NOTES for Psa 17
Standing before the Lord must be sincere and truthful. It is precisely because the psalmist is confident of his own truthfulness that he dares not only to cry out to the Lord, but also to call down His judgment upon himself. The psalmist needs not only to offer repentance to the Lord for the sins he has committed, but also, with God’s help, to feel healed and freed from the power of sin.
Yes, the Lord hears everyone who turns to Him, but how important it is to feel that the sins you have committed do not make you an outcast, and that the rebukes addressed to the wicked cannot apply to you yourself. The sense of being in the right that the psalmist experiences is not egocentric self-satisfaction, but the awareness of someone who stands before the Lord and seeks to live in harmony with Him.
Only with such an outlook can one hope both in the justice of God’s judgment and in the Lord’s protection from the wicked.