Psalms For Life
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Yahveh Elohim hear our prayers

Psalm 15

Welcomed at God’s table

Many people think God’s primary concern for us is rule-keeping when it’s really our personal character: the kind of values we live by and the kind of people we’re becoming.

 A David psalm.

1 What kind of person do you welcome
to stay in your tent, YHWH?
Who may live on your holy hill?

2 A person of integrity
who does what’s right
and speaks truth from the heart.
3 Who doesn’t slander
harm their neighbor
or hurt their reputation.
4 Who loathes depraved people
and honors God-fearers.
Who keeps their oaths—no matter what—
refusing to go back on their word.
5 Who lends to the poor
without charging interest
and refuses to rob the innocent of justice
for a bribe.

The person who lives like this
will never be shaken.

In the ancient world, entrance liturgies listed the external rites required for admission to the god’s sanctuary and ended with a threat if the conditions weren’t met. By contrast, David’s focus is on the moral character and behavior needed for inclusion in God’s household. And David ends with a promise, not a threat.

The tabernacle wasn’t just the tent devoted to God’s worship. It was also his royal residence. Every Israelite was called to be God’s servant, and kings in the ancient world included their devoted servants in their household, as Saul included David in his. Inclusion in a royal household promised face-to-face encounters with the king, whose bounty could be life changing. So, asking what kind of servant God looks for is vital.

Broadly, God seeks those who live to please him and, implicitly, ask his forgiveness when they fall short. After all, the tabernacle is where God forgives sins. While his standards are high, God doesn’t demand perfection and knows we can’t love our neighbor in our own strength.

What specific qualities does God look for? David alternates between positive and negative characteristics, they being equally important. Positively, God welcomes those who have integrity, do right, speak honestly, loathe the loathsome, honor the God-fearing, and keep their word. Negatively, they don’t slander, harm others, gossip, take advantage of the poor, or take bribes to pervert justice. God welcomes at his table only those who seek to live by his values.

David’s underlying point is that we can know what to expect of YHWH, who doesn’t cut deals with evildoers or withdraw his welcome from those who, by his grace, live as the psalm describes. Because of his own brokenness, Saul withdrew his welcome from David, making David flee for his life. Canaan’s gods were equally capricious. But not YHWH. Whoever loves him and their neighbor like this will never fall from his favor.[1]

Prayer:

Lord, you ask me to present myself a living sacrifice, even as Jesus did. Help me to see as he saw, love as he loved, hate as he hated, and please you in all I do. Make me holy as you are holy, so I may know the joy of serving in your kingdom and feasting at your table. Amen.

In your free moments today, meditate on these words:

The person who lives like this
will never be shaken.

[1] David’s promise completes the Psalter’s progression from the threat of being shaken in Psalm 13:6 and the observation that God sides with those who seek him in Psalm 14:5.

Why YHWH?

Every translator of the Psalms must decide how to handle God’s personal name, YHWH or YHVH, which occurs repeatedly in its Hebrew text. Translators of the King James Version usually translated it “LORD” (all caps) and sometimes transliterated it (badly) as “Jehovah.” Likewise, all modern translations either translate or transliterate it. Some other options for translating it are “the Eternal,” “the Almighty,” or “the Sovereign Lord.”

While translating it aims to make it more accessible to readers, transliterating it seems to me more faithful to the text since it’s not a word at all, but rather God’s uniquely personal name. This roots it more firmly in the biblical story as the name God revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai. Meaning “the self-existent One who answers to no one,” the name YHWH set Israel’s God apart from all the gods of Israel’s neighbors.

Personal names are, well, very personal. Even the sound of a name can evoke strong emotion. I’ve chosen to transliterate only YHWH’s consonants since the earliest Hebrew manuscripts contain only consonants, the vowels being added much later. My aim in doing so is to honor God’s name and set it apart, as unique.

One problem with YHWH is that we aren’t sure how it was pronounced since Jews long ago stopped saying it out of reverence. (They read Adonai instead whenever they come to YHWH in the text.) I take the advice of my esteemed Hebrew professor, Raymond Dillard, who advocated pronouncing it as Yahveh (Yah·vay). He favored that over the standard Yahweh since the modern Hebrew pronunciation of its third consonant makes the name sound more robustly Jewish. It also makes it sound more robust, period.

Finding strength in the ancient psalms
May these psalms be a light to you in dark times. You can read more of Mark Anderson's writings on Christianity, culture, and inter-faith dialogue at Understanding Christianity Today.