"Track 26: Walking in Integrity (Psalm 26)”, Will DuVal | 7/13/25
Psalm 26 | 7/13/25 | Will DuVal
I wanna BEGIN this morning by inviting you to imagine with me a few different scenarios:
*Scenario 1: You’re at lunch with the family after church today. The menu says, “Kids 3 and under eat FREE!”. Your child just turned FOUR, like… not even a MONTH ago. You order, and the waitress asks, “How old is he?” – How do you RESPOND?
*Scenario 2: You’re playing beach volleyball with some friends - and by the way: these situations are all TOTALLY hypothetical - But it’s a CLOSE game; you’re trailing by just ONE POINT and now it’s MATCH POINT. You’re at the net and as you jump to block, on the way up, you feel the bottom of the net - EVER so slightly - just GRAZE the very HEM of your shorts; I mean GRAZE! - if you hadn’t put on those 5 extra pounds and had to size up from a 32 to a 34, we’re not even having this conversation! And the other team hit the ball into the net ANYWAY. But TECHNICALLY, according to the rules, clothing is an extension of your body, so it should be a net violation on you; their point, they WIN.
NO ONE else saw it; how COULD they? It was barely a GLANCE, and it didn’t even affect the PLAY.
What do you DO? Do you call your foul?
Or how about THIS one; last scenario: I heard a pastor use this one in the intro to HIS sermon on Psalm 26 this week; true story. He said that just the week prior to his preaching, apparently an armored vehicle there in Atlanta was transporting a bunch of MONEY from ONE bank to ANOTHER, and while it was driving down the HIGHWAY, one of the rear doors malfunctioned and SWUNG open, and two large bags of CASH FLEW out, hit the ground, and sent hundreds of THOUSANDS of dollars worth of bills FLYING out all over the road. “Money was EVERYWHERE. It caused a TRAFFIC jam, as people JUMPED out of their cars to scoop up the [bills]... thinking they had just won the LOTTERY… 175 thousand dollars was taken and” as of that next Sunday when he’d delivered the message a week later, “only 4 thousand dollars had been returned.” (Erik Veerman, “A Life of Integrity”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaNKkZpyEZE )
Ask yourself with me: “What would I do, in that situation?”
The ANSWER will be determined by our INTEGRITY. That’s the “word of the day”, for this particular Sunday, in Psalm 26: INTEGRITY. Dictionary.com defines it as “adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.” But the SECONDARY definition listed is this: “the state of being whole”. “Integrity” is related to words like “INTEGER” (remember WHOLE numbers, from math…) and the word “INTEGRATED”, when disparate stuff gets combined into one unified “WHOLE”. According to the BIBLE, that’s what our LIVES should be like:
**Where the OUTER self is fully INTEGRATED with our INNER self. No DUPLICITY - if I SMILE to your FACE, I’m not gonna turn around and talk BAD about you behind your BACK because I’m secretly harboring resentment against you in my HEART; NO - my inner and outer selves are INTEGRATED. If I’ve got a problem with you, I go to you and address it.
**Integrity means my PUBLIC self is fully integrated with my PRIVATE self. No FACADE - who you see in church on Sunday morning is the same person you’d see in the CAR if you rode HOME with us on Sunday AFTERNOON, when the kids are all tired and hungry, whining and fighting - the person who comes out THEN is no different than the nice, upstanding church member you see before you NOW.
**Most of all, Integrity means my stated VALUES are fully integrated with my lived REALITIES. No HYPOCRISY- I practice what I PREACH. You can see how this might prove PROBLEMATIC especially for those of us who PREACH for a LIVING!
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*** “Don’t LIE”; “Hey Bo, it’s time to throw away your PACIES.” “WHY?!” “Well, to prevent later dental issues, speech delays, and other developmental issues associated with prolonged pacifier use.” …OR because Baby Rhys and Baby Phoebe at church really NEED them, so we need you to be a BIG boy and share with the BABIES” – I’m just gonna tell you - ONE of those answers is QUITE a bit easier to sell than the OTHER, and it’s NOT the HONEST answer.
*** “Honor your SPOUSE” - that’s easy enough to PREACH… but to PRACTICE? What about when I don’t feel super honored by HER?”
And while you may not preach for a living, we’ve all got PRINCIPLES that we claim to - at least ASPIRE to - LIVE by. The QUESTION is: How fully INTEGRATED are they with our actual PRACTICE? Do we practice what we preach?
