THRU THE BIBLE EXPOSITION

Psalms: Living By Faith In God

CXLII. God’s Development Of Strong Godly Leaders

(Psalm 142:1-7)

Introduction: (To show the need . . . )

There is a great need at all levels of human experience for strong, godly leaders:

(1) It exists at the international level: “Hamas gained bragging rights for surviving two years of Israeli attacks at what, at least to what (Hamas) leaders regard, as the paltry cost of tens of thousands of lives and continued imposition of unspeakable misery on the millions of people still subject to its brutal control.” (“Gazans remain hostage to Hamas,” Republican-American, October 15, 2025, p. A6; parentheses ours).

(2) It exists in large urban cities: “24 years after 9/11, New York City is on the brink of voting in a Uganda-born Islamist mayor . . . Zohran Mamdani, 33.” He is “an unapologetic Islamo-Marxist who . . . advocates socialist redistribution of wealth, taxing ‘millionaires’ – those who haven’t fled the city – emptying jails, replacing cops with social workers, laying on free buses, subsidizing grocery stores and forcing cheap rents on landlords” (Miranda Devine, “The dangerous Mam on the hour,” New York Post, October 20, 2025, p. 11).

(3) It exists in local towns: “Police say” that “Jacqueline ‘Mimi’ Torres-Garcia . . . a slight girl . . . suffered prolonged abuse and malnourishment, was killed and placed in a plastic storage container in the basement of the family’s Farmington home before they moved to New Britain, where her remains were found behind an abandoned house” (Christine Dempsey, “Girl’s death is ‘heart-wrenching,’” Republican-American, op. cit., October 16, 2025, p. A4). “Police have arrested . . . her mother, her aunt and her mother’s boyfriend, in connection to Torres-Garcia’s death,” but the girl’s father was not living in the home, Ibid.

(4) It exists in evangelicalism as a movement: “Dr. Hugh Ross, founder and past president of Reasons to Believe,” claims, “‘The facts of nature may be likened to a sixty-seventh book of the Bible.’ . . . (W)hat he . . . means is that the modern, secular, scientific (evolutionary) consensus about the origin, history, and age of the creation is the sixty-seventh book of the Bible and, therefore, should be used as the inerrant and supremely authoritative hermeneutical grid for interpreting at least some of Genesis 1-11” (Terry Mortenson, “Can the Heavens Declare the Age of the Earth?”, op. cit., Answers, p. 32-33; parentheses ours). But Dr. “Ross’ old-earth views on Genesis are not defending the inerrancy of Scripture . . . but subtly undermining it. All old-earth scientists, apologists, theologians, and pastors” like Dr. Ross “are using secular, scientific consensus to interpret Genesis in a way that evades and contradicts the plain meaning of the text,” Ibid. As a result, Dr. “Ross’ teaching has influenced many Christians, including many evangelical scholars,” causing “massive confusion about general revelation and its relationship to questions about the origin of the universe and mankind, and the timeline for their creation,” Ibid., p. 32.

(5) It has long existed at the local church level: (a) The need for strong, godly leaders in churches was so great in the 1960s when I was in high school in California that a pastor there told me that he was concerned about the Christian leadership vacuum that he saw already existing in my generation! (b) Also, not long after I graduated from seminary in the 1970s, one of our professors began a Christian leadership training center near the seminary! (c) I was recently asked by a concerned believer if I might consider tutoring less-experienced pastors. After giving this request some thought, I concluded that it was improper for me even to think of tutoring others on pastoring since I am still being tutored by God on the ministry after 48 years in the ministry! The angelic conflict in today’s pastorate is far too great for any mortal man to be an authority on pastoring! The best I can do is tell other pastors how God tutors me!

Need: So we ask, “How can the great need for strong, godly leaders be filled?”

I. Psalm 142:1-7 is an instructional psalm by David on God’s agenda for developing strong, godly leaders:

A. The psalm’s introductory note, part of the Hebrew text, claims that this psalm is a maskil, a “‘didactic poem,’” one that instructs its hearers or readers (H. C. Leupold, Exposition of the Psalms, 1974, p. 958).

B. The way this psalm instructs is to give “helpful instruction on the basis of the experience out of which it grew” (Ibid.), that experience being David’s prayer for God’s help when he hid for his life in a cave from king Saul.

C. God had previously led His prophet Samuel to anoint David to be king Saul’s place, and God’s Holy Spirit had left Saul and come upon David while God had then sent a demon to plague Saul, 1 Samuel 16:1, 13-14.

D. There were two reasons behind these divine actions (as follows):

1. First, God wanted to shift from Saul’s reign to David’s reign without causing a typical destructive civil war in Israel. God’s moving the Holy Spirit from Saul to David equipped David to act rightly and successfully and God’s replacing the Holy Spirit with a demon for Saul caused Saul to act wickedly and to fail, but with these destinies coming to fruition over many years to save Israel from a harmful civil war.

