Here’s my translation of Psalm 3. It’s a simple, beautiful psalm of rescue or salvation. I’m using rescue in my translation, partly because the word “salvation” has been dulled and avoids this connotation. I think “rescue” feels more immediate as well, and that seems to capture the essence well.
Psalm and Narrative
This is a psalm of hope against despair, a confession of deep faith in the face of great opposition. It locates itself as a meditation of David during his darkest hour, facing the treasonous rebellion of his own son. I think that text is meant to give a location not just of the writing of the psalm, but more importantly, how the psalm is to be read. The psalm is intended to be read and prayed in the context of a particular narrative moment. This is a great insight into the nature of biblical narrative! The story itself of Absalom’s rebellion, dark as t is, can become the story of the reader and a tool for prayer. We don’t just pray the Psalm. The Psalm unlocks the narrative itself to be prayer. Perhaps we can even read the entire psalter this way! As the language of the Psalms penetrates our hearts and we fold its prayer language into our own lives as praying beings, we can become more adept at reading biblical narratives, because we see the Psalms in the stories.
It works the other way as well. We have to know the Absalom story in order for this Psalm to have its full effect, and this can be said of the rest of the Psalter as well. The Psalms can’t be read independently of the Narratives, prophetic traditions, wisdom literature and covenant documents that make up the rest of the Bible. These are not worship poems to be used independently of the narratives of the community in which they were created. The Psalms are a critical part of how that community responded to the experiences to which the other biblical books give testimony. The community that owns the rest of the Bible becomes a worshipping community as the Psalms help us take the content of the narratives and our own narratives into the house of the Lord. Sometimes the Psalm lead us to confront the Lord, holding him to his promises. Other times they lead us to acknowledge the wisdom of the Lord and his way of becoming righteous. Sometimes the Psalms lead us to acknowledge what the Lord has already done for us. Sometimes they lead us to cry out in desperation for the rescue that can only come from him.
Rescue
This Psalm does exactly that, leading us to cry out in the face of great opposition for the help that can only come from God. It helps us to banish fear, even if that fear is pretty reasonable. This psalm speaks to our need for rescue, or salvation—and who hasn’t experienced it? How many of us have never felt surrounded, alone, desperate? The Psalm recognize that basic feeling, and confirm it, but that isn’t the point. The point of the psalm is coupling that emotion with faith in the Lord’s rescue. It leads us not to simply cry out (although other Psalms do), but to cry out in faith. It sees the hopeful future of help from the Lord, acknowledging that even in the dire present the Lord has sustained life. “I awoke because the Lord helps me.” In this simple way, the Psalmist sees his own experience of salvation already owned and realized, but still needs a greater salvation, a fuller rescue from the enemies that surround and threaten. The psalmist is vulnerable, but it is this vulnerability that allows for God to be the glory of the psalmist, allows God the opportunity to lift his head and provide his trademark rescue. the affirmation of the end of the psalm, that the rescue belongs to the Lord, is a powerful affirmation of this aspect of God’s identity. God is a rescuer. He is a savior, someone who pulls people out of the direst circumstances.