King David claims to, here in Psalm 26; right off the bat, opening verse: “I have walked in my integrity”. But interestingly, by the END of the psalm, he’s changed his TUNE ever so slightly: “as for me, I shall walk in my integrity”. Did you CATCH it? David goes from boldly ASSERTING his integrity… to optimistically PLEDGING to walk integrity – WHY? What’s behind the softening of his language? You think maybe the more David PREACHED here - and tells us all about what integrity IS, God’s high HIGH standard - maybe the more CONVICTION he came under, about just how much integrity he actually LACKED? Such that his bold PROCLAMATION - “I HAVE walked in integrity” - after further review, had to become a more humble PLEDGE and PRAYER instead - “I SHALL walk in integrity”?
Well, let’s just see. Let’s check it out together. (SCRIPTURE:) I invite you to STAND with me… We’re gonna read it together out loud, and I’m just gonna WARN you before we DO, that we’re ALL about to LIE in church! 🙂 Here we are, talking about integrity, and the pastor is totally setting you up, to LIE in CHURCH, by reciting this psalm, where David’s gonna CLAIM to live a life of integrity, the kind of life we should all be living, but… yeah, about that…
Alright; I just thought it was fair to WARN you, before I asked you all to LIE. So here we go; let’s read it together - this is the inspired word of God:
“Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the Lord without wavering.2 Prove me, O Lord, and try me; test my heart and my mind.3 For your steadfast love is before my eyes, and I walk in your faithfulness.
4 I do not sit with men of falsehood, nor do I consort with hypocrites.5 I hate the assembly of evildoers, and I will not sit with the wicked.
6 I wash my hands in innocence and go around your altar, O Lord,7 proclaiming thanksgiving aloud, and telling all your wondrous deeds.
8 O Lord, I love the habitation of your house and the place where your glory dwells.9 Do not sweep my soul away with sinners, nor my life with bloodthirsty men,10 in whose hands are evil devices, and whose right hands are full of bribes.
11 But as for me, I shall walk in my integrity; redeem me, and be gracious to me.12 My foot stands on level ground; in the great assembly I will bless the Lord.”
This is the word of God… Seated…
The Lord, through his inspired penman David, is calling us here to a life of INTEGRITY. But he not ONLY “exhorts” us to it, he INSTRUCTS us IN it, we are SHOWN the PATH to tread: we walk in integrity by living in accordance with these FIVE PRINCIPLES. And I want to try and help us make these principles PRACTICAL. Because AGAIN: that’s what integrity IS; it is PRACTICING what you PREACH. ANYONE can PREACH it. EVERYONE’s got PRINCIPLES; the question is - well, the TWO questions are: Firstly, “Are your principles GOD’S principles?”; and SECONDLY, “Do you actually LIVE by them?” I know you TRY to, you ASPIRE to… but INTEGRITY’s about DOING it. So as we go through, I’m gonna try and suggest a few ways we can actually put the PRINCIPLES God gives us here into PRACTICE, in our daily lives.
And here’s principle #1: We walk in integrity by TRUSTING God’s faithfulness. (vv1-3) According to Psalm 26, that is where integrity STARTS: by TRUSTING in the LORD’s faithfulness.
But the PSALM starts, in v1, with David praying, “VINDICATE me, Lord”. The Hebrew verb shaphat means “JUDGE”; David is requesting a COURT date, in God’s heavenly tribunal. Commentator James Boice explains WHY (231): “It is not David’s [standing] in the eyes of other people that concerns him but rather God’s vindication… it is not David’s OWN reputation but God‘s reputation that he covets… What he is asking is that God will show by the quality and steadiness of [David’s] life that a moral life is always best - for the sake of God‘s own honor.” – VINDICATE me.
“For I have WALKED in my INTEGRITY”. And it’s almost as if David CATCHES himself, and couldn’t in good conscience PRAY that, CLAIM that, without IMMEDIATELY adding the SECOND half of v1, which helps qualify and EXPLAIN the preceding line; this is example of synonymous parallelism, where the second line repeats the first in order to emphasize and to CLARIFY it. So what does it MEAN to “walk in one’s integrity”, according to David? It means to TRUST in the LORD.
