_David resorteth unto God in confidence of his integrity._
A Psalm of David.
Judge me, O LORD; for I have walked in mine integrity: I have trusted
also in the LORD; _therefore_ I shall not slide.
Examine me, O LORD, and prove me; try my reins and my heart.
For thy loving-kindness _is_ before mine eyes; and I have walked in
thy truth.
I have not sat with vain persons, neither will I go in with
dissemblers.
I have hated the congregation of evil-doers; and will not sit with the
wicked.
I will wash mine hands in innocency; so will I compass thine altar, O
LORD?
That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of all thy
wondrous works.
LORD, I have loved the habitation of thy house, and the place where
thine honour dwelleth.
Gather not my soul with sinners, nor my life with bloody men;
In whose hands _is_ mischief, and their right hand is full of bribes.
But as for me, I will walk in mine integrity: redeem me, and be
merciful unto me.
My foot standeth in an even place: in the congregations will I bless
the LORD.
This is a prayer unto God, containing a complaint against hypocrites
who want to be justified by the works of the law, and who always
persecute the true doctrine of faith and condemn its supporters for
heretics. David calls these characters dissemblers, heretics, bloody
men, wicked persons. For although they boast of great sanctity, yet
their hearts are full of hatred and bitterness against God, and craft
and iniquity against their neighbour: as Christ says of all such
pharisees when he rebukes them by Luke, “Ye are they who justify
yourselves before men, but God knoweth your hearts.” For such worship
God with their lips, but their heart is far from him: they worship him
not in truth, but do all for gain.
In a word they serve not God but Mammon and their own belly: as Paul
saith to the Philippians. And this Psalm saith, “And their right hand
is full of bribes.” Yet their hypocrisy has a wonderful outside
appearance. And indeed the false church who has power and dominion on
her side, has always a more wonderful and showy appearance than the
true, which lies hidden under the various forms of the cross.
Therefore we have need to pray in no slothful manner that God would
preserve us in his true Church, and would not suffer us to be mingled
and carried away with these characters, lest we have our portion with
such hypocrites, whose end, though they may for a time make a show
before the world, shall be destruction, and whose glory shall be
turned into confusion: as we have seen it exemplified in the Pope and
his kingdom.
This Psalm belongs to the Third Commandment, and to the first and
second petitions of the Lord’s Prayer: for it speaks of the true
worship and kingdom of God.