In Psalm 3, David - now an old king - has had to flee from his treacherous son Absalom. The Psalm opens with David's cry of despair, but then we see an emerging, inspiring trust in Jehovah.

In his exegetical work, "The Inner Meaning of the Prophets and Psalms", Swedenborg notes that David's despair and prayer in this Psalm represents and foreshadows one of the Lord's states during his life on earth, "when He was in temptations and subjugated the hells, and was then in a state of humiliation, in which He prayed to the Father". (The Inner Meaning of the Prophets and Psalms 253).

To elaborate on this a little bit... Jesus's life on earth was a gradual process of marrying the human nature that he'd taken on from Mary into His inmost Divine nature. There were times when he felt the humanness strongly -- times of temptation, doubt, weariness, and even despair. And, too, there were times when the Divine-ness was flowing strongly - times of great teaching and powerful miracles of healing and feeding the 5000 and turning water into wine, and many more.

In Psalm 3, the whole literal sense has an inner meaning; here are some of the key points:

David represents the Lord, especially the Lord as we are able to know Him and understand Him by means of “divine truth.”

David's flight from Absalom pictures his loss of a state of the good of love and innocence. (References: Arcana Coelestia 3755; Matthew 14:20)

His foes, or adversaries, mentioned in Psalm 3:1, probably represent falsities derived from evil. (References: Arcana Coelestia 9313)

We can feel this way, when we're in trouble in our lives. We lose confidence. We face treachery. We don't know what to think anymore; we're confused. What's true? What's false?

But then, in Psalms 1:3-4, Jehovah is a shield. He answers from his holy hill -- and holiness represents a state of sanctuary, and worship, while hills represent a love of other people and a caring for them.

In Psalm 3:7, smiting enemies on the cheekbone symbolizes the power of spiritual truth to disperse false ideas. (References: Isaiah 30:28; The Apocalypse Explained 923).

This whole cycle is a recurrent theme in the Word. As human beings with minds that are both spiritual and natural, we face both natural and spiritual dangers. In this Psalm, David is facing a physical threat from Absalom, and also the spiritual threat of despair and loss of faith. The focus here is on the internal, spiritual threat. David fights his way through it, turning to the Lord for help, and - by that active faith - allowing the Lord's strength to lift up his head, to awaken him, to be sustain him, and to give him courage.

Finally, too, in Psalm 3:8, we see that David doesn't take credit to himself for this new courage; instead, "salvation belongs to the Lord".