And those last two words of v1 are a bit misleading: “without wavering” is a poor translation. The Hebrew literally reads: “I shall not SLIP”. The old KJV renders it best: “ I have trusted also in the Lord; therefore I shall not slide.” So there are TWO key phrases then that BOOKEND this great psalm: “I shall not slide”, here in v1, and then “on level ground”, which concludes the psalm in v12. And as Boice points out: “ they unify the psalm, teaching that the one who trusts God will have a level foundation on which to build their life, while the one who does not trust God is on steep, slippery terrain.” (230)
So it’s not MY unshakeable faith in GOD - MY trusting in Him “WITHOUT WAVERING” that is the source of my confidence, the foundation of my hope, the “level ground” on which I’m standing; RATHER, it is the LORD’S faithfulness toward ME. David makes it CLEAR, in v3: the ONLY reason he is able to invite God to “PROVE me… TRY me… TEST my heart and mind [or “my kidneys and heart” in Hebrew; the seat of my EMOTIONS, and the center of my moral decision-making (Wiersbe, 906); so “God: examine my MOTIVES and my AFFECTIONS, the INNERmost PARTS of me.] V2 here is reminiscent of Psalm 139, where David famously invites God to “Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous way in me” (vv23-24). But here’s the point: the only way that any of us can actually INVITE God to PERFORM such a “fearless and searching moral inventory”, is if, verse THREE: “HIS steadfast love is before our EYES”; it’s if GOD’S chesed - his “loving faithfulness” - is the determinative factor we’re keeping in VIEW. As David concludes v3: “I walk in YOUR faithfulness”, God. He opened with “I walk in MY integrity”, but already by v3, David realizes “I walk in YOUR faithfulness.”
By the way, backing up to v2 again for a moment, “prove… try… test…” - Warren Wiesbe points out “These words [ALL] refer to the testing of metals to determine their true value and also to remove the dross” (OT Commentary, 906). How do you do THAT? You’ve gotta BURN out the imperfections. It is the “refiner’s fire”: God’s PURIFYING us through our TRIALS. Commentator James Johnston puts it this way (Psalms, 274): “God sometimes tests our integrity with a trial by fire. We may be honest and upright at room temperature, but what will happen when he turns up the heat?”
When INTEGRITY could cost you your JOB: do you own up to that mistake you made, or fudge the numbers so no one finds out?
When integrity could cost you your MARRIAGE: do you admit to yet another SLIP UP, knowing it’s possible that this is IT, she’s finally had ENOUGH?
It’s EASY to have integrity when it doesn’t COST you anything. But what about in the FIRE, the CRUCIBLE?
How IS it that David here can say, “Go ahead, God: crank up the HEAT!” Johnston asks and answers for us (275): “Why would anyone invite this kind of painful, penetrating testing? David has the confidence to lay himself bare before God because he knows who God IS. He is focused on God’s ‘steadfast love’ (v3), his commitment and loyalty to his people… Integrity has everything to do with what we believe about God… We will not endure the testing of our integrity unless we believe that God loves us and is absolutely faithful.”
So here’s my suggestion for putting this principle into practice: Get your THEOLOGY right! That may not SOUND very “practical”; “I thought you said you were gonna give us actionable steps to take” - I AM; here’s Step ONE: THINK CORRECTLY about GOD. A.W. Tozer famously said, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”
If you think God doesn’t really CARE that much whether or not you’re a person of integrity, or that he grades on a curve, and as long as you try to be a “pretty good person” MOST of the time, that that’s somehow “good ENOUGH” - you better THINK AGAIN! Jesus said, “You must be PERFECT as your heavenly FATHER is perfect”! (Mt 5:48)
On the OTHER hand, if you think God is up in Heaven waiting on you to get your ACT together, to get your LIFE cleaned up, and finally BECOME that person of INTEGRITY before He will ACCEPT you, then friend: you’re gonna be waiting a LONG time.
You need to get your THEOLOGY straight:
-You need to think about GOD more accurately - he’s really more holy than you ever dared to imagine.
-And you need to think about YOURSELF more accurately - you really are more SINFUL than you ever dared to admit.
-But here’s the GOSPEL: when our eyes are opened to think about JESUS more accurately, we come to realize he really is even more LOVING and FAITHFUL than we ever dared to hope.
What is before YOUR eyes, friend? Is it YOUR integrity (or lack thereof!), or is it God’s “steadfast love”?
What are you TRUSTING in? Is your confidence in YOUR inconsistent integrity, or in GOD’s unfailing faithfulness?
