1. In thee, O LORD, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion.
9. Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth.
18. Now also when I am old and grayheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come.
We usually think of David as the young shepherd boy, but here he is speaking of his old age after many terrible things have happened in his life and lifetime. He has seen God deliver him from bears and lions and Goliath and false friends and evil men and many other dire circumstances, and now he is not the strong fearless man that he was. Also he has just experienced the worst thing that could happen to him, that someone close to him had conspired to kill him and take away his kingship, the very kingdom that God had promised would last forever. It had almost been usurped by a man who did not honour and trust God, by men who did not know or care about the promised King Eternal, the Messiah.
At the time he wrote this psalm he was back ruling the nation for God and holding a good testimony of righteousness before the surrounding nations, he was able to encourage and sustain the witness to his own people through the priests and the singers who ministered in the tabernacle, and he still had enough smarts to rule in fairness, but what about the future? What if his own mind gets grey like his hair and what about the morals of the one who succeeds him? No wonder that we see his concern in this psalm for the future of God’s plan for Israel and for His Messianic King. Thus his prayer "Please, God, that I never get confused about what is right and wrong."
For we all have heard of people who ‘lose it’ when they age, who used to be so correct and godly, but become so . - . - . It makes us want to memorize and repeat this prayer in the first verse of Psalm 71 that God will keep us from ever being confused about what is right and what is wrong. That we never forget that there is an eternal difference between good and evil. And that those around us who leave God out of their lives and what they do are wrong for there is a spiritual world as well as a material one, that there is a personal evil enemy of good and righteousness, the enemy of God who wants to usurp and spoil us. Many have believed his lies and have conspired with him to confuse us and our children, to spoil God’s good plans for the future and His kingdom.
O God, may I, we, live to show Your power to this generation and your strength to every one is that is to come. Let me never be confused. Amen!