An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King
Table of Contents
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 1 - Psalm 2
Chapter 1—Psalm 2
There are two great lines of truth in the sacred writings, which, for distinction's sake, may be called Church truth and Kingdom truth. The first is only met with in the New Testament; the second is found throughout the Bible. The former tells us of God's counsels about the Lord Jesus Christ, and about His body, which is also His bride; the latter announces God's settled determination about the government of this world by the Man of His choice with both, the incarnation and the cross are intimately connected. As man, the Lord Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church, but only after His resurrection and ascension was the body formed. (Eph. 1:22-23.)
As man, too, all government of this world will be placed in His hand whom God has raised up from the dead. Thus, the two great features of the first Adam's history before the fall will he found reproduced in the last Adam, the possession of a bride, and the sovereign authority over the earth. The first Adam, untried and unfallen, possessed the one and exercised the other; the last Adam, tried in every way possible, and proved to be obedient to God's Word, will rejoice in the former, and wield with an, iron rod the latter.
As man, according to Psalm 8, will the Lord Jesus Christ, who is God, blessed for evermore (Rom. 9:5), take the kingdom and rule. As to His divine essence, He is God; as to His person, He is the Son of God; and as to His natures, He is both divine and human. As God, He now sits where none but God could, on the Father's throne (Rev. 3:21). As Son of man He will sit on His own throne. He occupies now His place on the former. He will by and by occupy His place on the latter. About this it is that our Psalm speaks.
When Adam first trod upon this earth no will was known upon it but God's—every creature obeyed Him—for acknowledging the authority of man (Gen. 2:19, 20), placed over them by God, they bowed to the Creator's will. When the Lord entered the world God's authority was for the most part ignored, and will one day he openly defied (Rev. 17:14). Between God's counsels and the world's desires there is now a wide divergence, as this Psalm, in which we are introduced to both of them, makes plain. All appears in turmoil on earth, so different from that quiet scene in Eden, where each animal passed in review before Adam, and God's creatures received their several names from the man formed to rule over this earth. Here, on the contrary, we have the heathen raging, people imagining a vain thing, nationalities and races alike disturbed, and rulers of all grades disquieted, at the thought of subjection to God's will. Man, created in the image of God, is found rising up against His authority. What a picture does this present of the insubordination of those who ought, from their place upon earth, to have set an example to the whole universe of unhesitating obedience to the Creator's arrangements! Centuries have rolled by since Adam and Eve were in the garden, and each one tells its own tale of God's goodness and mercy to His creatures, and of His unremitting thoughtfulness for all that they require. Doing good, giving rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling men's hearts with food and gladness, is the simple recital of the Creator's beneficence (Acts 14:17), and yet commotion is witnessed upon earth in opposition to the development of His counsels. With different aims for the most part, divided generally by jealousies and conflicting interests, on one point nations can unite; to ward off one issue they can deliberate together. What is it that binds them in one common accord—what common danger do they wish to avert? They take counsel against Jehovah, and against His Messiah. "Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us." God's Word strips off all disguise, and exposes in its nakedness the wickedness of their design. Jehovah and His Anointed, the Christ, are on the one side, and the powers of the world are arrayed upon the other. It is this which can so deeply stir hearts, and bind by the ties of common interests both nationalities and dynasties.
Will they succeed in their efforts? The Psalm answers the question; but answering it before ever the struggle began, makes manifest God's foreknowledge, as well as His unalterable intention. The confederacy could not be formed till God's counsels had begun to develop themselves, but the plans of men are here foretold to warn the world to be wise in time. On earth there may be disturbance—above, all is calm. "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the LORD [Adonai ] shall have them in derision." What a contrast does this present to impotent rage of God's rebellious creatures. He sits in heaven, and laughs at it. The settled determination of the Almighty can no more be overturned than the throne of God itself. He sits, while below Him men are in commotion. The term used suggests the immutability of His counsels; so that if men cannot restrain His actions, they must bend before the might of His power (v. 5).
We are turned, then, from the council chamber of men to hear what God thinks of it all. He laughs them to scorn; for what can might, intelligence, wit, or combination effect, if opposed to God's settled purpose? Men plot and counter-plot, often the sport of circumstances, never really the controllers of them, and He who sits on the throne on high laughs at the machinations of mortals. Could the Creator be diverted from His long-prepared plan by the rage and opposition of men He would not be God, and we could put no confidence in His Word. But He is God; therefore His purpose is unchangeable. He is Jehovah; therefore His word is unalterable, and on it we can plant our feet, conscious of the stability of our ground. So, to the all men's projects about the government of this world, God has but one answer, "Yet have I set My King upon My holy hill of Zion." Whatever else may pass away, this word of our God shall stand forever, a comfort to His people, that neither time nor the world's opposition can produce even a modification of His Word.
Observe the language, "My King," "My holy hill." God appoints the King, and He has a place on earth from which He will never be dislodged. Little thought of by many is that hill of Zion, so long covered with ruins and the remains of former grandeur, but it is. God's holy hill still, and He here claims it for Himself. God, then, whom men will at a future day attempt to exclude from His own world, has a place on earth which He calls His own, and a King who shall one day be firmly seated thereon. Should not this arrest attention and arouse inquiry? Are men satisfied with the present arrangement of things upon earth? Clearly God is not satisfied, for what room is there in the partition of earth by man for the King to have a place, whom God here calls His own? Originally, God set the bounds of the nations according to the number of the children of Israel (Deut. 32:8). Then there was room on earth among the nations for His anointed one to reign. What room is there now in man's arrangements for such an event? Men have parceled out the world as far as they could, have created counterpoises in the preponderance of influence on the one side, and provided checks against any encroachments on the other, but where have they left room for Him to come in, Who must and shall reign? The world goes on without Him, and as the opening verse of the Psalm shows, desires nothing better than his prolonged absence—willing to put up with anything rather than to have Him present. What does the reader think of this? 'Tis true, we cannot alter the existing arrangements of nations, for that is not work to which God's people are called. To obey the "powers that be" is our plain duty, where God's claims do not conflict with human enactments; but, in proportion as we enter into God's thoughts, we must look forward. for a brighter day to dawn, and the advent in power of the Lord Jesus Christ to take place. Nothing short of this, as regards the government of this world, will correspond to God's mind; nothing short of it should we desire.
For whom then are we to wait? Who is God's chosen King? Let the Psalm reply—nor the Psalm simply, but a speaker who is now introduced in it, the King Himself, Who tells us about His person, the extent of His dominion, the manner of its acquisition, and the character of His rule—disclosing what no mortal ear heard the Father's communication to the Son, when He entered this world as the virgin's child.
"I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto Me, Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee." Of birth in time these words undoubtedly speak; and, while marking this One out as distinct from all angelic beings (Heb. 1:5), they direct attention to One only out of all the myriads of men who have lived and died upon earth, the long-promised Messiah, to whose advent in humiliation the Apostle Paul directly applies them (Acts 13:33). The promise to the fathers was fulfilled when God raised up Jesus. But does not this refer, it may he asked, to His resurrection rather than to His birth? Clearly not. For when the former is treated of, the Apostle defines it thus: "concerning that He raised Him up from the dead," and quotes another scripture with reference to that truth, from Isa. 55:3. The fact is, verse 33 is concerned with the Lord's presence on earth, and verse 34 clears up what would otherwise be an unanswerable objection, how, if He was the Messiah, He should have passed through death. Predicted as God's Son, as well as the virgin's child, how could these statements be harmonized? His miraculous conception explains them. Born of the virgin He truly was, but conceived of the Holy Ghost. Wherefore, as the angel Gabriel announced to Mary—"That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." Luke 1:35. It is in this sense, horn in time, really a man, but God's Son, that the Father's words are to be understood. And though all believers are born of the Spirit, and to be sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty is their title and position likewise, yet of none but Jesus was it or will it ever be true that existence as man upon earth is due to conception by the Holy Ghost. Thus distinguished from all angels, because He is God's Son—distinguished too from all men because conceived of the Holy Ghost in His mother's womb, we are turned from all who have appeared in the world to One alone as answering the description of God's King. The King Himself it is who speaks, and points out what is peculiar to His person.
Born a man, His position in relation to men is only what could have been expected. On the day of His birth Jehovah addressed Him, and promised Him the dominion over the entire human race. "Ask of Me, and I shall give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession." He must be more than man to have had this communication then made to Him; but as man, born into this world, He is here addressed. All belongs to God, and He promises to bestow it on His Son. What title to earthly possessions can equal this—the free grant from the One who possesses it! The devil offered Him afterward the kingdoms of the world—not knowing surely that already it had been promised Him by the only One who could fulfill His word. Unconditional, too, is the promise which certainly will be made good. How this tells of the perfectness of the Lord Jesus Christ! Adam, before he was tried, filled the place of head on earth. He fell and lost it. The inheritance was promised to the Lord, to be bestowed on Him whenever He shall ask for it. Here there is no room for any change in God's plans. When the Lord asks, He shall have all this; for though, as a man untried, He received the promise, in Him there was, there could be no failure. How God manifests His delight in this One, called by Him, "My Son!" A dominion, wider in extent than ever David or Solomon acquired, is His by free grant from the Lord Jehovah, His Father. Dreams of universal sovereignty, men have before now indulged in. Attempts to reduce and to retain in subjection large portions of the earth under one scepter have be-en made, and for a time have proved successful; but to none besides His Son has God promised the dominion of the whole earth. All nations, peoples, and languages shall indeed, in the fullest sense, do obeisance to Him; and, differing from all empires that have arisen, His will never pass away. The uttermost parts of the earth, too, are to be His possessions. No frontiers with which men are familiar, as mountains, seas, or rivers, will mark the boundaries of His kingdom, since the confines of the earth alone will limit His possessions on this globe.
The title and extent of His dominion being declared, the character of His rule is next set forth. As He received the authority from His Father, so by Him is the manner of His kingdom determined. "Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." One thing then is clear—when He wields the scepter none will be able to resist the might of His arm. God has given all nations to Him to reduce them to subjection. To resist successfully His authority will be impossible, for the rod of iron will prove itself too strong for the vaunted power of man. To effect a compromise with Him, or to preserve a position independent of Him, will be out of the question, for as a potter's vessel is helpless in the hands of its destroyer, so will human might be powerless in the presence of God's chosen King. Complete subjection to Him, as the absolute arbiter of their destinies, will be the only condition on which men will live under His rule. No bonds of love, no silken cords of affection will be the connecting link between Him and the nations on earth. The breaking them with a rod of iron tells of their antagonistic spirit; the dashing them in pieces like a potter's vessel indicates that the exercise of power is the only means of keeping in check the otherwise unbridled will of fallen and unconverted men. What a change all this will introduce from what is now manifested about the Lord Jesus Christ! Ignorance and unconcern about Him now characterize the world; then He will be known and obeyed, however unwillingly, wherever man shall be upon this globe of ours.