Walking in integrity STARTS with trusting in the LORD.
SECOND (#2)- We walk in integrity by SHUNNING God’s enemies. (vv4-5)
To “SHUN” is “to keep away from [someone or something] due to motives of dislike or caution” (dictionary.com).
Here’s how David put it in vv4 & 5:
“I do not sit with men of falsehood,
nor do I consort with hypocrites.
I hate the assembly of evildoers,
and I will not sit with the wicked.”
WHY? Because David thinks he’s BETTER than them?
No, because he knows that “Bad company RUINS good morals.” (1 Cor 15:33). Show me your FRIENDS, and I’ll tell you your VALUES. If I had a NICKEL for every time I was listening to someone’s testimony and heard “...but then I started running with the wrong CROWD”, I’d be a rich man. How many Christians have wandered OFF the straight and narrow path, because they were following crooked and carefree people?
David knows: If I’m really gonna be committed to living this life of integrity - which in the fallen world we live in, means swimming UPSTREAM - I simply cannot surround myself with folks who are going with the FLOW, in the wrong direction.
I like how C.S. Lewis explained it: “a Christian would be wise to avoid, where he decently can, meeting with people who are bullies, lascivious, cruel, dishonest, spiteful and so forth. Not because we are “too good” for them. In a sense because we are not good enough. We are not good enough to cope with all the temptations, nor clever enough to cope with all the problems, which an evening spent in such society produces. The temptation is to condone, to connive at; by our words, looks and laughter, to “consent”…” (C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1958), pp. 68, 71-72, 74).
Lewis is saying: The issue isn’t that we Christians are too GOOD to hang out with such worldly people; the issue is that we’re not good ENOUGH to hang out with them without SUCCUMBING to the same kind of WORLDLINESS.
Our late dog BENTLEY - God rest her nephesh - she had a lot of issues. From day 1, she suffered from severe separation anxiety - if we left her for half an hour, she’d try and chew through her CRATE, she was so worried. Severe FOOD insecurity; she’d steal food off the counter right in FRONT of you, knowing full well you were gonna spank her, cuz she was THAT convinced she was gonna STARVE otherwise. But the one thing that she never bothered us with, for like the first 2 ½ years of her life, was BARKING. I kid you not: I was convinced she COULDN’T bark! It was her ONE redeeming trait… UNTIL… Polly and I went on vacation and dropped Bentley off at my MOM’s house, with my mom’s DOG, Wrigley. And Wrigley LOVED to bark; FAVORITE thing. And guess who discovered her BARK, that trip? Bentley. WHY?
Because it is in a dog’s NATURE to bark; it’s INSTINCTIVE- an “innate impulse or tendency”. If you leave a dog that DOESN’T bark with a dog that DOES for 10 days, which one’s gonna INFLUENCE the other?
Now, for those of us who have been “born again” through faith in Christ, God has now supernaturally given us a NEW NATURE - “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation,” 2 Corinthians 5:17 says. Praise God!
BUT… your old, sinful, fleshly nature - though it no longer DEFINES you or ENSLAVES you - it is nevertheless still present WITHIN you, waging WAR against the Holy SPIRIT who now ALSO indwells you. That’s why Ephesians 4 has to exhort us to “put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires… and put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (vv22-24)
So we fight the good fight DAILY against our own FLESH, never forgetting that we now have TWO natures: the SPIRIT nature, and the SIN nature. And the reason we’ve gotta be so CAREFUL about the company we keep, Church, is that no matter how “well-trained” you are - 1 Timothy 4:7 exhorts us to “train yoursel[ves] for godliness”; you can TRAIN a dog not to BARK. But here’s the thing: no matter HOW well-trained you are, you need to realize that BARK is still somewhere inside you. And you put me in the wrong environment, surround me with the wrong dogs, and it doesn’t take long for that bark to resurface.
I hope the next time you FIND yourself in that environment, in the “assembly of evildoers” - when the guys in the locker room start telling crude jokes, the girls at the salon start dishing the latest hot gossip - and that fleshly part of you is tempted to join in, I hope you’ll remember this sermon and have the courage to speak up and say, “Not TODAY, WRIGLEY!” and then just walk away. You don’t have to call ‘em SATAN, like Jesus did Peter (“Get BEHIND me, Satan!”; “Not today, SATAN!”); Wrigley’s a good CODE name, if you remember the illustration. And as a BONUS: they may be so confused that they stop sinning! (“Who’s WRIGLEY?!”
