Lord?" For He is our salvation.