Psalms 27:10: “When my mother and father forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.”

 

The first word in this verse in Hebrew is Ki. Translators take a lot of liberty with this word.   Generally  it is rendered as a conjunction because or a pronoun that.  The KJV uses the word when. That’s cool, I like that.  The ERV uses the word for. God’s Word translation says: even if. So all our major English translations will say: When, for, or even if my mother and father forsake me. They all avoid the most common rendering of because my mother and father forsake me.

 

To make this more interesting the word forsake is in a perfect tense.  A perfect tense expresses an action that has already taken place.  The writer’s mother and father have already forsaken him.   Most commentators will say that David is picking the two people in the world who will be the least likely to forsake you and even in that unlikely event, the Lord will still be there.

 

Perhaps that is true, but I have sat through a series of training classes for foster care and I listened to a lot of stories of young people who have been forsaken by their parents.  Ok, maybe I am talking extremes.  But for most of us, our parents will one day forsake us from the simple reason that we will outlive them.  The word forsake  in Hebrew is ‘zav which does mean to forsake or abandon, however, this is an abandonment that takes place after you have used up every resource and there is nothing more you can do.

 

In other words the picture is not one of parents just forsaking their child even if there is something more they can do, it is a picture of parents in a position of hopelessness, and their child is in a situation where the parents can do nothing to help the child.  This could be  a child with an incurable disease or a criminal charge.

 

As a child we can always go running to our parents to help him out, his kindergarten problems will become adult problems and as much as the parents would want to help out, there is nothing they or anyone can do.  It is at this point, after exhausting all help from family and friends that many finally turn to God as a last resort.

 

It would appear that the message given here is that when we try to depend upon the arm of the flesh, there is no guarantee that it will not fail us.  However, if we depend upon God, he will not let us down, but will lift us up.

 

Interestingly enough the word for lift us up is in an imperfect form. In other words it is in a future tense.  This lifting up does not take place right away, but it will come in God’s time.

 

The word for lift up is  saph which means to gather up, assemble, or collect.  The word is often used for expressing hospitality to a wanderer or someone who is homeless.  This is also a word used to express not just an assembling, but a welcoming with open arms.    Thus when the arm of the flesh fails us, the Lord will welcome us with open arms.

 

What really catches my attention is the fact that the word for lift me up is in an imperfect or future tense.  For many Christians, myself included, it is not a matter of exhausting all help from the arm of the flesh, but it is that we get tired of waiting on God.  We  need His help, we pray and nothing happens, so we turn to plan “B” which is the arm of the flesh.  If that fails, then we again turn back to God.

 

So what this verse is saying to us is that God is faithful, more dependable than the arm of the flesh, we  just need to sit back and be a little patient.

 

 

 

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