God's purpose about Christ thus unequivocally declared, what remains but to exhort men to submit to the authority of the Lord Jesus. Kings and rulers, at the beginning of the Psalm, are depicted as taking counsel together against Him. Kings and judges, at the close, are exhorted to obey Him; for to obey God, they must bow before His Son. Professed subjection to God, apart from submission to Christ, is mere pretension, which will not be accepted for a moment. To serve Jehovah with fear, and to rejoice with trembling, to kiss the Son lest He be angry; and they perish from the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little, these are the injunctions given them; for life under His rule, with the retention of place and dignity on earth, is all that is here offered to them. Life, be it observed, not salvation, is the portion held out to them. But, though the question of salvation is not raised with these kings and judges, there is a little sentence which is pregnant with meaning—"Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him." This suggests the existence of a class different from those just spoken of—God's saints, who have put confidence in God's King. Saints on earth, when He shall reign, who will have passed through trials for His sake, will witness that this is true. Saints in heaven will likewise attest the faithfulness of to His Word. And we know, ere the day of Christ's triumph dawns, that this is so, as we receive with unhesitating confidence the simple statements of the Word. Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him now; blessed will they be forever with Him on His throne, beholding His glory, and sharing in the inheritance (John 17:24; Eph. 1:10-14; Rev. 3:21).
But why has He not yet asked for and received the kingdom? Why this delay between God's promise and His petition for its fulfillment? The answer we know, and what answer have we to give? He waits to be gracious. He waits till the number of saints, who arc to reign with Him, shall be complete. The dominion is His. The promise of Jehovah to Him, makes that clear, and His present place at the Father's right hand manifests that the One who was on the cross, the suffering Messiah, is also the One who will appear as the triumphant Messiah; and we know, for He has told us, that He will not be alone on His throne. All who overcome now shall have a place with Him then. In the Psalm, which gives the earthly aspect of the kingdom, He recounts God's promise to Him. In Revelation God elation 2:26, 27, which tells about the heavenly aspect, He gives promises to His own, and lets them know that they shall rule as He will, and the extent of His dominion over all nations shall he theirs likewise; for what God is now doing is this -by the preaching of the gospel of His grace -to gather out souls from the world to be companions of His Son when on His own throne.
Why then need attention he drawn to this Psalm? Because the struggle has begun. Acts 4:24-28 lets us into this secret, and acquaints us with the first actors in the business. Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and people of Israel, were gathered together against the Lord, and against His Christ. From that day to this the struggle has continued; for just two sides, and two only can there be—neutrality in such a matter is only disguised opposition—for he that is not with Christ is against Him. Yet the issue of the conflict is not doubtful. Christ shall reign, and as all Pharaoh's people had to kiss Joseph (Gen. 41:40, margin), so all allowed to live, when He reigns, must kiss the Son. God's determination is plain. He has announced it beforehand, but has not told us when He will make it good. But as surely as Joseph, whom his brethren put out of their sight, became lord of Egypt, so all God's counsels about His Son, Jesus shall infallibly be accomplished. Successfully to resist Christ's authority then will be hopeless, for power arrayed against Him must only end in the complete discomfiture of His opponents (Rev. 17:14; 19:19-21). But now is the time for proving the truth of the closing sentence of the Psalm, to trust in Him, and to be blessed for evermore.
To be continued
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 2 - Psalm 16
Chapter 2—Psalm 16
The birth of the King having been announced in Psalm 2, we have next to retrace His footsteps as He walked upon earth as a man. Power to be exercised by Him as God's' King seems only natural and right, but a position of lowly dependence is one which man would never have assigned to Him. Yet this was the place He took when upon earth, who will one day rule all nations with a rod of iron, for He was to show what Adam had failed to exhibit—the proper character and position of the lowest in rank of God's intelligent creatures, called by Him, man.
Perfect God and perfect man, what ever be the relative position He occupies, in it He is perfect.
As man on earth, He entered fully into His place, and acted throughout as befits the creature. And this we have traced out to us in the Word, not only in those books which recount His history, but in the Psalm and Prophets, which mark out beforehand the road appointed Him to traverse. Among the Psalms which describe Him upon earth, Psalm 16 must be included. Twice in the Acts do' we find it quoted (2:25-28; 13: 35), and both times it is expressly applied to Christ. Peter, taking up the question of David's authorship, points out that he wrote not of himself, but of another. The Psalm is a psalm of David, but the hope it expresses belongs to a Person very different from the youngest son of Jesse. David's sepulcher, existing at that day, proved he did not write of himself. "He is both dead and buried," is all that the Apostle could say of him. He died, was buried, and is risen, is the testimony which he bore to Christ. "David speaketh concerning Him," is the language of the Spirit by Peter, with reference to His own words by David. At Antioch, in Pisidia, Paul, addressing a mixed company of Jews and Greeks, and anticipating the objection that might be raised against the Messiahship of Jesus, because He had died, quoted this Psalm, to show that His resurrection was predicted. David saw corruption, but He, whom God raised again, saw no corruption. Thus at Jerusalem and again at Antioch, it was clearly shown that Psalm 16 had reference to another than the writer—even to David's Son, who is also David's Lord.
Glancing over it, we may see that only one speaker is introduced throughout it. In Psalm 2 we had three; here we have but one, so He, whose hope it expresses at the close, is the same whose dependence it declares at the beginning; for while part of the Psalm any saint might take up, whose walk was conformed to the standard it describes, One only has ever been upon earth, who could apply it all to Himself. Enoch and Elijah can tell of a road to heaven, which passes not through the gates of death; but none of God's saints who have entered death, have passed through it without their bodies being subjected to corruption. For observe, the Psalm speaks not of the state and portion of the unclothed spirit, but of the reunion of body and soul after each should go to their respective places—the former to the grave, the latter to hell, or hades (Sheol). Death, however, is here only in prospect, the walk which preceded it being the subject of the Spirit's description.
Like a lake whose surface is unruffled by the least breath of any disturbing element, reflecting the very color and calmness of the heavens above it, disclosing, too, beauties in its depths, a bright shining object, at once attractive and soothing—such is the character of our blessed Lord and Master as brought out to us in this Psalm, in which we mark no trace of the opposition that He met with from men, nor of the unevenness of the road over which He journeyed. With one exception (v. 4) there is nothing here to intimate the presence on earth of a will which did not, like His, bow to that of God. It is One, as He walked with God, whose footsteps we have here delineated, and just what we meet with elsewhere in the Word, so useful to us who are often so dull of comprehension; we have but one aspect of the Lord's work upon earth given to us in this Psalm to contemplate. The full picture, with every feature in harmony, we get in the Gospels, while different aspects of His life are brought before us in the Old Testament scriptures. The principle of His walk, the character of His service, the treatment He experienced, the grace and gentleness which He manifested—all these, blended together in the Gospels, are described particularly and separately by the Prophets who lived before the cross. So, while noting His perfection throughout, we may study for our profit the different features of His character, who is both God and man, our Savior and our Lord.
To turn now to the Psalm before us, which gives us the principles of His walk before God—it begins with declaring His dependence, and ends with expressing His confidence. "Preserve Me, 0 God," is the first utterance. "Thou wilt show Me the path of life," is the closing expression of confidence. How fully then He took the place of a creature, who should ever be dependent upon the Creator. To be as gods, was the bait held out but too successfully to Eve in the garden of Eden; the refusal to leave the path of dependence upon God, characterized the second Man, when tempted by Satan in the wilderness. Yet all the while He was God. The stormy sea obeyed His behest, and was stilled; fishes were brought in abundance to Peter's net, and one fish brought him the exact sum demanded as tribute from the disciple and his Master; the winds, too, dropped at His word; the devils owned His authority; and death released its grasp, when He bade Lazarus to come forth. Power then He had; all nature obeyed His bidding, who took so dependent a place as to say, "Preserve Me, 0 God: for in Thee do I put My trust." Is it degrading for a man to own himself dependent on a superior being? Is independence of God what the creature may desire? These questions receive a complete answer from the acts of God's Son down here. He was as a creature dependent, and throughout He remained so.
His dependence affirmed, His associates are next described—"My goodness extendeth not to Thee; but to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom [in them, not in whom] is all My delight." A position of isolation was not that designed by God for man. Separation from evil doers is to characterize His saints (Rom. 16:17; 1 Cor. 5; Titus 3:10; James 4:4); but a misanthropic spirit was never the result of divine teaching, nor is a pharisaic standard of moral fitness one upon which God looks with approval. As man, the Lord owns a distance between Himself and God. "My goodness extendeth not to Thee." And though the only Man, who from His own holiness might have withdrawn Himself from contact with sinners, He was found in their company, and tells us in the Psalm that in them was all His delight. Man in nature loves the company of the great, and those best known to fame. The Lord Jesus found His delight in the saints (those separated to God) and in the excellent (those obedient to the Word). With others, just mentioned in verse 4, He could have no communion. On earth for God, with those who were on God's side, He could and did consort. Publicans, as Levi and Zacchaeus; sinners, as the woman of John 4; those who had been demoniacally possessed, as Mary Magdalene and the man of Gadara, found themselves at home in His presence. Those from whom a Pharisee would have studiously kept aloof, He allowed to approach (Luke 7). It was this which so puzzled Simon the Pharisee. He thought he knew much about that woman, but the Lord showed that He knew more, and allowed her to touch His feet, and accepted as personal service the expression of her heart's deep thankfulness. With publicans and sinners He would eat; He abode in the house of Zacchaeus, and passed two days with the Samaritans of Sychar. The "friend of publicans and sinners," men in derision called Him, who associated with the saints, and with the excellent. From John's disciples He chose some of His own—those who having been, baptized of John in Jordan, confessing their sins, owned that a standing before God on the ground of their own righteousness was a hopeless thing. What then was the reason of this action on His part, so unaccountable to many about Him? The excellent were those who confessed they had sinned; the saints were such as turned from their former ways to follow the Shepherd of the flock. When God made a decree for the waters of the sea, when He appointed the foundations of the earth, the delights of Wisdom were with the sons of men as distinguished from the angelic creation (Prov. 8:31). The fall of man came, and the Lord subsequently appeared upon earth. Then we find it was no longer simply a question between men and angels, but between two different classes of men, the self-righteous and impenitent on the one hand, and the repentant sinners on the other. Unchanged was His delight in men, but manifested under new circumstances. "The saints that are in the earth, and... the excellent," were the classes that He singled out, and drew around Himself. What grace does this bring into notice! Holy, harmless, undefiled Himself, the poor penitents and the sin-burdened souls could find a ready welcome from Him. Men called them publicans and sinners; He calls them saints and excellent. The former expressed what they thought of them; see how God regarded them: so it was fitting that, when addressing God, by such terms should He describe them. What joy to souls, when drawn by grace to Christ, to know God thus regards them, and that He can thus describe them. How entirely their past sinfulness is put out of sight, and how clearly their present character in God's eyes is kept in view. Saints and excellent, such were His companions; such are those with whom forever He will be associated. At the outset of His ministry such were found in His company at the close of His life, one such was with Him, cheered by the dying words of the Savior of sinners, "Today shalt thou be with Me in paradise."
His associates having been described, we next learn how He viewed His appointed path. And here we must surely feel, that great indeed is the distance between us and Him, though by grace partakers of the divine nature, and having Him for our life. The description of His associates tells us of His grace; what follows speaks of His perfectness. Others had turned away from God -to seek satisfaction from unhallowed sources (v. 4); He owned that Jehovah was the portion of His inheritance and of His cup, and accepted what God provided. Circumstances, whatever they might be, He regarded as ordered by God, in whom He found His portion, which therefore, was unfailing and unchanging. He, too, maintained His lot. Able by His presence to overawe souls, and by His word to control the course and actions of demons, He did not assert His rights, but left it to Jehovah to maintain His lot. How truly, how fully, He was the dependent One, though alone of men He could say, "I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering." Isa. 50:3. Thus, leaving all in Jehovah's hands to provide for Him—what Adam failed to do—He could say, "The lines are fallen unto Me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage." No garden of Eden, as Adam had, was His home upon earth, to delight Himself in the abounding fruits of the Creator's beneficence and power. Born in a stable, cradled in a manger, possessing not, as He ministered to others, what the foxes and birds could count upon as their own, a fixed resting-place for His head (Matt. 8:20), and even indebted at times to godly women for the supply of His bodily wants (Luke 8:3), His experience of Jehovah's providential care He has left on record for His people's instruction.
