A Green Olive Tree
What makes for a good story? What elements must be present in a book or a movie for you to sit back after watching or reading and let out a sigh of satisfaction?
There are many answers that one might give to this question. Someone might point to character development as most important. Others might remind us of the importance of world building and an immersive and captivating setting that the characters find themselves in. Still others might highlight the importance of a good villain. What is batman without the joker anyway? Or Luke without Darth Vader?
But as important as all of these things are J.R.R. Tolkien argues that when it comes to works of fantasy at least, there is one element that rises to the top. One piece that is so crucial that one might argue that all truly complete fantasy stories must have. What is it? Tolkien argues that it is the joy and consolation of the happy ending.
Let me read for you Tolkien’s own words in his essay titled, on Fairy Stories.
"The consolation of fairy-stories, is the joy of the happy ending: or more correctly of the good catastrophe, the sudden joyous “turn.” This happy ending does not deny the existence of catastrophe, of sorrow and failure: the possibility of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance; but what it does deny is universal and final defeat— giving us a fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world, potent as grief.
It is the mark of a good fairy-story, of the higher or more complete kind, that however wild its events, however fantastic or terrible the adventures, it can give to child or man that hears it, when the “turn” comes, a catch of the breath, a beat and lifting of the heart, sometimes accompanied by tears”… again all because in the end the story as a whole is seen to be but a servant of this miraculous and joyous happily ever after."
And I start this way this morning because as we look at Psalm 52 together, things indeed look very bleak. We find David facing an absolute catastrophe. And yet, as we consider the Psalm as a whole we find that somehow, amazingly David is not devastated by the wreckage that he encounters. And as we press into why this is the case we will find that this due to one indispensable piece of knowledge that David has learned to cling to in times of trouble– David knows how the story ends. He knows that the turn is coming. He knows that even this catastrophe will not have the final word.
And so as we turn our attention to the text we will find three things this morning.
First in verses 1-4 we find the Catastrophe, then in verse 5 We find “The turn” and lastly in verses 6-9 we find the happy ending.
The Catastrophe
Let us begin in verse 1 with the Catastrophe.
Here David begins this Psalm with a question,
“Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?”
Right from the beginning we should note that this Psalm has a very different flavor than perhaps what we are used to. The vast majority of the 150 Psalms in the Psalter are addressed directly to God.
But a small handful such as Psalm 2 and here in Psalm 52 begin by directly addressing an evil doer or a group of evil doers.
And here David zeroes in on one worker of evil, one who is boasting, whom he addresses as a mighty man.
And this question here in verse leads us to ask two more questions— Namely, Who is this mighty man and what exactly is he boasting of? And in this particular Psalm David does not leave us to guess about either of these things.
Look at the prescript with me.
"To the choirmaster. A Maskil of David, when Doeg the Edmoite, came and told Saul, “David has come to the house of Ahimelech.”
Here we have our villan. We have our mighty man. This man names Doeg the Edomite. And we can read all about this mans evil exploits back in 1 Samuel chapter 21 and 22.
Let me just summarize here what’s happening in these chapters. David is on the run. He has just found out for certain that king Saul wants him dead. And so he and a small company of men fled from the town of Gibea with very little provisions. Now because convenience stores were hard to come by in those days David depended upon the hospitality of others to supply what he needed for his escape from king Saul. And the very first place that David stopped for help was a place called Nob, which was actually a city of priests. And David approached a particular priest named Ahimelech for help, asking for food and for weapons. Now Ahimilech was suspicious about why a high commander in Saul’s army was with such a small escort but in the end Ahimelech gave David 5 loaves of holy bread to eat and the sword of Goliath, which is pretty awesome.
Now, without knowing it, Ahimilech has just become guilty of aiding and abetting an enemy of the state. King Saul wanted David dead and by his actions Ahimilech has just essentially said, I’m with David. I’m with him, not with Saul.
Now this could be disastrous for Ahimilech, but only if word of what he has done actually gets back to Saul. But before this chapter closes we read this.
“Now a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day… His name was Doeg the Edomite, the chief of Saul’s herdsmen.”
So the stage is now set. Ahimilech has helped David and this man Doeg was there to see it.
And as we turn the page to 1 Samuel 22, we find King Saul doing what he does best—throwing himself a massive pity part. Why? Because so far, David has given him the slip. And so he wines and sulks because he cannot get his way saying,
“No one discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse. None of you is sorry for me or discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me, to lie in wait, as at this day.”
Then answered Doeg the Edomite, who stood by the servants of Saul,
“I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob, to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub, 10 and he inquired of the LORD for him and gave him provisions and gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine.”
At Saul’s lowest moment when he is looking for a fall ma,n Doeg steps up and says, I know something. David was at Nob. Ahimelech helped him.
