Psa 36 | EE | STEP | This is for the music leader. He is the servant of the LORD. It is for David.

Psalms 36

Reach for the Sky

This is for the music leader.

He is the servant of the LORD.

It is for David.

1 ^{▼▼This verse is empty because in this translation its contents have been moved to form part of verse Psa 36:4.} ^{▼▼In this translation, this verse contains text which in some other translations appears in verses Psa 36:1-Psa 36:4.}2 ^{▼▼This verse is empty because in this translation its contents have been moved to form part of verse Psa 36:4.} ^{▼▼In this translation, this verse contains text which in some other translations appears in verses Psa 36:1-Psa 36:4.}3 ^{▼▼This verse is empty because in this translation its contents have been moved to form part of verse Psa 36:4.} ^{▼▼In this translation, this verse contains text which in some other translations appears in verses Psa 36:1-Psa 36:4.}4 The godless man does not obey God.

This tells me that: he is not afraid of God

· he does not see that this matters · he tells himself that God will not see the bad things that he does

· he thinks that God will not hate these bad things · he says things that are bad and not true

· he has stopped being honest

· he does not do anything good · he makes bad plans on his bed at night

· he decides not to do things in a good way

· he does not turn away from doing wrong things ^{▼▼36:1-4 Verses 1-4: These verses are difficult to translate. Some Christians think that David is writing about himself. We all have a bad part. Saint Paul called this bad part ‘the old man’ in us. It makes the Christian life difficult for us. Other Christians think that David is writing about other people. It does not matter who is right. Even very good people sometimes have bad thoughts like those in verses 1-4.
In verse 2, the Bible does not say who ‘he’ is. When we think it is God, we put it in brackets: (God). If ‘he’ means the bad man in this verse, then the bad man will not believe that he has done wrong.
Verses 1 and 2 tell us about the inside of a bad person. That is the part that we cannot see. Verses 3 and 4 tell us about what he does. That is the part that everyone can see.}

5 LORD your kind love is as high as the skies.

Your truth reaches the clouds.

6 Your goodness is like strong mountains.

Your justice is like a deep sea.

LORD you make men and animals safe.

7 God, your kind love has great value.

The children of men are safe under the shadow of your wings.

8 There is enough in your house to give them all that they need.

You give them all a drink of pleasure from your river,

9 because you have waters that give life.

In your light we will see light. ^{▼▼36:9 Verses 5-9: This is all about God. It tells us to look at our world. We can see clouds in the sky. We can see mountains and seas. These all give us help to remember what God is like. When we see the sky, we must remember his kind love. When we see the clouds in the sky, we must remember his truth. In this psalm, this means that God will do what he promised. He will keep his promises. Another way to say this is that God will be faithful. When we see a mountain, we must remember that God is good. He is more than good, God is righteous. We have a special word for the goodness of God. It is righteous. It means that God always does what is right, never what is wrong. And when we look at the sea, we must remember the justice of God. Justice means that in the end what is right and fair will happen, not what is wrong and not fair. Here is a list to help us:
Sky – When we see it, we remember His kind love
Clouds – When we see them, we remember God is faithful and keeps his promises
Mountains – When we see them, we remember God is righteous and does what is good
Sea – When we see it, we remember His justice, so that God does what is fair
Part of verse 9 is difficult to understand: ‘In your light we will see light.’ We need light to see things that are in our world. We need special light from God to see the things that are in God’s world.}

10 Go on giving your kind love to the people that know you.

Give your goodness to the people that have clean hearts.

11 Do not let people that walk proudly hurt me.

Do not let bad people make me run away.

12 The people that did bad things lay there, where they fell.

Somebody knocked them down and they cannot get up again. ^{▼▼36:12 Verses 10-12: Here David prayed that God would give his kind love and goodness to the people that know God. He probably meant the other things in the table also. He also prayed that bad people would not stop God doing this.
There are bad people all around us. If we know God and love him then we do not want bad people to stop God doing this. We must pray as David prayed.
‘Walk proudly’ in Hebrew is ‘the foot of pride.’ People with feet of pride go through life (or walk through life) thinking that they are better than God. The psalm ends by telling us what will happen to bad people. One day they will fall down and never get up again. God will decide when this will happen.}