Meek, He was also lowly; for in nothing would He be independent of Jehovah, though He thought it not robbery to be equal with God. From His infancy it was noticed that He was filled with wisdom; as He grew up, we learn that He increased in wisdom (Luke 2:40, 52); and when He appeared as a teacher among His countrymen, knowing Him as a carpenter, and believing Him to be the son of a carpenter, they inquired in astonishment, from whence did He derive it all? (Luke 4:22; Mark 6:2; John 6:42) He tells us in this Psalm, that the source of strength for Him as a man was the fountain of knowledge for Him likewise (vs. 7).
Thus He blessed the Lord who bestowed it; and His will being in full harmony with God's mind, when others were asleep His reins instructed him.
Dependent, meek, lowly, teachable, upon that from which man shrinks He could look unmoved. To death, man's natural end since the fall, He who was sinless looks forward. Having set Jehovah always before Him, He would not be moved; for the One who had upheld Him in life, would bring Him through death; nay, more than that, would not leave Him for any time in it; for God's presence was the goal to which, as man, He was journeying. Elsewhere we find Him contemplating death as that which cuts short all connection with earth (Psalm 102); here He views it as that which lay in His road to God's presence, the aspect in which God's saints can now regard it likewise. Earth is not the only stage on which men will move; so death does not terminate man's existence, nor cut short the saints' enjoyment. It is the portal to another sphere, and, for those who have a portion in heaven, a door to endless joy. Beyond death then He here looked. To be in God's presence was His desire; for the path of life for Him, as for millions of God's saints, lay through the gates of death. Pleasures for evermore He desired, and He points out where they can be enjoyed. How truly He knew man's place upon earth, and shared in the hopes and joys of God's saints. Life beyond death, in the fullest joy, because in God's presence, and there to abide forever, is the closing thought of the Psalm. Across the brief period of time, to that which has for us a beginning, but has no end, called eternity, are we here in thought conducted; from a scene ever changing to God's presence, where all is stable and abiding, our eyes are now turned; the portion indeed of God's heavenly saints, but the portion of His well-beloved Son likewise, who, born into this world, went through it as a man, and passed out of it by death.
Had men according to their own wisdom undertaken to track out the Lord's path here below, how different would their accounts of it have been from what we have here! Each might have seen Him through the medium of their own thoughts, and at best have recorded their impressions about Him; but here we have His own thoughts and feelings laid bare by Himself. And surely, as we take in what He expresses in this Psalm, we get a better understanding of the value and character of the gift which He gave to His own just before departing out of this world to go to His Father—"My peace I give unto you." John 14:27. Here, in a degree unequaled, we have that peace portrayed, and may learn how to share in it, as in Col. 3:15 we are exhorted to let it rule in our hearts. For "the peace of God" we should doubtless there read, the "peace of Christ." Thus we get mirrored in the Word a walk of subjection to God, as exemplified in the Son of the Highest. Far, far, surely most will admit that they walk behind Him who is our life; and often have not the children of God had experience of just the opposite to that peace which He so fully enjoyed, from failing to learn of Him, in whom "There only could God fully trace A life divine below."
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 3 - Psalm 40
Chapter 3—Psalm 40
Written, as the Psalms were, for the instruction of others, and not simply to record the experience of the one whose thoughts they express, we find at times in the construction of these sacred songs a methodical arrangement very different from what might have been expected. Of this the Psalm before us is a good example, for, historically speaking, the first four verses have their place at the conclusion instead of at the beginning of the Psalm, announcing as they do the answer to the cry of the poor and needy One, which we meet with in the closing verses. The purport of this arrangement seems plain; for the Psalms were written to encourage God's saints in trial, and to afford suited expressions for the thoughts of their hearts. Now to know that others are in the furnace with the sufferer will show him that he is not alone and may check the thoughts so common under such circumstances, that he is singular in what he has to pass through; but the companionship of others in the trial offers no ground for expecting deliverance from it. Yet this is what the sufferer wants and, thank God, it is what the Word provides. So before reading of the trials which forced the cry of distress from His lips, we learn that He has been brought out of them, and the new song of praise and thanksgiving has taken the place of the prayer for deliverance. Hence others may he encouraged to act like the delivered One when placed in similar circumstances. For the comfort is this, that He has been brought out of all His trials by the goodness and power of His God. Had it been the might of His arm that had gotten Him the victory, His example would only avail for those who possessed the like strength. Any wanting that would find no encouragement for them in the knowledge of His salvation. But that is not the aspect of things we have here. It is the full deliverance of the poor One—of the needy One—who having felt the power of man's opposition, has been saved by the power of Jehovah's arm, and has thus learn, ed what it was to be thrown upon God. This is what God's saints want, and what the godly remnant in Israel will find applicable to their condition upon earth.
Another remark as to the structure of the Psalm will not be without interest. We learn from Peter that the Spirit of Christ was in the Prophets, and guided them in their writings (1 Pet. 1:11); so that the sacred writers, taught by the Holy Ghost, clothed the ideas which God intended should be in the Word, in language suited to express His thoughts and those of God's saints. All that the Lord could say, His saints cannot, for in some respects He stood alone. Certain things were true of Him in one way (vs. 12), and true of His people in another; but many things, to which He could give utterance, His people can take up as true of themselves likewise. On the cross, of course, when making atonement, He was alone. Suffering the consequences of sins He was the sinner's Substitute—the thieves suffering justly, receiving the due reward of their deeds—He having done nothing amiss, yet bearing the sins of others. Sins then, as laid upon Him, He might call His own, but in a sense very different from that in which others must acknowledge them as theirs.
Besides suffering from God when making atonement, He suffered from men as God's faithful witness upon earth. His people can share in this, in their measure; therefore the language He could use, they can likewise, for He has been in circumstances similar to theirs. Now, as we read this Psalm, we must admit that there is one and the same speaker throughout. He who sings the song is the same One who uttered the cry; and He who looks for deliverance is the One who is the subject of prophecy. The Psalm is clearly the utterance of Christ, and part of it (vss. 6-7) refers to Him exclusively. But we learn from Psalm 70, which is nearly the same as Psalm 40:13.17, how God's saints can take up, as divinely provided for them, the language He could use. What is peculiar to Christ in Psalm 40 is not reproduced in Psalm 70; but what a saint under pressure from the opposition of men might express, is given us as His language in Psalm 40, and is put into the mouth of the saints in Psalm 70. Had we only Psalm 40, we might not have been able to draw a line between language there peculiar to Him, and language common to Him and to others. With Psalm 70 to compare with Psalm 40, we can, on the highest authority, do this; and while marking what applies especially to Him, we can see how really and how fully He entered into circumstances similar to those in which God's saints have been, and may be found; so not only in walking before God, but in His bearing as He suffered from men, is the Lord Jesus Christ an example and an encouragement to God's saints.
Are we wrong in saying that this Psalm applies to Christ? The statement it contains makes the matter pretty plain, and the comment of the Holy Ghost by Paul, on His own words by David dispels all doubt. "In the volume of the book it is written of Me," introduces us not to David, of whom we have no prediction before his birth, but to another, who is the subject of divine revelation. "I come," tells us that He had an existence before He appeared on this scene; for no mere child of man, speaking of his entrance into this world, could say, "I have come." Thus, His pre-existence is implied, and the agreement of His will with the action is announced.
For, though taking human form, the form of a servant, He speaks not as One obeying a command, but as One agreeing to take up a work, and delighting to do God's will. The conclusion which must force itself on the mind from the words of the Psalm is declared to be correct by the statement in Heb. 10:5: "Wherefore, when He cometh into the world, He saith, Sacrifice," etc. His presence on earth was to be the harbinger of a great change, as His presence here at a future day will inaugurate a new regime. What Israel had brought to God year after year, was not that which He came to offer. Burnt offerings and sin offerings of the herd and of the flock God would not require. The Speaker here was to be the Sacrifice. He was God's Lamb for both sin offering and burnt offering. Obedience to God's will in the offering up of Himself was to characterize Him. "Mine ears hast Thou opened" (or digged) expresses this; for "a body hast Thou prepared Me," which we read in Hebrews, is the statement of the Greek translation—man's paraphrase of God's own thought.
The great burden of the Psalm is the Lord's life of ministry upon earth while, however, looking forward to His death with its consequences, first of opposition from men, and then of deliverance by Jehovah out of all His trials, being brought up out of the horrible pit, out of the miry clay. Verses 1-3 tell of this deliverance; 4 shows that others may experience a similar one; 5-10 recount the subjects of His ministry; 11-17 give His cry to Jehovah consequent upon the opposition He met with from men.
He preached to the Jews, righteousness, and set forth God's righteousness, faithfulness, salvation, loving-kindness, and truth, in the great congregation (the general assembly of the nation—not the elders and doctors simply). Before the flood there had been a preacher of righteousness. When the Lord appeared, He too preached righteousness, but under very different circumstances. Noah could show men what they ought to do, and warn them of the sure fulfillment of God's word, but the patriarch had nothing to point to as a witness that God was faithful, except previous actions in judgment (Gen. 3-4). The flood attested God's truth, but only when it was too late for man to prove God's loving-kindness and salvation. But the Lord's presence on earth told of God's faithfulness, for the Word had often predicted His advent; and as He moved about from place to place, He declared God's love, and announced His willingness to save.
A preacher of a different class Israel had formerly known. Solomon, the wisest of men, was charged with this duty among his countrymen. He preached of man's follies, and sought to impress on his subjects the vanities of the things of this life. John the Baptist, at a later epoch, was known as a preacher, proclaiming the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. But differing from Noah, Solomon, and John, the Lord preached the glad tidings of the kingdom of God—a message never before delivered by any teacher or messenger from God; for it was not till He, the King, stood upon the earth, that the kingdom, as a present thing, could be preached. By and by on the mountains of Judah, will voices be heard proclaiming the advent in power of Him who Himself preached in lowliness the gospel of the kingdom (Isa. 52:7). The Lord's ministry was, however, different in character from that which will be. On earth—though" in heaven—the only-be gotten Son declared the Father, and displayed in His actions and taught by His word what God was. To His disciples He insisted on the need of righteousness (Matt. 5:20) as necessary to enter the kingdom; to Nicodemus He spoke of God's love; before the Pharisees He justified God's ways in receiving sinners (Luke 15); and to the woman of Sychar He made known for what the Father was now seeking (John 4:23). In Galilee He told the multitude of life everlasting (John 6); in Jerusalem He proclaimed the grace which God was offering (John 5: 24, 25); and the full refreshment provided for sinners, whose only needful qualification was to thirst for it (John 7:37). Rest, too, for the weary, He offered (Matt. 11); and the door to abundance of pasture He pointed out (John 10:9) God's grace and man's need He freely and fully preached; but what the results would be to Himself, the Psalm beforehand made known.
Ministering thus among men, declaring God, proclaiming His salvation, He has to turn to Jehovah, and on the ground of His own faithful service await His intervention for deliverance. Had it been the power of the enemy which thus openly assailed Him, none need have wondered; for He was manifested to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8).
