Psalm 140

What’s Happening?

In Psalm 140, David cries out to God for rescue from his enemies (Psalm 140:1). As Israel’s anointed king, he is called to rule a kingdom of peace built on God’s truth. But a conspiracy is afoot. Liars coil around David like snakes, their venomous words stirring up sedition and violence as they scheme against God’s anointed king, threatening the peace of Israel (Psalm 140:2-3).

So David pleads with God to protect him from the traps his enemies have set (Psalm 140:4). His snake-like enemies spread lies that slither through the kingdom, intending to ensnare him and drag him toward death (Psalm 140:5). Though he is the chosen king, David throws himself on the mercy of the true ruler of the universe, God himself (Psalm 140:6-7a). David asks God to shield his head, so that the serpents’ strikes would not prove fatal (Psalm 140:7b).

David prays for a great reversal—that the serpents would suffer the venomous bites intended for him (Psalm 140:8-9). He asks God to restore peace by purifying his kingdom with fire and cleansing it with water. The fiery lies stacked against him—meant to burn down his reign—will consume the conspirators who lit the flame, reducing their lies to ashes (Psalm 140:10a). The liars are then cast into the watery abyss, the realm of serpentine chaos monsters (Psalm 140:10b; cf. Isaiah 27:1). Using the purification imagery of ashes mixed with water, David asks God to cleanse the land by handing over the liars to the very destruction they had planned (Psalm 140:11; Numbers 19:1-10).

Then David proclaims who will live in this purified land once the snakes have tasted their own venom. The righteous ones, who suffered in the face of the snakes’ slander, will be vindicated and freed (Psalm 140:12-13). When God defeats David’s enemies, the poor, needy, and upright will triumph over the lies of the snakes, filling the land with peace and truth. All who trusted in God in defiance of the serpents’ lies will inherit God’s restored kingdom.

Where is the Gospel?

From the beginning, the King of the universe created out of the watery abyss a kingdom of peace in the Garden of Eden and invited humankind to rule it. But a snake-like chaos monster set a trap of lies for the rulers of God’s kingdom, and the earth fell under its poisonous dominion (Genesis 3:1-6). Since then, God’s people have been threatened by the venomous words of the serpent. Since then, God’s kingdom has needed an anointed King to crush the snake and send it back to the watery abyss. Jesus is that anointed King. 

Jesus escaped every snare set by the serpent. The serpent told Jesus he could become King by asserting his own authority as God or by trusting in snake-like power (Matthew 4:1-10). But Jesus rebuked the serpent’s lies, showing himself to be the true ruler who succeeded where humanity stumbled. To free his people, Jesus let the serpent strike him down. Like David, Jesus was surrounded by the venom of slander and lies. The Pharisees tried to trap him in his words (Matthew 22:15). The priests bore false witness to sentence him to death (Matthew 26:59-60). His own follower denied knowing him (Matthew 26:69-75). Despite his proven innocence, the governor Pilate sentenced him to death (Matthew 27:19, 26). Jesus was mocked as a false king, and passersby openly challenged his identity as God’s Son (Matthew 27:29, 39-40). The serpent spoke its ultimate lie when Jesus died: Clearly, Jesus is no king, no god, and no help for those under the dominion of the snake.

But like David, Jesus cast himself on the mercy of God, trusting that he would be vindicated (Luke 23:46). To the watching world, it looked like the lies were true and that God had abandoned him (Matthew 27:43). But with his dying breaths, as the serpent dragged him toward death, Jesus quoted another psalm of David to proclaim that God had not forsaken him (Psalm 22:1, 24).

And in his resurrection, Jesus crushed the snake’s head and was vindicated as the true King of the universe (Genesis 3:15). The shame heaped upon him rebounded onto the serpent. All who aligned themselves with the snake were put to open shame as liars (Colossians 2:15). The fiery coals they lit to proclaim Jesus’ defeat toppled back onto their heads (Revelation 20:7-10). Every lie about Jesus is proven false. He is the King who reigns over all the world (Philippians 2:9-11). He is the true Son of God who cleanses the land from sin (John 1:29). He will return to drive every lying snake from his world, sending them back to the abyss from which they came (Revelation 13:1; 20:1-3). 

Even now, Jesus is eradicating the serpent’s lies in order to build a true kingdom of peace and truth, a safe haven for the poor, the needy, and the upright. As fire and water cleanse and purify, the vindicated King Jesus is cleansing and purifying his people through the indwelling fire of the Holy Spirit and the water of baptism (Matthew 3:11; Acts 2:1-41). With him, we share in his vindication. With him, we triumph over the serpent’s schemes. With him, we conquer the lies of the snake with truth, and the chaos it brings with life.

See for Yourself

I pray that the Holy Spirit would open your eyes to see the God who rescues his people from the lies of their enemies. And may you see Jesus as the one who conquered every lie with truth so that we might join him in his vindicated Kingdom.