“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers” (Ps 1:1). “I will not sit with the wicked.”
THREE QUESTIONS inevitably arise when you encourage folks to “SHUN God’s enemies”:
First- “What about EVANGELISM? The Great COMMISSION? How are we supposed to witness to the lost, ‘make disciples’ of those who still need to be TAUGHT to OBEY all that Christ commanded… how do we DO that if we’re not supposed to hang out with SINNERS?
Well, I think the key is to scrutinize the VERBS employed here; does David SAY “don’t HANG OUT” with sinners? No. JESUS hung out with sinners, ALL THE TIME! Now, he was JESUS; He didn’t HAVE a sin nature - no “inner BARK” - so just keep that in MIND, before YOU seek out prostitutes and tax collectors for dinner companions; YOU’RE NOT JESUS. But ALSO, it’s one thing to “hang out”, and it’s another thing to “SIT”; the Hebrew verb used here in v4 and REPEATED in v5 for emphasis - yashab - it means to “SETTLE” or “DWELL”, to “LIVE”, “put down ROOTS”. You don’t wanna do THAT with “liars”, “hypocrites”, the “wicked”. Now, when does just “hanging out” become “yashabing”, DWELLING with them? How much time is TOO much time to spend with “evildoers” - that’s the other thing, we have to pay attention not ONLY to the VERBS here, but to their OBJECTS: “evildoers”, “the WICKED”; these aren’t just your run-of-the-mill sinners. These are openly defiant, God-hating - living in conscious REBELLION against God - kinda people. I don’t think David has in mind here that really sweet coworker who just started attending your office Bible study, but then you found out she’s living with her long-term boyfriend; David’s not saying, “Shun HER! Kick her OUT!” No; he’s talking about the coworker who filed the complaint to HR about the Bible study, to try and get it shut down. Watch out for THAT guy. Don’t “consort” with HIM.
SECOND question: Are we really called to HATE God’s enemies? V5 says “I hate the assembly of evildoers”. David states it even STRONGER in Psalm 139: ““Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?
I hate them with complete hatred;
I count them my enemies.” (vv21-22)
But doesn’t JESUS call us to “LOVE our enemies” (Mt 5:44)?
YES, He does. But commentator Derek Brown (“Should We Love our Enemies or Hate Them?”, https://withallwisdom.org/2023/07/26/should-we-love-our-enemies-or-hate-them/) helps address this tension by asking:
“How can you hate those who rebel against God and still love them? …Jesus instruct[s] his disciples to love their enemies, just like God loves his enemies. But what does enemy love look like practically? It certainly doesn’t mean that God loves his enemies’ twisted character or rebellious sin. Love in this sense is God’s tangible provision for his enemies’ needs: “he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matt 5:45). That’s the model for how his disciples are to love their enemies. We are to respond to our enemies with tangible actions for their good and blessing… What Jesus is NOT calling us to, however, is moral indifference where we ignore their sin… How do we work this out practically? Solomon puts it well [in Ecclesiastes 3] “There is a time to love, and there is a time to hate” (Eccl 3:8). There will be times when it is appropriate to love our enemies, provide for their needs, bless them when they curse us, and pray for their salvation. But there will also be times when it is appropriate to despise their ungodly character and look forward to God’s judgment upon his enemies and our enemies (see Rev 6:10). That’s why David could pray, “Oh that you would slay the wicked” (Psalm 139:19)! We don’t delight in the suffering the wicked will endure at God’s hand, but we do delight in God’s justice and at the removal of all unrighteousness from the world.”
I think Brown is spot on. Now, if you find it DIFFICULT to HATE God’s enemies while also LOVING them and actively working to bless them, JOIN THE CLUB! Jesus never said it would be EASY to experience and express BOTH, in godly tension and proportion. But it is POSSIBLE.
But here’s the third and maybe TOUGHEST question of ALL concerning “shunning God’s enemies”: isn’t that US?! Liars, hypocrites, evildoers… - SINNERS! Isn’t that US? In God’s heavenly courtroom, aren’t you and I rightfully declared guilty on all charges?