But the instruments used to kill Him were men on whose behalf He came—manifested, as John also tells us—to take away sins (1 John 3:5). From these, for whom He so patiently and graciously labored, He asks deliverance. They sought after His soul to destroy it; He sought to give them everlasting life. At Nazareth and at Jerusalem men attempted to kill Him, who was God's faithful witness among them, once at the former place and several times at the latter. At last they succeeded, and Jerusalem thus earned the unenviable title of Sodom and Egypt, and the place where our Lord was crucified (Rev. 11:8).
What had He done to deserve this at their hands? He had preached God's faithfulness and God's salvation. He had declared God's righteousness and God's truth. His feelings under this hostility, the result of His ministry, He here lets us understand. He was not as one indifferent to their behavior and insults, or as one conscious of His own strength, looking down from a pinnacle of greatness on the rage and spite of puny creatures. He felt deeply what He passed through, and looked only to the Lord for deliverance. "Innumerable evils have compassed Me about," He has to say, and Jehovah's active interference He asks for as really wanted: "Withhold not Thou Thy tender mercies from Me, O LORD: let Thy loving-kindness and Thy truth continually preserve Me." "Be pleased 0 LORD, to deliver Me: O LORD, make haste to help Me." Such words prove what He felt and what He desired; and the opening of the Psalm acquaints us with that which He experienced from God, as the body of it tells us what He experienced from man. He cried, and was delivered. He was heard because of His piety. Impossible was it that a faithful witness should not be delivered, all must admit. But the depth of need into which the faithful and true Witness descended, tells a tale of man's heart, and of His obedience. Heard, raised up, and so delivered, He exemplified in His own salvation the sure future of those who bear witness faithfully for God in the world which has crucified His Son. And the new song, at a future time to be sung by myriads of the redeemed, the Lord Jesus was the first to pour forth, for the term "new song" has reference in Scripture to the celebration of full and final victory, and that in connection with the kingdom. Israel at the Red Sea (Exod. 15) did not sing it, but their descendants will bear their part in it (Psalm 96; 98), and joyful tones from creation's voice will form the accompaniment to that new song sung by God's ransomed and finally rescued people upon earth. Nor will earth only hear it, for in heaven, around God's throne, the heavenly saints will give expression to it (Rev. 5:9). No angels that we read of have part in this. Those only who have been delivered by God can join in it. The Captain of our salvation first, then all who share in deliverance will sing the new song, for in common with Him they will have proved God's power to help.
Delivered from His enemies, He looks for their destruction (vss. 14-15), the righteous retribution which their conduct deserves. As delivered by God, He owns the godly as His associates, and this too after His resurrection On earth He found His delight in them; on high He does not separate Himself from them. "Praise unto our God" shows that He is forever a man; and though Himself the only faithful witness who never once failed, He reminds all God's servants that He regards them as in connection with Himself. "Our God" witnesses of this—His voice to us from beyond the grave. By and by the whole universe will see that He is not ashamed to call us "brethren." But now "our God" and "us-ward" speaks to our hearts of this grace; for having once identified Himself with God's saints, He will never separate Himself from them.
Nor is this all. The present effect on others of His deliverance He describes. His feet established, the new song put into His mouth, all that Jehovah has done for Him who waited God's time, and has proved His faithfulness and power, will tell on many hearts, and encourage suffering disciples (v. 3). Results of everlasting importance flow from the Lord's atoning work; results too of great value accrue to God and to the saints from His deliverance out of death. God's power to deliver is seen, therefore confidence in God must be engendered. How great that confidence should be, the following verse sets forth, announcing the blessing of the man (Gr., lit., the strong man) who "maketh the LORD his trust, and respecteth not the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies." Not the poor feeble one only, but the naturally strong man, should learn wherein his great strength lies. Faithful in service, we learn what the true spirit of 'a minister should be. Drawing attention by His ministry to what God is and does, He desires all eyes to he turned to, and all hearts to be occupied with, the Lord Jehovah alone. God's salvation they should love. "The LORD be magnified," they should continually say. To rejoice in Jehovah, and be glad in His God, is what He desires for them, and trust in the Lord, encouraged in others by the knowledge of His deliverance, is the, wish of His heart. This should be the result of true ministry, and it is what He looks for. Differing from all other ministers who speak of a work done and proclaim God as the righteous One and the Giver of all good likewise, He, who was in Himself God's gift, and did the work in which we rest, and because of which we give thanks to God, yet seeks not to draw attention to Himself, but turns all hearts to God. Thus the character of Christ's ministry, the consequences of it to Himself, and the spirit which actuated Him, are brought out by the instrumentality of the inspired penman.
A few remarks in conclusion. In Psalm 16 we meet with an atmosphere unruffled. Here we read of opposition and hatred which pursued Him to death; for the former Psalm gives us His walk in communion with God; this latter, His service for God among men. Thus both Psalms are needed to show us what the Lord Jesus Christ was when upon earth. The former acquaints us with that which was within Him—this, with that which was around Him. Psalm 16 shows us how to walk—this, how to serve, our example in both being Him who when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously (1 Pet. 2:23); and for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down on the right hand of the throne of God (Heb. 12:2); receiving a title of which He is indeed worthy, "The leader and the perfecter of faith," (W.K. trans.) a title descriptive of Him, and suggestive to us.
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 4 - Psalm 102
Chapter 4—Psalm 102
"A Prayer of the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed" (or exhausted) "and poureth out his complaint before the LORD," is the title in the Hebrew prefixed to this Psalm.
A peculiarity about this should be noticed. It is not uncommon to meet with a title affixed to a Psalm, recounting some special circumstances under which it was written. Psalm 3; 7; 18; 30; 34; 51; 52; 54; 56; 57; 59; 60; 63, and 142 are examples of this; but in each case they refer to some incident in the life of David which furnished an occasion for the utterance of his heart. And though there are in the book Psalms of Asaph, of Heman, and of Ethan, and one by Moses, yet the only composer, whose circumstances are stated as having called forth any of these inspired compositions, is David, the type of the Lord Jesus as God's Anointed, suffering from others before being seated firmly on his throne.
In the Psalm before us, however, while we have the circumstances stated under which it was composed, the name of the afflicted one, with whose trials we are hereby made acquainted, is withheld from us. The question then might be asked, Was the name withheld by accident or by design? By design we must surely agree, for not until the Epistle to the Hebrews was written, was it (we may well believe) generally known to whom the Psalm referred. Then the ellipsis could be filled up with the name of the suffering one, who is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ, God over all, blessed forever. Who penned the Psalm by the direct guidance of the Holy Ghost, or what were the peculiar trials of the writer under which this divine effusion was poured forth, we shall never know while on earth.
At what epoch or at what place the sacred penman put on record these wonderful words, are questions we must leave undetermined; and though they are the expressions of an individual that we have not before our eyes, we can very intelligently peruse them by the light cast on the subject from the Epistle to the Hebrews.
This brings out a very interesting point in connection with the structure of the Word of God; namely, the existence of latent truth—truth not apparent on the surface, yet really in the text, which when brought out, all can see was actually there. At times passages of Scripture are applied to individuals and to events with which they have no direct connection. We have an instance in the application by Matthew (chapter 2:17, 18) of Jeremiah's words in chapter 31:15 of his prophecy. Then was fulfilled, says the evangelist, the prophet's words with reference to the sorrow caused by the Babylonish captivity; not indeed that Jeremiah predicted what Matthew relates, but the evangelist could apply the language of the son of Hilkiah to the general sorrow caused by the massacre of the infants in Bethlehem.
It is not, however, any accommodation of our Psalm to a purpose foreign to its original intention, which its use in Hebrews suggests; but it is the true meaning of it, which its real Author, the Holy Ghost, there brings out. It is God quoting His own word to bring out the original thought contained in it. If we read the Psalm without the divine explanation, we should say that there was but one speaker throughout it; when we see the bearing of the quotation in Heb. 1, we learn that there are two. From vv. 1-23 is the utterance of the one, the afflicted one; from v. 24 to the end is the response of the other; and from Hebrews we learn that both the one and the other are the Lord God of hosts. Jehovah addresses Jehovah. "I said, 0 My God, take Me not away in the midst of My days: Thy years are throughout all generations," are the words of entreaty from Jehovah as man, addressing the Lord in heaven. "Of old hast Thou laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the works of Thy hands," etc., are the words of Jehovah in heaven in response to Jehovah on earth, acknowledging that the afflicted One who cries, is indeed the Creator of the universe. Without the quotation in the Hebrews we never should have guessed this. With it, all is clear, and the amazing grace and real humiliation of the Lord Jesus Christ is brought out to us.
For, let us remark, He is not here called God's Son, but Jehovah Himself God witnesses of it; God addresses Him as such. He who will not give His glory to another, here admits the eternal existence and creative power of the virgin's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. We are not turned to His works to see who He must be; we stand by and listen to Jehovah's own statement to Him, and hear the wonderful announcement that the afflicted One upon earth is really Jehovah of hosts. A mystery which none can solve, we have here revealed; but though an insoluble mystery, it is a simple truth which we must accept. To explain it is beyond our power; to accept it is the duty of every creature. God owns Him to be God, who could say in truth, “O My God."
Does it seem strange that Jehovah should address Jehovah? We have something analogous to this both in Gen. 19:24 and 1 Sam. 3:21. In the former passage, Jehovah, we read, rained down fire and brimstone from Jehovah out of heaven. In the latter, Jehovah, by the word of Jehovah, revealed Himself to Samuel: Does it appear strange that the Lord Jesus, if Jehovah, should be called the afflicted One? He thus styles Himself in Psalm 40:17. That He is Jehovah, God asserts; that He is in affliction, God declares.
Thus in this Psalm we have the divine and human natures of the Lord Jesus distinctly proclaimed. Distinct they are from one another, but united in one Person; for the One who tells out His affliction, is declared on the highest authority to be the self-existing One. His deity none but God could declare, for who besides God could reveal His eternal existence? His manhood, with death before Him, He sets forth One sees the propriety of this, and it is just what we meet with in Hebrews. In chapter 1 God affirms His deity, and in chapter 2 Christ bears witness to His own humanity. In the former chapter God tells us about His Son, for God alone could pronounce as to His divine essence. In the latter, He speaks in the quotations to God, and thus gives evidence of the reality of His human nature.
He looks forward to death in this Psalm as we have seen in others also. But here we must mark a great difference. In Psalm 16 we see Him looking to be brought up out of death; in Psalm 40 we learn that He has been delivered—raised up from the dead. But here, while we have Him contemplating death, we have nothing from Him about His future—nothing about resurrection. Viewed as a man we can see the reason for this. Man's proper portion is on earth; so the earthly hopes, the earthly blessings, are all that we have here depicted—those hopes and blessings of which death deprives all those over whom it has power. Viewed as Jehovah, we can see another reason for this. Jehovah abides; therefore resurrection would be quite out of place in a Psalm which sets forth Christ's deity. As man, as Messiah, we have the Lord brought before us. "Thou hast lifted Me up," refers to His Messiahship. Thou hast "cast Me down," shows what He has to expect in accordance with Daniel's prediction, to be cut off, and to have nothing (Dan. 9:26, margin).