2. Second, God wanted to develop David into a good, effective, successful king unlike Saul who lacked godly character, and prolonged suffering for David at the hands of Saul would achieve such a goal.

E. Accordingly, Psalm 142 starts with David’s helpless cry to God for deliverance, but it ends with David’s confidence that the Lord would cause the righteous in Israel to gather around him as supportive subjects in fulfillment of God’s clear intent as signaled in David’s anointing that David be Israel’s king, Psalm 142:1-3, 7.

II. Thus, the instructive details of David’s leadership development are presented in verses 4-7 (as follows):

A. David realized in his trial in the cave that he could not rely on any other human being for help, Psalm 142:4:

1. When he stated that he looked to his right hand (v. 4a), he referred to “the post of a protector” (Joseph A. Alexander, The Psalms, 1975, p. 547), realizing that no other human was concerned enough to protect him.

2. David then knew that any refuge for him on earth had vanished, that no other man cared for his life, v. 4b.

B. For this reason, David cried unto the Lord Who had led the prophet Samuel to anoint him as Israel’s next king, thus that God intended that Saul not kill him. David then said that God was his Refuge and his Allotted Land of Inheritance in the land of those who were physically alive, Psalm 142:5.

C. David then asked God to pay attention to his cry for help because he was very low in his current state of hiding from Israel’s king in a cave, and thus that he was socially “insignificant” (dalal, Kittel, Bib. Heb., p. 1098; H. A. W., The. Wrdbk. of the O. T., 1980, v. I, p. 190) in the viewpoint of others in Israel, Psa. 142:6a.

D. Also, David acknowledged that in his current situation, his enemies in king Saul, Saul’s court and Saul’s army were too strong for him even to be able to deliver himself, Psalm 142:6b.

E. David thus asked God to save him from his present figurative “dungeon” of “imprisonment” in the cave, hiding from Saul, that he might praise God’s Name. David then trusted that God’s anointing of him to be king would be fulfilled as God would cause the righteous ones in Israel to gather supportively around him, v. 7.

Lesson: God developed David into a strong, godly king by letting him face a great trial where he would realize that he needed to rely on the Lord alone not only to lead Israel, but even to stay alive, and that by recalling through the ministry of the Holy Spirit that God’s anointing of him to be Israel’s next king was itself a promise that God would deliver him so that he could even live and rule.

Application: (1) May we trust in Christ Who died as our Atoning Sacrifice for sin that we might receive God's gift of eternal life, John 3:16; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11. (2) May those whom God calls to lead realize that the sole Source of their existence and success as leaders is God, that they trust Him alone and obey His Word to succeed!

Conclusion: (To illustrate the message and/or provide additional guidance . . .)

We view Scripture for additional guidance on the issues of concern mentioned in our sermon introduction:

(1) On the need for strong, godly leaders at the international level, in our large cities and local towns, (a) we must obey Scripture on our personal role at each level (b) and pray for and trust God’s sovereign governing at each level to preserve the social order so that the Church might disciple (1 Timothy 2:1-4; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-17).

(2) On Dr. Hugh Ross’ aim to make secular, scientific, (evolutionary) consensus as authoritative as Scripture, (a) though nature provides some revelation by revealing God’s “eternal power and divine nature” as Romans 1:18-20 NIV states, one cannot interpret what he witnesses in nature by using evolutionary presuppositions that contradict what Scripture literally teaches as does Dr. Ross and the secular scientific consensus and still treat that interpretation as God’s truth without making God counter His own Word! The problem is not with natural revelation, but with the errant evolutionary presuppositions that cause one to misinterpret what he witnesses in nature! (b) As for interpreting Genesis 1-2 literally, Jesus in Matthew 19:4-6 referred to the literal view of Genesis 1:27 and 2:21-23 where God made Eve from Adam’s rib as His basis for rejecting their separation by divorce. He thus taught the special creation of Eve from Adam so that neither one evolved! (c) Also, since Jesus viewed Genesis 1:27 and 2:21-23 literally, we must view Genesis 1-2 literally, what leads us to believe that God did not use any evolutionary processes to create!

(3) On the need to develop strong, godly leaders in local churches, (a) we can apply the lesson of Psalm 142:1-8 in this message. (b) As for pastors, they can be tutored by God by applying (i) the Pastoral Epistles, (ii) Matthew 13:1-52 and (iii) Revelation 3:14-22, Scripture passages on leadership in our era as we clarify on our Church website.

May we trust in Christ Who died as our Atoning Sacrifice for sin that we might receive God’s gift of eternal life. May those who are called of God to lead realize that God is their only Source of sustenance and success for life and leadership and thus trust Him alone and obey His Word to function in effective leadership.