And what happens next should make our stomaches churn because In his fury Saul summons not only Ahimilech but all of the priests at Nob to come to him. And after questioning Ahimilech he orders his servants to put not just him but all of the priests to death.
And text tells us, that in response to these orders not a man moved. Even the servants of Saul knew better than to raise a weapon against the holy ones of Yahweh.
And so who can Saul turn to when his servants are all more righteous that he? He turns again to Doeg his trust informant and says,
“You turn and strike the priests. And Doeg the Edomite turned and struck down the priests, and he killed on that day eighty-five persons who wore the linen ephod. And Nob the city of priests, he put to the sword; both man and woman, child and infant, donkey and sheep, he put to the sword.”
This is the mighty man of verse 1. What he boasts over is not a military victory over an armed opponent but the slaughter of the weak, the weaponless, and the unprepared.
And we should hear David’s mocking tone of Doeg here. What a mighty man you’ve shown yourself, you coward. Murdering those who cannot fight back.
David sets the tone for this whole Psalm and we get the impression here, David will not stay silent here. He will speak back to evil.
And notice what David says next seemingly out of no where he says,
“the steadfast love of God endures all the day.”
This sudden insertion of God’s love in the face of this great evil reminds David and reminds Doeg and reminds us that though a dark cloud has settled over the sky of David’s life it will not out last the sun. David states evil in the eyes and he says God’s love will outlast you.
And then and only then does David turn his attention back towards Doeg’s evil deeds.
Look at verse 3,
“You love evil more than good”
David makes it clear where this wickedness has come from. Long before Doeg committed this atrocity, atrocious things had long before gripped Doeg’s heart.
This great wickedness was no accident. Doeg loved evil. His heart was filled with disordered loves and his mind was filled with disordered thoughts. He loved evil and he hated good and eventually these wicked desires spilled over into unspeakable acts.
Which is precisely every single one of us is warned in Proverbs 4:23 says
“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”
We need to hear this, brothers and sisters. Because all of us capable of atrocious acts. If we go on filling our minds with wicked thoughts and our hearts with disordered desires, these things will sooner or later spill fourth as wicked deeds.
Brothers and sisters guard your heart. Keep them with all vigilance.
But David doesn’t stop here. David spends the vast majority of these four verses renouncing not Doeg’s violence or even his cowardice, but instead renouncing the wickedness of Doeg’s tongue.
Look at verse 2,
"Your tongue plots destruction,
like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit."
David says, Doeg, long before you ever put a sword in your hand, you unsheathed a far more deadly weapon, a tongue filled with wicked words, as lethal as a razor blade.
Oh what destruction wicked words are capable of.
Listen afresh to James chapter 2.
"How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell."
Do you realize that in the past decade nearly 15 million acres of land have burned in California? That’s well over an 1/8th of the state. Consider the massive toll of these fires.
And then also consider this. How many of these fires began with the careless flick of a cigarette? Something that might seem so small and so tiny and insignificant.
Well as David considers the devastation happening around him, he wants us to consider this— this all began with the flick of a tongue.
Oh the power that we wield with our words! The power to kill! The power to give life! What an awesome and terrible stewardship we have over our mouths. Well would the follower of Christ mark the words of Eph. 4:29,
“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up.”
We might easily preach a message on this one point, but we must now return to David himself. Let’s review for a moment what’s happening with David here. David is on the run. He is being hunted by the most powerful man in the kingdom. He has little food and provisions. He has an adversary named Doeg bent on his destruction. And David has now discovered that he has occasioned the death of 85 priests together with their families.
And the question I want to ask you this morning at this crucial juncture is this: how is it possible that David doesn’t simply lay down and die here? How can you get out of bed in the morning with this kind of atrocity staring you in the face? How many men and women have been absolutely da-bilitated by lesser tragedies than these?
How can David keep going? Where does he find the strength to talk back to evil?
Answer: Look with me at verse 5 where we discover “the turn.”
“The Turn”
Listen to what David says in Psalm 52:5,
"But God will break you down forever;
he will snatch and tear you from your tent;
he will uproot you from the land of the living."
The one reason that David is not utterly devastated by what has just happened is this: he knows how the story is going to end.
And in many ways the key word of verse 5 is “forever.” There would be no turn if it were not for David’s consideration of eternity.
And we see this idea expressed over and over again the Psalms. Think about Psalm 73. In Here Asaph spends 15 verses talking about how envious he is of evildoers in this life. How it seems that God blesses them at every turn, and how the righteous seem to struggle just to survive.
And it’s only when he puts on the lens of eternity that he make sense of this life at all. He says in verse 16.
Psalm 73:16
"But when I thought how to understand this,
it seemed to me a wearisome task,
until I went into the sanctuary of God;
then I discerned their end."