What this was to Him we now get set forth. "My days are like a shadow that declineth" (lit., stretched out to nearly its full length); "and I am" (or shall be) "withered like grass." Yet He had not reached the full term allotted to man upon earth, for He adds, "He weakened My strength in the way; He shortened My days"; and turning to Jehovah, cries, "O My God, take Me not away in the midst of My days: Thy years are throughout all generations." With His feelings as a man we are thus made acquainted, for, really a man, He could feel, and did feel all that man, as man, should feel under the circumstances in which He was placed in grace to us. A sinner dreads death because of the consequences to him after it. A saint may rejoice be cause of what is beyond it. But man, as man, can only view it as the Lord here does—the cutting off of His days—akin to Hezekiah's feelings, who expressed himself in a similar manner (Isa. 38:10).
We read in Phil. 2:7 that the Lord Jesus made Himself of no reputation (or, emptied Him self), and humbled Himself; the former was manifested in His be coming a man, as a servant subject to God; the latter was displayed in His submitting to death—the death of the cross. Both of these, but especially the first, are exemplified in this Psalm. He emptied Himself—how truly, how fully. Though He is the Lord Jehovah, of whose creative and sustaining power the universe bears witness, He was found as a man upon earth, crying in His affliction to Jehovah. All man's feelings He could and did enter into; and the effect of intense mental suffering, the Word tells us, He learned by experience (Luke 22:44).
Here He describes how His affliction acted on His bodily frame (vss. 3-5), a condition to which man may be subject—to be pitied, yet not to be wondered at; but when it is of the Lord Himself that we read it, we may wonder indeed. Added to all this, He was reproached by His enemies, who were banded together against Him (vs. 8). Nothing then is before Him but death, and that the death of the cross; for though atonement is not the subject of which the Psalm treats, the reason why He was to be cut off is stated (vs. 10). Thus He emptied Himself, and He humbled Himself. He stooped to be a man, and was to die the death of the meanest of men. To this He here looks forward, not as a contingency, but as a certainty.
Thus feeling about it as none but a man could feel, His perfection as man appears in a twofold way. He receives it all as from Jehovah, and is occupied with God's thoughts about the future, as regards the earth, Zion, and the world.
He must die, but it is God who takes Him away (v. 24). He must pass off this scene by His enemies persecuting Him to death, but He regards this as Jehovah's doing (v. 10). Facing death as He here does, He speaks, as has been observed, of nothing about Himself beyond it. Seen upon earth once, when He entered death He passed off it, and the world saw Him no more. "Withered like grass." Born into this world a king (Luke 2:11), saluted as such in His infancy (Matt. 2), proclaimed as such by the multitude on His public entry into Jerusalem (Luke 19:38; Matt. 21:5), death seems to have cut short all hopes founded on His Messiahship (Luke 24:21), and effectually to have barred against Him the way to the throne. "Cut off, having nothing," fitly described Him.
Perfect as a man, He is not engrossed with this, but looks forward to what saints will witness and enjoy upon earth after His decease. Death then is not here contemplated for those who shall witness what He describes, and enjoy what He predicts. "I am withered like grass," He says of Himself "But Thou, O LORD, shalt endure forever; and Thy remembrance [or memorial] unto all generations," is His statement about the Lord God of hosts. This at once introduces a sketch of God's plans about Zion, the earth, the destitute, the world, and all who belong to it.
What are those plans upon which He can dwell, to be carried out after His decease? They are far-reaching and comprehensive. The heathen and all the kings of the earth will be concerned in them. Nations and kingdoms will find that they affect them. Zion must be rebuilt, her desolate condition must be reversed, and the Lord must appear in His glory. Then too will it be seen that Jehovah regards the prayer of the destitute, and does not despise their prayer; for the afflicted, persecuted remnant of His people shall rest again finally in their land and in Jerusalem.
But how can this be secured if the enemies of the righteous can make war against them upon earth, and even Messiah Himself be cut off? Upon what ground can they hope that objects and purposes so opposed to this world's interests can ever triumph and be made good? Can righteousness ever gain the ascendancy in a sphere where self-interest is the ruling passion, and hostility to God the prevailing feature? What answer does the Psalm make to this? It does give a complete answer; and what an answer it surely is! All the future rests upon Jehovah's nature and character; "Thou, 0 LORD, shalt endure forever." Upon this is based by the afflicted One the certainty of the fulfillment of the Word.
Generations may pass but Jehovah abides. Man goes away, but God never changes. To Him then He looks to fulfill all the prophecies about Zion and the world. He, as a man, would be cut off, but Zion's hopes would not fail, for Jehovah ever remains. Let the wicked then triumph as they may—let Satan seem all-powerful—Jehovah's nature assures the saints that not one of His words shall fail of its accomplishment. Of men we may have to speak in the past; as regards their connection with earth, "they have been." Of Jehovah we can always speak in the present—"He is." If we think of the future—"He will be." Therefore He will fulfill His Word. Upon this, His eternal existence, as a rock which time cannot disintegrate, nor the waves of man's opposition uproot, earth's future and Zion's sure blessing can and do rest. What ground this is to take up! He who has pledged His Word will never pass away. So His purpose, who is ever-existing and almighty, shall assuredly be established. This is a consideration full of comfort for the godly, but most solemn for the ungodly.
On Jehovah's immutability and nature His people can lean; and to point this out as equally true for future generations, these words were written (vv. 17-20). Solemn as this consideration surely is, it becomes intensely solemn when we learn who that One is who cries in His affliction, and speaks of the malice of His enemies. He is Jehovah Himself, as we have seen; and God answers His appeal by declaring (that all may be acquainted with it) His eternal existence, and the mighty power of Him whom man despised and even abhorred. Heaven and earth may pass away, but He is, and His years have no end.
What then must those expect who, having crucified Him, refused afterward to believe on Him? What too milk those have before them who persistently stand out against Him? Where He has been dishonored, there will He act in power; and Jerusalem, which witnessed His crucifixion, will rejoice in the exercise of His goodness and avenging power. What will His enemies then receive? On this the Psalm is silent, being beyond its scope. The portion of the children Of His servants, a portion to be enjoyed upon earth, it does relate: "The children of Thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before Thee." But of nothing beyond earth does it take cognizance. What a change will then take place! He died; His enemies survived. He will reappear in power and great glory; the children of His servants will rejoice and be blest, while His enemies will be—where? Other scriptures tell us their then condition, and their future portion (Rev. 19:21; 20:5, 12-15).
Balaam, looking forward to the future, exclaimed, "Alas, who shall live when God doeth this! He asked a question which was not given to him to answer. To us the answer has been made known.
None of those who now believe on the Lord Jesus Christ will be living upon the earth when He comes to reign; they were caught up previously to meet Him in the air, and will come with Him and behold from above the afflicted One in heavenly glory and power (1 Thess. 4:17; Zech. 14:5; Rev. 19:14).
There is a resurrection unto life, which will be a completed act when He begins to reign. There will be a resurrection unto judgment for the ungodly dead at the close of it (Rev. 20:4, 5, 12, 13).
All who share not in the former must have to do with the latter; and the lake of fire, the second death, must be their portion forever and ever.
This solemn question having been answered so clearly from the Word, why should any, who have the opportunity of sharing in the portion of God's saints, exclude themselves from it? The number of the heavenly saints is still incomplete; the house furnished for the feast is not yet full; and the Lord, by His servants, is still beseeching souls to enter while there is room.
Will those then left behind on earth after the Church has been removed behold these things of which the Psalm speaks? Some will, but none, we believe, will be among that number, who, once having had the offer of God's grace, have resisted it. For of all such, who shall be on earth when He returns to it in power, we read, they "shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power; when He shall come to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all them that believe" (2 Thess. 1:9, 10; 2:12). Will such have another chance? Scripture is clear. Those who share not in the first resurrection at the commencement of His reign will only be raised up for judgment at its close.
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 5 - Psalm 22
Chapter 5—Psalm 22
"Because of Thine indignation and Thy wrath" are words uttered by the Lord in Psalm 102, with reference to the reason of His death. How they can be reconciled with what He deserved, as His walk and His ministry show, Psalm 22 clears up. On the cross He bore God's wrath, but as the sinner's substitute.
That this Psalm treats of Him, the sin-bearer, who died upon the cross to make atonement, the New Testament makes plain. The first words of it were uttered by Him upon the cross, when for the first and last time they were used in all their fullness. The language of the eighth verse was the language of the chief priests to Him as He hung in agony on the tree, unconscious that they only made themselves the mouthpiece to express what David beforehand had declared the Lord's enemies would say. The action described in verse 18, we are expressly told, was fulfilled at the foot of the cross, when the soldiers parted His garments among them, and for His vesture, woven without seam, they cast lots. The first part of verse 22 was accomplished by the Lord Himself on the day of His resurrection, the historical account of which John gives us, and the doctrinal teaching of which the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews brings out to us (John 20:17; Heb. 2:12). None, with these facts before them, can doubt of whom the Psalm speaks—no, nor who it is who speaks throughout it; for one Person only, can we say, here speaks for the instruction of God's saints. He, who cries out at the beginning, leads the praises of the redeemed in verses 22-25. He before whose eye the soldiers divided the garments, and whom the chief priests derided with their taunts, describes the grand results for Jehovah which would accrue from His death upon the cross. It was proper, we must admit, that the Lord Jesus should Himself proclaim to men and the universe the glorious results of His agony and death.
What a condition was that to which Messiah, God's well-beloved Son, stooped! God's saints can find comfort in the remembrance, if called to suffer for the truth, that they have part in the sufferings of Christ (2 Cor. 1:5; Col. 1:24; 1 Pet. 4:13); but He had to say that in one respect, in suffering for God, He stood alone. "They trusted," He says of saints at a former epoch, "and Thou didst deliver them... But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised of the people." It was indeed so when servants of the chief priests buffeted Him, and soldiers of the Roman governor mocked Him. He was made an object of contempt and ridicule for the multitude—every feeling of a man outraged, every right of a man violated. These were ingredients in that cup in which bodily suffering was added to mental trial.
Besides all this, and far deeper than all these sufferings, He experienced what no human language can portray, for no human thought can conceive the agony which drew from His lips the cry with which the Psalm opens, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" Here, and only here, in the whole Bible, have we any clue to what He must have passed through when dealt with by God as the sinner's substitute; yet it is but a feeble clue after all, for the negative manner of expressing His greatest suffering cannot convey to our minds the positive agony that He then underwent. Just enough is conveyed by the words to teach us that those sufferings were inexpressible, and inconceivable by man, though real, and really borne. For it was not as anticipating something which lay in His path, that He uttered that cry on the cross; but, as having already experienced it, He thus cried out. The extent, intensity, and character of His sufferings, men knew nothing about till just at their close.
Of both suffering from God in making atonement, and suffering from man, the Psalm speaks, but in markedly different terms. Of the former the Lord has to say, "So far from helping Me." Of the latter He cried, "Be not Thou far from Me, O LORD: O My strength, haste Thee to help Me." v. 19. He sought no respite from sufferings needful to be endured to make atonement; He asked deliverance from sufferings from men who took advantage of His condition in grace, and received it. The Lord heard Him and delivered Him. From what formed no needful part of the momentous work He came to perform, He asked for help, and, we learned, received it; but from that which could, not be averted, if God's will was to he done, and man's salvation to be secured, He shrank not, nor received relief.
"That all was done, that all was borne,
Thine agony, Thy cross, can tell."