YES. But friends, the GOSPEL is that Jesus Christ BORE our guilt and TOOK our shame and PAID for our sin once and for all on the cross. “he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed…
his soul makes an offering for guilt”, the Bible says, “and he makes intercession for [sinners].” (Isa 53:5,10,12)
Jesus “became sin for our sake” and was shunned as an ENEMY of God, so that WE might be forgiven, CLEANSED, and ACCEPTED as God’s friends and CHILDREN, never to be cast out again, and all we have to do - all we CAN do! - to receive His unimaginable GIFT of forgiveness and ADOPTION is BELIEVE! “Whoever BELIEVES in Jesus shall not PERISH but have EVERLASTING life!” (Jn 3:16).
Before we move on, let me suggest one additional application of this principle in practice: one way you and I can refuse - SHOULD refuse - to “sit” or “consort” with “wicked” “evildoers”, is in our choice of ENTERTAINMENT. Media. “whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable… think about these things.” (Phil 4:8) Listen to - WATCH - these things. “Sit” with THESE influences. But “the wise FEAR the Lord and SHUN evil” (Pr 14:16).
Principle #3, for walking in integrity: we PROCLAIM God’s praises. (vv6-8)
The best DEFENSE is a strong OFFENSE. The best way to PROTECT your integrity is by PURSUING the LORD, in WORSHIP.
“I go around your altar, O Lord,
proclaiming thanksgiving aloud,
and telling all your wondrous deeds.” (vv6-7)
“O Lord, I love… the place where your glory dwells”; and where is THAT? In David’s day, God’s glory dwelt in the TABERNACLE, above the ark of the covenant. But what about TODAY?
There are THREE places today where God’s glory dwells in a UNIQUE way - yes, God is omnipresent. But if He ever feels DISTANT to you, and you want to rediscover and experience God’s presence and His GLORY, here are three surefire places to look:
1) His WORD. Speaking of proclaiming God’s praises as a MEANS of maintaining one’s integrity - the LONGEST chapter in the Bible, Psalm 119, is basically a LOVE poem written to God specifically for His WORD: “Oh how I love your law!” (v97)
And here’s how it commends us to integrity:
“How can a young man keep his way pure?
By guarding it according to your word.
With my whole heart I seek you…
I will delight in your statutes” (vv9-16).
The psalmist is saying: “If you want to keep your way PURE, be a person of INTEGRITY, you need to CHERISH God’s word.” “Proclaim thanksgiving aloud” for God’s WORD. If we’re going to tell OTHERS of “all God’s wondrous deeds,” first we’ve got to KNOW them for ourselves, and we LEARN through His WORD.
God’s glory DWELLS in His WORD.
2) Second, His PEOPLE. V8 rejoices: “I love the habitation of your house”. Where is God’s HOUSE today? Ephesians 2:22 ““in [Christ] the whole structure [of the CHURCH], being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” – Church: WE are God’s house! Collectively, when we are “joined together”; Jesus said, “where two or more are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”” (Mt 18:20)
And by the way, if “BAD company RUINS good character”, the converse is ALSO true: “GOOD company SHAPES godly character.” You want to grow in godliness and integrity? Surround yourself with others who are similarly swimming upstream. If you love the LORD, you WILL love His CHURCH, His BRIDE. Tell ME that you love me, you just can’t stand my WIFE, and I’ll tell YOU what you can DO with your so-called “LOVE”, where you can SHOVE it. Cuz if you TRULY love me, you will LOVE my BRIDE. “He cannot have God for His Father who has NOT the CHURCH for his MOTHER” (Cyprian). It’s a PACKAGE DEAL: you love the LORD, you love His CHURCH.
3) And the THIRD place God’s glory dwells: in His WORD, in His PEOPLE, and in His SON: “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. ” (Jn 1:14)
We pursue integrity by proclaiming God’s PRAISES for his WORD, for his CHURCH, and for his SON. That’s your practical application for principle #3: PRAISE GOD from whom all blessings flow, especially those three blessings. Perhaps the easiest way to RUIN your integrity starts with INGRATITUDE. That’s where it all starts to go off the rails - when we stop THANKING God, we stop FOLLOWING God; when we stop PRAISING Him, we stop PURSUING Him. The next time you’re tempted to GRUMBLE and give in to discontentment, try “proclaiming thanksgiving aloud” instead, and you can START with God’s word, his people, and his Son.
