Psalm 72 – Taking Lead

We all have a following. It may be as simple as an individual child, an employee, a friend, or someone we’re mentoring. It may be as vast as a company, a team, an organization, or even a church. While the scope in which we lead may vary greatly, we’re constantly in a position of influence.

Leadership has become quite an endeared term to us, and honestly, rightfully so in many cases. However, when we allow the idea of leadership to surpass the significance of what or whom we are leading, and what we represent, we run the risk of losing what makes it special.

David understood this. When praying for his son, and future king, he prayed knowing the benefit of yielding his leadership completely to the path of the one who “spoke and it was”. Here’s what he prayed for and the appropriate response that comes with it.

“Endow the king with your justice, O God, the royal son with your righteousness. He will judge your people in righteousness, your afflicted ones with justice.” – Psalm 72:1-2

A look into the Hebrew shows that this request was for God to offer a divine level of discretion (justice) and that He would grant him the ability to lead with His righteousness. The word righteousness is the Hebrew word “tsdaqah” which can be applied in a number of ways, each of which are amazingly appropriate: That he would lead with rightness (abstractly), rectitude (subjectively), justice (objectively), virtue (morally), or prosperity (figuratively).

It was a given that if granted, Solomon would then lead with a “straight course”, not veering to the right or left, and offer justice to the “afflicted” (humble, lowly, needy, poor). What a great example to us all, as a praying parent, a dependent leader, and as a developing child (His child).

“This psalm belongs to Solomon in part, but to Christ more fully and clearly. Solomon was both the king and the king's son, and his pious father desired that the wisdom of God might be in him, that his reign might be a remembrance of the kingdom of the Messiah. It is the prayer of a father for his child; a dying blessing. The best we can ask of God for our children is, that God would give them wisdom and grace to know and to do their duty.” – Matthew Henry