The Psalm then divides itself into two parts in verse 21. Throughout the first part we meet with turmoil, discord, rage, and enmity—men attempting and accomplishing all they desired, in putting Him out of the world who was the object of their unrelenting hatred. In the second part we meet with an atmosphere of peace and blessedness. Throughout the first part the Lord is passive, suffering from God, and from His creatures; throughout the second He is active. Men's thoughts, motives, and desires are disclosed in what they did to Him. His thoughts and actions are told out in His own words. But, though in the second part all is peace and quietness, there is no silence. The din of this world's discord had been heard when He hung on the tree, beset by the bulls of Bashan, and taunted in His bodily agony by those who professed to be leaders and teachers in Israel.
All that quieted down by the death of the object of their hatred, the noise of men's opposition -giving-way to the wailing of the women and others who lamented Him. Night set in, and the darkest day which the world had ever seen became a thing of the past. His enemies returned to their homes and to their families, to resume, when the Sabbath was past and the feast was ended, their wonted occupations. His body was laid in the tomb, the stone rolled to the door, and all seemed secure. The guard of soldiers kept watch over the grave of Israel's Messiah. Men had done all they could, pursued Him to the latest hour of His life on earth, and only stopped because death effectually barred all further action against Him.
The silence which ensued on His death He first broke, and thereby showed what was in His heart. "I will declare Thy name unto My brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise Thee." Not a word of judgment, not a thought of vengeance, only love, and a desire for God to be known, we learn, then occupied His thoughts. Love was manifested in thinking of others, and the desire to make God known was expressed in the resolution to praise Him openly. "Both He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare Thy name unto My brethren," (Heb. 2:11, 12) tells us what the Psalm does not—something of the personal excellence of Him who hung upon that cross. "All of one"; that is, one lot or company, as men, He is not ashamed to call them brethren. Marvelous grace, that such a statement should be made in God's Word, connecting together those who were otherwise wide as the poles asunder-the Sanctifier and the sanctified. He first declared it, and the Holy Ghost, by the Apostle, enlarged on it. It is not, however, universal brotherhood, embracing all the race, that we here read about. Such a tenet is foreign to Scripture, and only betrays gross ignorance as to God's nature and man's condition. This brotherhood is only predicated of the Sanctifier and the sanctified—terms suggestive of man's condition by nature, which needs that he should be sanctified, as well as of the nature of Him who sanctifies those otherwise unsanctified; for, what a mere man, however holy, could never effect, He does, and provides that they should know it at the earliest possible opportunity.
On earth, before the cross, He had proclaimed in what close relationship to Himself He would regard all those who heard and did God's will (Luke 8:21). To His disciples He had said that He was their Master, and all they were brethren (Matt. 23:8). Now, after His resurrection, He first addressed them as His brethren, being not ashamed thus to describe them. To Mary first (John 20:17), then to the company of women returning in haste from the sepulcher to announce the Lord's resurrection (Matt. 28:10), He entrusted a message to His brethren. To whom were they to deliver it? What class of people could this be? They all knew without a doubt, and carried the message without hesitation to His disciples, who now were His brethren. At that time, therefore, there were those on earth whom He thus owned, and the women recognized them as such. Are there any still? Thank God there are. For all who hearken to God's Word are born of God, and are of that class styled by the Lord as His brethren.
Found on earth in the company of the saints (Psalm 16), acknowledging a common position with them even after His resurrection (Psalm 40), He here announces that they stand in the closest relationship with Him, for His Father is their Father; His God is their God. As God's Son from all eternity, He might have said, "My Father and your Father," without any implication (doctrinally) of having taken human nature; but as a man born of the virgin, He adds, "My God and your God." Between Him and the saints the difference is immense, and must ever remain so; but the relation to God is similar. His words tell of a distinction while declaring the relationship -My Father, My God, your Father, your God.
Now that the relationship is confessed, and the saints declared to be His brethren, we learn what He would make known. He would tell God's name to them. His public ministry ceased when the Jews finally determined to crucify Him. But death and resurrection could not separate Him from His brethren. On the very day that He rose, He was found in their company in Jerusalem. The doors were shut for fear of the Jews, but this could not hinder intercourse between Him and His own. He stood in their midst and taught them the fulfillment, by His death, of the written Word of God. None but His disciples did He then, or afterward, own as the saints of God, or the assembly of God.. The Jews had cast Him out; but outside of Judaism, and apart from the temple ritual, in the room where His disciples assembled, He was found. A company, whom the chief priests and scribes, with the Pharisees and Sadducees would disown, He acknowledged, and to them He declared God's name; that is, what He is, evidenced by what He says and does. The Jews thought they knew about God; His name, however, was to be declared by Christ, and that only to His own brethren. That company, to be afterward known as the sect everywhere spoken against, had a special interest for Him, and has still. To those composing it, He declared what God is; that is, His name. And besides this, in their midst, the only congregation which God could then, as now, own, He was to praise God. How contrary was all this to men's thoughts! Those who seemed but fit subjects for the executioner's weapon, unworthy to live, to proscribe whom and to persecute whom even unto strange cities was an act, it was thought, well pleasing to God, these were the only people, after the Lord's resurrection, among whom He would be found, and to whom He would declare or tell cut God's name. "Away with such a fellow from the earth: for it is not fit that He should live" (Acts 22:22), lets us into the thoughts of the Jews about the disciples of the Lord Jesus. And yet it was to this class alone that the Lord Jesus here says He would address Him self, and among them strike the keynote of praise.
The songs of Zion might resound through the temple courts, but the keynote of praise, to which God could now hearken, was struck elsewhere. First struck by the risen Savior, it has never yet died out. From age to age, from country to country, has this song of praise spread, and heaven itself will forever ring with the full, rich melody flowing forth from each one, and the unbroken harmony of countless voices uniting in praise to God and to the Lamb. In the Church, an assembly gathered on new ground apart from Jewish ordinances, the true note of praise was first raised by Him, who came from God and went to God. Praise for the heavenly people was rightly started by Him who belongs to heaven. At the Red Sea, Moses and the children of Israel, with Miriam and the women with their tumbrels, praised God for their deliverance. In this Psalm, He who is Jehovah, as man, leads the songs of the redeemed.
There is a reason for this. He has suffered and has been delivered; therefore He can sing, leading His people in their songs of worship, because of God's mercy and God's delivering power. As having experienced it, He can sing of it, and thus teach His people the suited language to use before God. He states in Psalm 40 that His deliverance would be an encouragement to others; in Psalm 102, God's answering the prayer of the destitute is to be instruction for a future generation; but in Psalm 22, it is not encouragement for others, nor instruction for a future age, but the suited language for God's saints now, that He would illustrate by His own example.
The deliverer has been Himself delivered; their Savior has known God's salvation for Himself (v. 24). His song, therefore, His people can join in. But here we are taken beyond Judaism to the sheep outside the fold-the two flocks, as we know elsewhere, now made one, composed of believers from among the Jews and from among the Gentiles. Into depths greater than they have ever sunk, Christ has gone down, and from them has been brought up, the witness to them that God answers prayer; the witness, too, by His resurrection, of the perfect acceptance of that work because of which He had to cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?"
But a time is coming when the praises, led by Him, of the congregation of God's saints, as at present owned by God, will cease to be heard upon earth. Caught up to he with the Lord in heaven, their place and their service will he found no more on this globe. Will praise on earth then forever cease? No; Israel will again be brought forward as God's earthly people, and praise will ascend from the godly remnant of them, manifested as the people that Jehovah has formed for Himself. Who will lead them in praise? The Psalm answers this question. Christ will do it. Again will He strike a keynote, and God's earthly people will respond to it: "My praise shall be of Thee in the great congregation: I will pay My vows before them that fear Him." v. 25. He alone has been in circumstances similar to those they will pass through; but having gone down into death for them, died "for that nation" (John 11:51), their deliverance is secured, who will have experienced a trial similar to His, anticipating the outpouring of God's wrath-in their case deserved, in His case endured as the substitute and the sin offering.
That we are here on the ground of the earthly people is clear, for the next verse (the consequence of what is celebrated in verse 25) tells of the meek eating and being satisfied, which will only take place when the Lord appears to reign. Contrast verse 26 with verse 24. In the latter we have the consequences of the Lord's deliverance, which saints now can share in. In the former we have what will only he made good to those who shall inherit the earth. Then follows the full result as it effects the whole globe:
"All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before Thee. For the kingdom is the LORD'S: and He is the governor among the nations. All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship: all they that go down to the dust shall bow before Him: and none can keep alive his own soul. A seed shall serve Him; it shall be accounted to the LORD for a generation. They shall come, and shall declare His righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that He hath done this."
Thus the counsels of God about the kingdom will be made good; and in this Psalm, which shows us the depths into which the King in His grace descended, we have announced the certain and full accomplishment of all that God has purposed about this earth. Dying on the cross, all might appear lost; so here, where the former is set forth, the latter is also reaffirmed. Not one thing has failed, Joshua could say. "Not one thing shall fail," we can add. All will be done, the kingdom be Jehovah's, and His Son be the King, who is Jehovah; for "the word of our God shall stand forever."
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 6 - Psalm 110
Chapter 6—Psalm 110
Two aspects of the Lord's death, as delineated in the Psalms, we have briefly looked at; namely, Messiah cut off and having nothing (102); and the Lord making atonement, and its results (22). His resurrection, looked forward to in Psalm 16, is regarded as an accomplished fact in Psalm 40, and His service consequent on it is predicted in Psalm 22. Now we have, a further step in God's revelation about His King, and we learn where He is at present. For, while Psalm 22 takes us back in thought to the past and onward to the future—that is, what has happened and what will happen on this globe—Psalm 110 speaks only of the present and future, and so takes us upward in thought to the Lord's present place at Jehovah's right hand in heaven.
Accustomed, as many perhaps have been, to read the Psalms as isolated compositions, complete each one in itself, they may not have noticed what every student of the Word should mark—that the book is not a collection of odes strung together haphazardly, without reason or method. Each
Psalm has its place in relation to the whole collection, from which, if it were displaced, the symmetry of this divinely ordered book would be marred, and the connecting thread perhaps broken. We may not be able in all cases to trace the connection, but attention to the order and subjects of the different books of the volume (for the whole collection is divided in the original into five books: 1-41; 42-72; 73-89; 90-106; 107-150) and to many of the Psalms in these different books, reveals a plan and an arrangement which has not, perhaps, been commonly suspected. By whom the collection was thus arranged, we are not informed; nor do we know by whom each Psalm was composed.
In places we meet with a series of Psalms taking up a certain line; for example, 44-48; 93-100; 120-134. At other times we have an arrangement inverting what would have seemed the natural order of the subjects, as where Psalms celebrating the Lord's triumphs precede those which make special mention of His sufferings and death; for example, 21 and 22; 68 and 69; 93-100 and 102. In the case of the Psalm before us, we have an example of a different class, its subject being the proper sequel to the thoughts brought out in Psalm 109. In the former we read of the Lord being persecuted by Judas, whose punishment is then predicted. In Psalm 110 we meet with God's answer to man's opposition to His own well beloved Son. Peter applies Psalm 109:8 to Judas, in Acts 1, though others besides him are clearly spoken of as persecuting the righteous One (vv. 20, 25). The same Apostle quotes Psalm 110 in Acts 2 as prophetic of the Lord Jesus, to whom alone it can be applied.
On different occasions in the New Testament is this Psalm applied to the Lord. The Jews evidently owned that it did speak of the Messiah, for when the Lord appealed to its language as pointing to the irresistible conclusion that the Christ must be greater than David, though descended from him after the flesh, His reference to it met with no disclaimer on their part (Matt. 22:42-46). On the day of Pentecost, Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost, applied it to the Lord Jesus, lately crucified, and then risen and ascended (Acts 2:34-36). Paul, when writing to the Hebrews, makes great use of it in reference to the Lord's Person (1:13), His work (10:12, 13), and His present service (5:6; 6:20; 7:17, 21, 28). Of Him then, and of Him alone, it speaks; for who, besides Him, could sit on Jehovah's throne?
