Arise, Jehovah; save me, my God! For thou hast smitten all mine enemies upon the cheekbone, thou hast broken the teeth of the wicked.
David prays this while running for his life from his own son Absalom. Yet the second half of the verse speaks of the enemy as already beaten. That mix of urgent plea and settled certainty is worth slowing down over. What does it mean to ask God to "arise" while saying He has already struck?
The setting: betrayal from within
One writer draws out why this trouble cut so deep. The betrayal came from inside David's own circle.
No enemy is so trying as the traitor among God's people; and the nearer to the king, the more pain, sorrow, and shame there is. The king had known more than one deep humiliation, but never one so heartbreaking, and so public, as this. Yet David's sorrow was far from pure. In Christ the same sorrow was purer and deeper in every way.
"Arise" — asking God to step in
The first half of the verse asks God to act. That prayer looks past the danger of the moment to a final outcome.
He looks to the Lord to arise and act for him. He is looking ahead to the time when God sets all his enemies aside in judgment. Then the Lord's people reach their final blessing.
Why he can speak of it as done
The verse gives a reason for the plea. Older translations put that reason in the past tense — God has struck them — and the writers quoted below follow that older wording. Nothing had visibly changed in David's circumstances; his confidence rested elsewhere.
Faith makes the things hoped for sure and solid, and so David saw all his enemies struck down and defeated. He was already enjoying the victory, because he knew that God had taken up his cause. It is a great thing for the soul to lean on the Lord with unshaken trust at the worst moment. It leaves everything in His hands. We so easily think something depends on our own energy and activity, and in this way we shut the Lord out.
Broken teeth: the picture explained
The second half of the verse turns to teeth. One writer traces that picture through two other Bible scenes.
"You have broken the teeth of the ungodly." This is a picture of breaking their power to devour those they counted as enemies. Psalm 22:13 says, "They open wide their mouths at me, like a ravening and roaring lion." Acts 7:54 shows the other side of it. The religious leaders of Israel had arrested Stephen. They hated being exposed as enemies of God, and they "ground their teeth at him." Break a man's teeth, and he can no longer grind them, however much he would like to.
An answer larger than the request
David had already asked God to keep him safe. Here he turns to what should happen to his enemies.
In verse 4 he had cried to the Lord for his own protection. Now he is sure of it, so he asks for the defeat of his enemies (v. 7). He even grasps the answer in advance: "For You have struck all my enemies on the cheekbone." Such a blow leaves a man far less bold. God answered this prayer more fully than David wanted. David had asked for Absalom to be spared (2 Sam. 18:5), and he was not.
Whose voice speaks in the psalm
Commentators read the psalm as more than David's diary. One sees in this verse a single cause shared by the Messiah and the godly who suffer with Him.
In Psalm 3, verse 7, the Messiah and the godly share one common interest. The ungodly are active and in power. The right to rule belongs to the Messiah, but the ungodly still refuse it. Meanwhile the faithful few are oppressed and suffering.
That reading also sets a limit on how directly a Christian can borrow the words. Here, rescue comes when judgment falls on enemies. The Christian's hope has a different shape.
The soul's experiences here, and the desires it expresses, show that the psalm has in view a godly Jew. He is waiting for blessing on earth in the coming kingdom age. That blessing comes when God judges the nations living at that time. The Christian's blessings are heavenly. He does not reach his full and final blessing through the judgment of his enemies. He reaches it when the Lord comes to take him to heaven.
Summary
- Betrayal — the sharpest wound comes from inside: a traitor near the throne, and public shame. Christ entered that same sorrow more deeply and purely.
- Arise — the prayer asks God to act now. It also reaches to the day when God sets every enemy aside and His people come into their blessing.
- Already — faith turns the plea into the past tense. David enjoys the victory before he sees it, because the cause is God's now, not his own effort.
- Teeth — cheek and teeth picture the power to devour and the rage to grind. Broken, the enemy keeps his hatred but loses his bite.
- More than asked — God answered beyond David's own wish. David wanted Absalom spared, and he was not.