We must remind ourselves of the end of the story.
Psa. 73:18-19
"Truly you set them in slippery places;
you make them fall to ruin.
How they are destroyed in a moment,
swept away utterly by terrors!"
Brothers and sisters, you want to know how to be hopeless as a Christian? You want to know how to be devastated? You want to know how to be totally da-bilitated? Let yourself believe that this life is all their is.
Let yourself believe that horrific headlines will have the final word. Let yourself believe that wicked men will go unpunished for their wicked acts. Let yourself believe that all of this tragedy in our lives, and in our families and in our world is pointless.
But brothers and sisters, I declare to you together with David, that this is not the end of the story.
As one of my favorite liturgies puts it,
we declare that evil and death, suffering and loss,
sorrow and tears, will not have the final word.
God’s steadfast love will outlast this. God’s righteousness will let no injustice go unpunished. God’s jealousy for his people will not let these tauntings go unanswered.
Vengeance is mine I will repay says the Lord. Brothers and sisters, it’s only a matter of time! By God’s grace, we can endure in the face of great tragedy because we know the end of the story. Just as Martin Luther once wrote,
"The Prince of Darkness grim, We tremble not for him; His rage we can endure, For lo! His doom is sure."
The turn is coming.
And this brings us to our final point: in verses 6-9 we find the happy ending.
The Happy Ending
And here I want to focus primarily on verse 8
Listen to these words of confidence from David’s mouth:
“but I am like a green olive tree in the house of God.”
David is brilliant in his choice of imagery here. He compares himself to a green olive tree. Why an olive tree? Well David wants us to consider the longevity of the righteous here and there is no better example of longevity in nature than the olive tree.
Just how long can an olive tree live? It’s funny because as I researched this question this past week different sources gave me wildly different answers. But even conservative estimates of how long an olive tree might live under the right conditions come in at 1,500 years. Isn’t that almost unbelievable? That it really is possible that an olive tree could have stood in Palestine when our Lord walked the earth?
This is what David is getting at here in verse 8. He says, I’m not going anywhere. I am stable. I am secure. I am well supplied.
This is of course a direct contrast to Doeg. A contrast very similar to Psalm 1.
There we read that…
Psalm 1:3-4
"The one who meditates on God’s word
is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.
The wicked are not so,
but are like chaff that the wind drives away."
David’s point here is very similar to Psalm 1. And he actually began to set up this contrast back in verse 5 when he said that God “will uproot you from the land of the living.” This is tree language. The is that God is pulling up the tree of Doeg’s life with not more difficulty than you and I might pull a weed from our gardens.
And David invites us here to examine the roots. Why is Doeg pulled up so easily?
Why will he not stand in the day of judgment? Answer: he has the wrong roots. Listen to verses 6-7.
“The righteous shall see and fear,
and shall laugh at him, saying,
‘See the man who would not make
God his refuge,
but trusted in the abundance of his riches
and sought refuge in his own destruction!’”
What were Doeg’s roots? What was he trusting in as a refuge? Where did he place his confidence? In the abundance of his riches.
In the day of judgement we might offer all the riches and the lands in the world but David assures us it will not be enough to save our souls from judgment. Hear this—At the end of all things the judge of the universe will not be bribed.
And it says in Proverbs 11:4
"Riches do not profit in the day of wrath,
but righteousness delivers from death."
Compare this now with David. Where are his roots? What is the anchor for his soul?
Look at the second half of verse 8, I trust in the steadfast love of God forever and ever. David has looked away from himself and he has sunk the roots of his soul down into the love of God. And there he has a sure and steadfast anchor for his soul.
Conclusion
But perhaps you are here this morning and even as I say these words, you are saying to yourself, you don’t know me. You don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t know what I have said. And if I’m honest I am more like Doeg than I am like David.
And I would say to you, brothers and sisters, every single one of us is more like Doeg than we are like David. All of us have stumbled in what we have said. All of us have been tempted to place our trust in the security of riches.
And so what hope is there for us?
As I close I would invite you to consider these words of George Herbert, which he wrote about our Savior Jesus Christ.
“all ye who pass by, behold and see;
Man stole the fruit, but I must climb the tree;
The tree of life to all, but only me …”
Brothers and sisters, we can say that we are like a green olive tree only because Christ hung on a tree for us. We must see that we too deserve the same fate as Doeg but on the cross of Jesus Christ, the Son of God son was treated like Doeg in our place.
We stand because he was broken.
We are stable because he was torn from his tent,
We are secure because the Son of God was uprooted for us.
Proving forever just how deep the Father’s love for us really is.
Let us look to the cross. And lets us say together with David,
“I am like a green olive tree in the house of God, forever.”
Let’s pray.