Here should be noticed a feature different from any met with in the Psalms already taken up. In each of them the Lord is introduced as a speaker, and in two of them (16, 22) He is the only one. Here He is silent. Not a word, not a whisper, do we read of, that escapes His lips—in perfect keeping with the character of the Psalm, and the place the Lord is here described as occupying. It was fitting that, as Man in humiliation, He should speak to God. It becomes man to do so. It is right that His exaltation should be proclaimed by Jehovah. So God addresses Him, gives Him His place, and by an oath confirms to Him an everlasting priesthood. But, though the Lord Jesus is silent throughout the Psalm, others are not. David, by the Spirit, speaks of Him and to Him (5.7; 2-4). The propriety of this we can all see. "God also hath highly exalted Him" (Phil. 2:9), therefore He reveals it, and men should own it, learning from God, through His Word, what is the only suited place now, in the whole universe, for Him who hung on the cross.
What an answer this is to men's treatment of Christ! They crucified the Lord of glory; Jehovah has placed Him at His side. The One rejected by the world occupies the highest place in heavenly glory. His session there proclaims that He is not an angel (Heb. 1:13). He is, He must be, Jehovah, the Eternal One; for of none but Him who is God could it be written, "The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit Thou at My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool." This is a startling fact in more ways than one, for it tells us of His Person, of His work, and of God's counsels.
1. His Person as divine is thus clearly announced, for no mere creature could ever fill such a place. God will not give His glory to another. No creature could ever sit there by divine appointment. On earth, as Psalm 109 depicts, He was poor and needy, the sport of men, the object on which they vented their rage, and one to whom they pointed with the finger of scorn. But no place is too high for Him to fill, who was cradled in a manger, and whose body was laid in that rock hewn tomb. As God, of course nothing could be added to Him; He only returned to the glory He had with the Father before the world was (John 17:5). As man, He is where man never was before, and Peter quotes this Psalm when speaking of Him as man (Acts 2:34.36). God, therefore, and Man He is. Were He not God, He could not be there. But He who is Man is there -the Man Christ Jesus, made Lord and Christ. As Son of God from all eternity, He sits at the Father's right hand; as man, He has been exalted by the right hand of God (Acts 2:33).
2. As to His atoning work, Paul shows us how this Psalm applies. The Lord has sat down, therefore all ministry at the altar and before the mercy-seat with His blood has ended. His position, now seated, declares this, in contrast to the daily standing of the priests at their ministrations in the ' tabernacle, offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which could never take away sins. But Christ "after He had offered one sacrifice for sins, forever [for a continuance] sat down on the right hand of God; from henceforth expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. For by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." Heb. 10:1; 2 -14. God raised Him from the dead, in token that He accepted Him as the sacrifice; He has sat down, the proof that it has done all that was required. No man, indeed, has seen Him in this position; but Scripture reveals it to us for the joy of our hearts and the establishment of our souls.
3. His present place tells us also of God's counsels. They are unchangeable. The princes of this world in their ignorance crucified the Lord of glory (1 Cor. 2:8; Acts 3:17). God has placed Him by His side, a testimony, indeed, as we have seen, to His Person and to His work—a witness also of the sure accomplishment of the divine counsels. For seated there, until His enemies be made His footstool, tells us for what He waits, a fact needful for all to be acquainted with; for, though absent from the earth for a time, He will yet be firmly established in the kingdom, and rule all nations with a rod of iron. Seated there by God's decree, it is clear that Jehovah has espoused His cause, and as this verse tells us will make good His dominion. God will one day make His enemies His footstool. Do men really believe this? Is the truth of the Lord's present place one to which men in their hearts subscribe?
To be indifferent to Christ argues indifference to God and to His counsels; to be unconcerned about the Lord Jesus must be folly; to oppose Him must be madness. Jehovah has publicly declared that He will make His enemies His footstool. It is not then a kingdom simply that God promises to Him—a dominion which none subject to it can overturn—but that those who have refused to acknowledge Him, and will forever remain opposed to Him in heart, must one day be completely subject to His sway—made His footstool. How complete will be their subjection then! Divine power will make the knee to bend, when the heart has obstinately refused to bow under a sense of His grace. For if such is His present place and future prospect, now at God's right hand, and by and by to be installed in His own kingdom by divine power, what must be His grace and love which moved Him, in obedience to His Father's wish, to become a man, to die for sinners. It is as we learn the excellence of His Person that we discover more of the greatness of His grace.
"From henceforth expecting till His enemies be made His footstool" is the comment of the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, as inspired by the Holy Ghost: From the Psalm we learn God's mind, from the Hebrews the Lord's expectation. Thus at the earliest moment, as it were, after He whom man had rejected had been accepted by God on high, was the unchanging purpose of the divine mind, with respect to the kingdom, declared. His enemies; will be made His footstool. Jehovah will do this for Him. With this stated at the outset, the Psalm proceeds to set forth some features characteristic of that time, showing that all on earth even will not be subject at heart, though all must outwardly acknowledge His sway. "The LORD shall send the rod of Thy strength out of Zion: rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies." Then Zion will be the seat of government, and in the midst of His enemies will the Lord rule. Observe, we read nothing of the extermination of all His enemies, for He will rule in their midst. Blessing there will be in that day—outward blessing for all—yet some will remain unchanged in heart, and be fitly described as His enemies.
It is true, all acts of evil will summarily be dealt with, but an iron hand will be required to keep in check man's otherwise unruly will. "Rule Thou in the midst of Thine enemies" gives us a clue to the condition of things that will then be in existence on earth. In conformity with this, we read elsewhere of the children of the stranger yielding feigned obedience (Psalm 18:44; 66:3 margin), and are told of the great outbreak of evil after the thousand years shall have run their course, when the devil will be let loose to deceive the nations. Man's heart, unless acted on by grace, will be just what it is now, when the Lord reigns, though it will lack the power, and in a great measure the opportunity, of doing as it pleases. To this, the dark side, there is however, a bright one. His people (for He will have one) will be willing in the day of His power, offering themselves willingly for His work, as some of the children of Israel did in the day of Sisera's defeat. These He will make use of, wherewith to chastise His and their enemies (Zech. 12:4-8; 9:13; Mic. 5:8-9), endowed as they will then be with the energy of youth.
4. In connection with the conquest to be effected by His people, something further is related, carrying us back in thought to the days of Abraham, the conqueror of the northern power of that day, which, with confederate kings, invaded the land of Canaan and carried Lot captive. Returning from the smiting of the kings (for the term in Hebrew, as well as in Greek, does not of necessity mean slaughter), Melchizedek, King of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met him with bread and wine (that is, with what sustains and gives joy) and blessed him (Gen. 14:18-20). In this Psalm, in which we have Israel conquering under Christ, we meet for the first time again with a notice of such a priesthood, conferred, we read, on the Lord Jesus, by the oath of God, and which will be exercised in the day of His power after the example of Melchizedek in the days of Abraham, who blessed Abraham, and blessed also the Most High God, thus taking a middle place between them, as surely He who is both God and man can take between Jehovah and Israel, Abraham's offspring. After Abraham's victory, Melchizedek thus met him. After His people shall be willing, in the day of His power, will the Lord, priest on His throne, be seen in the exercise of the Melchizedek character of priesthood.
The Aaronic character of priesthood has to do with the sanctuary, the Melchizedek character with the kingdom. The Psalm, however, speaks not of the Melchizedek character, but of the Melchizedek order of priesthood; nor does it speak of it as a future event, but as an established thing. "Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek." So, while the history of Gen. 14 throws light on the abrupt mention of the Melchizedek priesthood in this Psalm, the Epistle to the Hebrews explains to us the force of the word "order" as used here in connection with it. The Lord's enemies subdued, His people victorious, He, priest on His throne, will bless them, the counsel of peace being between Jehovah and Himself (Zech. 6:13). Now God's people need the exercise of a priesthood Aaronic in character, but Melchizedek in order; then, resting under His protection, all wilderness troubles over, all conflicts ended, like Abraham returning with the spoil, Israel will be able to enjoy the Melchizedek character of His priesthood, with which He will then manifest that He has been clothed by divine appointment.
But will this condition of things endure? The word "order" suggests its continuance, for, as Melchizedek had no successor, neither will the Lord. He "abideth a priest continually" is the divine comment on Melchizedek. He "hath an unchangeable priesthood" is the divine statement about the Lord. Priest after that order implies no successor—a pledge of abiding blessing for Israel—a word of comfort too for God's people now, who, while needing a priesthood to be exercised on their behalf, Aaronic in character, need also one that cannot fail; in other words, one after the order of Melchizedek. The little word "order" in connection with Melchizedek (whether in the sanctuary or on the throne) suggests a priesthood that does not terminate by the appointment of a successor, thus insuring to those concerned in it all the blessing and comfort of a settled order, and of an intransmissible office.
His conquests having been declared, and His ruling among His enemies foretold, we read now of judgments to be meted out to the rebels in arms against God's authority. Of the wrath of Him who sits at God's right hand, Psalm 2 has made mention; of the manifestation of that wrath, this Psalm gives example (v. 5). And since it forms part of the fifth book of the volume, and the setting up of the kingdom and power has been celebrated in the fourth (93.100), we can understand why the past tense is used when these judgments are spoken of.
The psalmist recounts what God did for His Son after His rejection by the world, and what Christ has done, to whom the kingdom has been given. "The Lord at Thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of His wrath. He shall judge among the heathen [nations], He shall fill the places with the dead bodies; He shall wound the heads over many countries." This refers, perhaps, to Rev. 19:19-21. With mighty power, according to the standpoint of this Psalm, He has been seen to be endowed; for this divine composition views God's counsels as in process of fulfillment. We too read it as partly fulfilled, and partly to be fulfilled. Its place, however, in the volume, as well as its language, contemplates a further development, before the world, of God's plan than can not be effected while the Church is still down here. The conqueror, according to the terms used, has gone forth in power, and His people are willing in the day, which they here own has at last dawned upon earth, that of His power. All has not yet been done which must be done to clear the earth of unruly rebels. But He has taken that work in hand, and is effecting it surely. So, as engaged in it, we learn of His continued dependence on God, who has given such proof of His invincible might. "He shall drink of the brook in the way; therefore shall He lift up the head."
What a contrast the close of the Psalm presents to the beginning, only to be understood and the two ends to be harmonized, as we bow to the mystery of His Person, perfect God and perfect man, Immanuel, by whom all God's purposes about the universe will yet be made good!
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 7 - Psalm 45
Chapter 7—Psalm 45
From Psalms which speak in part of the past and present, we turn next to two which speak wholly of the future. The Lord's present place we learn from Psalm 110, and the deductions to be drawn from such a position, the New Testament opens out to us. There we are directed to a different subject—the reappearance in person of the Lord Jesus on the theater of these events, connected with His humiliation and death.
