It is easy to recognize when someone else is wrong. It is much harder to recognize what their wrong is doing to us.

Someone lies about you, and suddenly you are rehearsing conversations in your head that will probably never happen. Someone treats you unfairly, and you start keeping score. Someone hurts you, and before long you are checking to see if life has caught up with them yet. Someone is dishonest, manipulative, arrogant, or cruel, and you know they are wrong.

Maybe you are right.

But there is a dangerous question buried in Psalm 5 that we don’t ask nearly enough: What is their behavior turning me into?

David was dealing with people he could not trust. He describes them plainly. “There is no faithfulness in their mouth.” He talks about wickedness, deceit, and people who “flatter with their tongue.” These weren’t imagined offenses. David wasn’t simply being overly sensitive. Something was genuinely wrong.

But right in the middle of describing all of it, David prays, “Lead me, O LORD, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies; make thy way straight before my face.”

That caught my attention because if I were writing the prayer, I know what I would be tempted to say. God, straighten them out. Expose them. Stop them. Show everybody what is really going on.

David certainly wants God to deal with evil. He makes that clear later in the Psalm. But before he asks God to deal with them, he asks God to lead him.

“Lead me, O LORD.”

There is a strange thing that can happen when we have genuinely been wronged. Being right can make us feel justified in almost any response. We can say things we normally wouldn’t say because “it’s true.” We can become harsh because “they deserve it.” We can gossip under the disguise of asking for advice. We can enjoy watching somebody fail and call it justice. We can hold onto bitterness and rename it discernment.

Sometimes those explanations may even contain a little truth. That’s what makes this so dangerous.

You can be completely right about what somebody did and completely wrong in what you allow it to do inside of you.

David seems to understand that. Surrounded by crooked people, he asks God to make his path straight.

Who Is Leading You?

The people who hurt us can become our teachers without us ever realizing it. They teach us to be suspicious. They teach us not to trust. They teach us to protect ourselves, assume motives, keep score, and strike back before we can be hurt again.

If we aren’t careful, somebody we don’t even respect can end up having enormous influence over the person we become.

Think about that for a moment.

A person can hurt you once and then continue shaping you for years without even being in the room.

Maybe that is why David’s prayer matters so much. “Lead me, O LORD.”

In other words, they don’t get to lead me.

Their actions don’t determine mine. Their character doesn’t determine mine. Their bitterness doesn’t get to produce bitterness in me. Their dishonesty doesn’t get to make me dishonest. Their hatred doesn’t get to decide who I become.

God does.

There is another line in Psalm 5 that makes this even more interesting. After David spends several verses talking about wicked people, he says, “But as for me, I will come into thy house in the multitude of thy mercy.”

That isn’t what I expected him to say.

I expected something closer to, “But as for me, I am righteous.” David has just described how terrible these people are, so this would have been the perfect opportunity to explain how different he is.

Instead, he talks about mercy.

David knows they need judgment, but apparently David also knows he needs mercy.

There is something spiritually dangerous about spending too much time thinking about someone else’s sin. Eventually we can become very aware of everything wrong with them and strangely unaware of anything wrong with us. Their pride is obvious, while ours feels justified. Their anger is sinful, while ours has a reason. Their words are cruel, while we’re “just telling the truth.” Their motives are questionable, while we rarely stop to examine our own.

David refuses that trap. He doesn’t stand before God pointing across the room saying, “Look at them.” He comes to God saying, “I need Your mercy.”

That’s a much safer place to stand.

You Don’t Have to Carry the Gavel

David eventually does ask God to deal with his enemies, and his language is strong: “Destroy thou them, O God.”

That can be uncomfortable to read, but there is something important about what David does. He doesn’t say, “Give me the chance to destroy them.” He puts judgment in God’s hands.

There are situations where wrongdoing needs to be confronted. Truth sometimes needs to be spoken. Boundaries may need to be established. Action may need to be taken. Psalm 5 isn’t telling us to pretend evil doesn’t exist or quietly tolerate everything people do to us.

But there is a difference between responsibly dealing with something and needing to personally see someone pay for it.

That second one can consume you.

Maybe one reason David can keep walking straight is because he realizes he doesn’t have to carry the gavel. God knows what happened. God sees what other people don’t see. God knows their motives, and He knows David’s motives too. God can judge rightly because God has the whole story.

David can leave some things in God’s hands.

So can we.

The Question We Should Be Asking

When somebody has hurt us, we naturally have questions. Why did they do this? Will they ever admit it? Does anybody else see what they’re doing? When will God deal with them? Will they ever face consequences?

We can spend years waiting for answers to those questions.

Psalm 5 gives us a different question:

Who am I becoming while I wait?

Maybe that’s the question that matters more.

You cannot always control what somebody says about you. You cannot make them apologize. You cannot force everyone else to understand your side of the story. You cannot determine when consequences will come, and you may never get the satisfaction of watching everything get set right.

But you can still pray, “Lead me, O LORD, in thy righteousness.”

God, don’t let this make me bitter. Don’t let this make me cruel. Don’t let this make me suspicious of everybody. Don’t let this steal my compassion. Don’t let someone else’s sin become an excuse for mine.

And don’t let a person who hurt me have the privilege of deciding who I become.

Maybe that is one of the deepest prayers in Psalm 5.

Not, “God, make their road harder.”

But, “God, make my road clear.”

There will always be people we cannot control and situations we cannot completely fix. There will be moments when somebody else’s behavior gives us what feels like every excuse in the world to respond badly.

David’s answer is surprisingly simple. Put your eyes back on the road God has put in front of you.

You don’t have to become like the person who hurt you. You don’t have to carry their bitterness. You don’t have to learn their ways. You don’t have to spend the next ten years proving they were wrong.

Let God deal with what belongs to God.

Then pray the prayer that might actually change you:

“Lead me, O LORD, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies; make thy way straight before my face.”

Psalm 5:8