#4) We walk in integrity by FEARING God’s judgment. (vv9-10)
David prays - PLEADS with - God in v9: “Do not sweep my soul away with sinners, nor my life with bloodthirsty men”. David knows a day is coming when God WILL judge the wicked (Ecc 3:17), and he doesn’t wanna be “SITTING” with them, counted in their number, their “assembly” when that day COMES!
Because David had a proper FEAR of the Lord. The Bible says “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Pr 1:7); “The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil” (Pr 8:13); and MOST importantly, “[God’s] mercy is for those who fear him” (Lk 1:50).
So Jesus warned, “do not fear those who can kill the body [only]. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Mt 10:28).
“Hellfire and brimstone” preaching sorta has a reputation today. But JESUS preached about hell more than ANYONE in the Bible, so label me however you want; I’m gonna preach what HE preached! And Jesus didn’t shy away from WARNING people about the REALITY of HELL; it is a real PLACE filled with real SOULS, and there is a real POSSIBILITY that YOU could find yourself there, if you don’t FEAR God’s JUDGMENT, his just punishment for your sin.
Polly’s grandmother - who until last week was the healthiest 87 year old you’ve ever MET in your life - she just went in to the hospital on Tuesday with stomach pain; by WEDNESDAY she was diagnosed with stage 3 or 4 ovarian cancer; by Friday they discovered it had eaten a hole in her stomach lining and her entire abdominal cavity was filled with sepsis; she had to have emergency surgery that saved her life… for now. But they said they probably won’t be able to do ANYTHING about the cancer; they give her months to live.
The last time I shared the gospel with her - and I LOVE Gran; we’ve got a GREAT relationship - but the last time I tried explicitly sharing the gospel with her - “God is HOLY; we are SINFUL; that’s why we all need a SAVIOR” - she walked out of the room. She wouldn’t hear it. Because she believes IF there’s a God at ALL, he is nothing but LOVE - no JUSTICE - and she believes that SHE is basically a good person, and therefore she has NO need for a Savior. And she has no FEAR of the coming JUDGMENT.
PRAY with me, that she has a change of heart before it’s too late.
Maybe that’s someone here this MORNING - you might not LIKE it, but you NEED the fire and brimstone; frankly, you need to have the HELL scared out of you, quite literally.
God is HOLY; Our Sin is a PROBLEM; but friends: here is the GOOD news: we need NOT fear God’s judgment, if…
#5 - We walk in integrity by RECEIVING God’s grace! (vv11-12)
That is David’s CONCLUDING prayer now, in v11: “redeem me, be gracious to me”!
“Redeem” means “RANSOM, deliver, RESCUE me”!
Chanan means “be gracious or show MERCY” - grace is receiving a GOOD gift you DON’T deserve; MERCY is NOT receiving a BAD punishment you DO deserve, and in Jesus Christ, friends, we get BOTH! The grace and mercy neither ONE of which we deserve - we DESERVE Hell, NOT love and forgiveness, but we get the OPPOSITE, because of JESUS. And all we have to do is RECEIVE it. Pray, PLEAD, along with David: “REDEEM me, be GRACIOUS to me,” O Lord. That’s the ONLY way “my foot can stand on level ground” - not by MY integrity, but by YOUR faithfulness to me.
I’ll close with this paragraph from James Johnston (279-80): “When we hear David’s absolute confidence in these closing verses, it doesn’t seem to fit with what we know of his life… We know that David did not live his whole life with absolute integrity (think especially of the whole Bathsheeba / Uriah incident!). Even at the END of David’s life, he disobeyed the Lord by ordering a census of the people (see 2 Sam 24; at the cost of 70,000 lives lost, as a result of God’s JUDGMENT for David’s sin). From what we know about David, this passage could not be about him. It can’t be about US either. If we are honest, we will admit that Psalm 26 holds up a standard of integrity we cannot live up to. David was a PROPHET; he spoke for CHRIST. The blameless integrity of Psalm 26 points us to the blameless life of Jesus… We can’t possibly be good enough to have the integrity that will survive God’s penetrating, painful testing… Jesus is the one man who fulfilled Psalm 26 completely… If Jesus is your Savior, then your feet stand on level ground with him. Your life is joined together with his. His blameless integrity is now counted as yours. His Spirit is within you, helping you to obey… You have nothing to fear.”
Is that true of YOU this morning? Is Jesus’ integrity now YOURS, because you are TRUSTING in Him, in humble, repentant, saving FAITH? If so, rest assured, beloved: you have NOTHING to fear.