”I come to you for protection, O Lord my God. Save me from my persecutors—rescue me! If you don’t, they will maul me like a lion, tearing me to pieces with no one to rescue me. O Lord my God, if I have done wrong or am guilty of injustice, if I have betrayed a friend or plundered my enemy without cause, then let my enemies capture me. Let them trample me into the ground and drag my honor in the dust. Interlude Arise, O Lord, in anger! Stand up against the fury of my enemies! Wake up, my God, and bring justice! Gather the nations before you. Rule over them from on high. The Lord judges the nations. Declare me righteous, O Lord, for I am innocent, O Most High! End the evil of those who are wicked, and defend the righteous. For you look deep within the mind and heart, O righteous God. God is my shield, saving those whose hearts are true and right. God is an honest judge. He is angry with the wicked every day. If a person does not repent, God will sharpen his sword; he will bend and string his bow. He will prepare his deadly weapons and shoot his flaming arrows. The wicked conceive evil; they are pregnant with trouble and give birth to lies. They dig a deep pit to trap others, then fall into it themselves. The trouble they make for others backfires on them. The violence they plan falls on their own heads. I will thank the Lord because he is just; I will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High.“
Psalms 7:1-17 NLT
A quintessential aspect of coming before God is the acknowledgment of his character. In doing so, it is important to acknowledge ours as well. We must be vulnerable about our flaws in character and our lack of judgment. We must step down from that position of a courtroom judge, and into the seat of a defendant. We must place ourselves on trial before him. In David’s psalm, he willfully begs God to judge him. He asks God to convict him in the way that God only can. He asks him to search his heart. This is a skill that many persecuted people seem to be unable to do. They eagerly ask God to judge others, but refuse to sit as the defendant. David understood that if we will not do this, then we impugn the very aspect of God’s character that we call upon. We impugn his justice. How we call for him to judge righteously if we refuse to let him judge us as well. It is important to remember this whenever there is a trial that we face and we feel persecuted and attacked. If we place ourselves in the hands of a righteous God, then we will be found innocent if we are innocent. And if we are not, then we will be given the difficult grace we need to become holy just as we ought to be. But if we judge others without allowing ourselves to be judged, we risk certain condemnation for mocking God and his sense of justice.
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