When the writer of Psalm 71 pleads with YHWH to spare him from the murderous intent of his adversaries, he banks on the long relationship that has bound the two together. Crudely put, he reminds YHWH that you don’t abandon an old friend in his darkest hour.
At the core of this extraordinary interaction lies an almost hidden truth: the writer himself did not establish this friendship. It predates his own birth, to say nothing of his eventual capacity to engage the relationship as a rational, articulate person.
For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O LORD, from my youth. Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother’s womb. My praise is continually of you. (Psalm 71:5–6 ESV)
It is not strange, then, that Christian thinkers should ground human relationship with one’s Maker in something other than unaccompanied human choice. In the text before us, the writer finds it important that he has been loyal and consistent to YHWH with respect to his praise. But he locates the initiation of what one might call covenantal friendship in the superintendence of YHWH over the very process of conception, gestation, and birth.
As with any truth of this kind, one basket or another cries out for all the eggs. Such monopolies should be resisted, for this is without doubt one of those complex truths that only a fool would reduce to absurd simplicity. It is wise not to base wide-ranging conclusions about reality on a single verse alone.
Yet one thing is clear enough: The joy and gratitude that are taken to be something close to defining qualities of life with God do not flow from the particular insight, wisdom, or strength of will that might manifest themselves in the life of a man or woman of faith. To the contrary, these things are nourished by a sense of being surprised by God, pursued or sought out by him, tracked down and adopted into his care.
Or, as here, by recognizing that the biblical God’s care for his sons and daughters begins before they have a thing to say about it.
‘You started this!’, we hear the poet declaring to YHWH with tender irony.
No wonder, then, the psalmist’s claim that he has continually praised only YHWH. Who, having glimpsed such things, would not?
Canter Bridge 
Leave a Reply