There is a peculiarity about Him in this respect that is predicated of no one else. In common with thousands, nay, myriads of God's saints, He passed away from this scene by death. But of Him alone it is revealed that, having gone out of the world by that door, He shall stand again in person upon this globe. When He returns to reign, His heavenly people will come with Him (Zech. 14:5; 1 Thess. 3:13), for seated as John saw Him in the vision, on a white horse, the armies of heaven will follow in His train (Rev. 19:11-14), and the saints of the high, or heavenly places, shall take the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever—even forever and ever (Dan. 7:18). But of none of the heavenly saints, who have gone down into death, is it predicted that they shall tread again on this earth. The Lord Jesus, however, will. On the Mount of Olives, from which, in the presence of His disciples, He went up to heaven, He will again stand; and, in keeping with the circumstances of that day, creation shall acknowledge, by commotion, the presence of her Creator and Lord (Zech. 14:4-5).
Man's place, after he has died, knows him no more. Not so with the Lord Jesus Christ. At Jerusalem He died; at Jerusalem shall He reappear; and the city of the great King shall welcome with acclamations His return in power, moved with a more real and deeper emotion than when the populace, on the occasion of his triumphant entry on the ass's colt, asked of the multitude, "Who is this?" Their question betrayed ignorance of what they ought to have known, and unconcern about Him, without whom their blessings can never be enjoyed. "Ye shall not see Me henceforth," said the Lord, apostrophizing Jerusalem, "till ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord." Concerned she will be then on His return, and will welcome it with gladness (Matt. 23:39), herself to be known henceforth by a new name, Jehovah Shammah; that is, Jehovah is there. Of the associations of the Lord Jesus with Jerusalem this Psalm treats.
How different were the feelings of the psalmist, as he sung by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost about the return in power to Jerusalem of David's Son and Lord, from that manifested by its inhabitants when the Lord entered it in accordance with the terms of Zechariah's prediction. Great indeed was his emotion, as looking through the vista of ages, he described the personal appearance of One whom he had never seen, but with whose Person he will be made acquainted, and whose triumphal progress he will with his eyes behold. "My heart is inditing [or has bubbled up] a good matter." What interest this had for him! Evidently he was full of it. The things he had made about the King stirred his soul to its very depths; and like one whose thoughts are engrossed with his subject, he mentions not the Lord by name, but at first only tells us of one of His titles, as if all must know equally with himself to whom the appellation of the "King" rightly belongs. To the writer, all was plain as, under the immediate guidance of the Holy Ghost, he penned the words which clothed, by divine appointment, the thoughts of the Spirit of God. His tongue was the pen of a ready writer. Thus the words we read are the words he uttered, written down probably by himself, that the inspired prophet and the reader might rejoice together.
Two leading thoughts form the subject of this song—the personal description of the Lord Jesus returned from heaven to earth, and the beauty and adornment of the Queen, Jerusalem, in the days of her restoration to Jehovah's favor. Now she is as the wife put away for her transgressions (Isa. 50:1); then she will be the wife publicly acknowledged, having Jehovah for her husband (Isa. 54:4, 5) and clad in her beautiful garments (Isa. 52:1).
On Zion the King had been firmly set by God's decree (Psalm 2:6); from Jerusalem the word is to go forth (Isa. 2:3); and here we have a description of the metropolis of the whole earth, as the Queen at the Lord's right hand, clad in gold of Ophir (Psalm 45:9). When facing death as man and Messiah in Psalm 102 He looked forward to Zion being rebuilt, and to Jehovah's praise being declared in Jerusalem. Now we see how fully that will be accomplished, and how the words of Isaiah will be fulfilled—"Thou shalt be called, Sought out, A city not forsaken." Isa. 62:12. In the day of her distress she was called an "Outcast... Zion, whom no man seeketh after." Jer. 30:17. Here she is described as sought out indeed, for the rich among the people are to entreat her favor (v. 12) and the daughter of Tire, that city, the synonym for commercial greatness and wealth, will be there with a gift, the substance of the world being then placed at Jerusalem's disposal.
But not only will earthly wealth flow to her, and temporal possessions be her portion, but what is far more valuable, she will possess an attraction for the King, who is here said to desire her beauty. All glorious within the house, her clothing of wrought gold, brought unto the King in raiment of needlework, surrounded by the virgins, her companions, how changed will her appearance and condition then be from what it was when Isaiah first described her (chap. 1:21.23). God's purposes are unchangeable; therefore He will fulfill His mind about her.
But how can such a change be brought about so that the polluted one, divorced for her transgressions, should become an object of beauty for the King? The close connection between Isa. 53 and 54 suggests the answer. In 53 we have the Lord's atoning work mentioned; in 54 the future glory of Jerusalem is described; and in 55 the grace which can be available for Jews and Gentiles is set forth, for what concerns Jerusalem and men is dependent on that mighty work treated of in 53. Hence we can understand how truly she will be an object of delight to Him whose death has availed for her. For though her filth will be washed away by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning (Isa. 4:4), she will owe all dealings with her for blessing to the atoning sacrifice of Christ. To deepen the sense of God's grace in the heart of the daughter of Zion, and surely in ours too, we read nothing in the Psalm about Jerusalem, but of her beauty and change of condition. Her Lord's joy in her (not hers in Him) is that of which the psalmist makes mention.
An analogy may here be traced between Jerusalem, the wife, and the Church, the bride, the pearl of great price. Both owe their position and relation to the Lord, to His death for them. To possess the Church He died, and to present her to Himself an object of beauty and of delight forever He still labors. To be to Jerusalem a husband, after all her sins and idolatry, He died; but with her Jehovah had relations before the cross, whereas the Church had no existence till after his death. Thus, though there is an analogy, there is also a great difference. Of Jerusalem it is written, "For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee." Isa. 54:7. Divorced once, she will be publicly owned as the wife when the Lord returns in glory. The Church is now only the bride; her marriage has yet to take place. Restoring grace Jerusalem will know, and forgiveness of all her past iniquities. Jehovah's wrath she has experienced, of which the Church, the bride, has known, and will know, nothing. On earth, as the wife, Jerusalem will be enriched with the world's substance, and have the place of pre-eminence above all other cities on the face of the globe, being the joy of the whole earth; yet she will only be the footstool of Jehovah. The Church, however, then above, will be the center of government for the universe, and not merely for the earth—giving light even to Jerusalem below her-for through her crystal walls' the light of the glory of God will illumine continually the city on earth (Rev. 21; Isa. 60:20).
Jerusalem thus described as the Queen, telling of the complete putting away of her defilement, and the full favor of Jehovah again, and that to be enjoyed forever, we have also in this Psalm the personal description of the King as He will appear to men on earth. How He will appear when He comes into the air for His saints, we read not, for that has to do with heaven; but how He will look when earth again beholds Him, the Word of God does reveal to us. His coming out of heaven, Rev. 19:11-16 describes; His personal appearance as King at Jerusalem, this Psalm depicts. There is, of course, a reason for this. Called here "The King," and rightly so, Scripture tells us that another will arrogate to himself that title, and by that name be known. The prophets Isaiah (30:33; 57:9) and Daniel (11:36) so speak of him, the antichrist of the future for Israel, the false prophet, who will support the blasphemous pretensions of the beast, for apostate Christendom (Rev. 13:11-17). He will claim to be the Messiah, and be received by the apostate portion of the Jews, (John 5:43; Zech. 11:16, 17) so we can understand the importance of the description, personal and moral, of Him who is God's King, that the faithful may be on their guard, and be kept from following an apostate people.
On Christians who know what their hope is, and whence they are to look for its fulfillment (1 Thess. 1:10; Phil. 3:20), the presence of a man upon earth, claiming to be the Messiah, would have no effect. For from heaven He will come for whom we wait, and into the air, not to the earth, will the Lord descend when He comes to take us up to be forever with Himself (1 Thess. 4:17). But to the faithful remnant, who rightly will expect the appearance of Messiah upon earth, the importance of a personal description of Him, whom another will have been impersonating, all must admit. The current will run so strong in that day of abounding apostasy, that, without grace to stem it, the godly will be unable to keep their feet. The feelings of a saint, and his difficulties at that time, we have told us in Psalm 73. "My feet," he confesses, "were almost gone; my steps had well-nigh slipped."
With the usual features of the antichrist, or false prophet, we are made familiar by the New Testament in 2 Thess. 2 and Rev. 13 Self-exaltation or desire to be looked upon as God and working miracles in support of his claim will be characteristics of the false king. Power to put forth in connection with, and under the protecting hand of the first beast, the imperial ruler or head of the Roman earth, will antichrist wield to make all apostatize, and to worship the image of that which Scripture, to show its moral character in God's eye, calls a wild beast, whose only object and aim is the gratification of itself at the expense and injury of others. At that time there will be two beasts, so-called—the one the head of the Roman earth, the other the pretended Messiah (Rev. 13). How different are the features of this horrid beast from those to be displayed in Him whom he will dare to impersonate! Though lamblike in outward appearance, yet his voice will betray his origin and his acts. Deceiving the world will indicate to God's saints his parentage.
Of the true Messiah we have, in Isa. 52:14, a description as He once appeared upon earth—"His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men." We know how true that was. Isaiah and other writers predicted His sufferings when in humiliation; and we can point to Him alone as the One in whom they were all fulfilled. How correct will this description of Him which we have in the Psalm prove to be, time will show. "Thou art fairer," we read, "than the children of men: grace is poured into Thy lips: therefore God hath blessed Thee forever." When manifested to the world all will see who is the King of God's choice. His personal appearance will mark Him out as the Head to whom all creation is to be subject. Grace, truth, meekness, and righteousness, are characteristics of the King. Oppression, deceit, arrogance, and persecution of God's saints, even unto death, will be features by which antichrist will be known. Comparing the ways of the latter when in the zenith of his power, with the picture given us in this Psalm by the Spirit of the true Messiah, the saints of that day will see that they have still to wait for the One who will correspond to the psalmist's description. The world may be captivated by false prophets and miracles, and many of the returned remnant may be ensnared (Daniel tells us, "the many"; that is, mass of them), so great will be his influence and apparently convincing his claims; but the true Conqueror and Hope of Israel, the godly among them will still desiderate. What their trials will be, Psalms 52.59 in some measure recount. What the deliverance will be, Psalms 45.48 in some degree depict; the answer to the cry of the afflicted saints is found in Psalm 44. The King is described in 45; God's presence in Jerusalem is announced in 46; the conquest and subjection of the nations to Israel is declared in 47; and the security of Zion from all attacks of her foe is celebrated in 48.
Who then is "the King?" He is a man, the virgin's Son, David's heir, Abraham's seed; He is God also, as verse 6 proves. To Him it can be said, "Thy God," speaking of His humanity, and, "0 God" speaking of His deity. Antichrist has never yet been seen on earth; but the Christ has been on this globe. "Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness" (v. 7), speaks of His character and ways when here in humiliation. Here then we see the end of a life in dependence upon God Meek, He was faithful at all cost to Jehovah; so dominion and might are to be His, nay, are His now, and the world will become part of His inheritance. What a thought for those in trial in all ages, as they read in the Word what the Lord was, and what He will be some day. He was meek and righteous; He will be King, and execute judgment. As in the history of Joseph, so it will be exemplified in that of the Lord, that waiting for God, time ends in deliverance by God's power, salvation by God's good pleasure.
As might, conquest, and dominion will be His in that day (vss. 3-5) so a throne too which endures forever He will have, and the right, as Father of His people (Isa. 9:6) to make them princes over all the earth; for of him, the King, not of Jerusalem, does verse 16 speak. So great, so glorious will be His kingdom on earth; that not as with sovereigns now will His ancestors be spoken of. David and Solomon will reflect no luster on His reign, for men will perceive that He is the fountain of power in Himself. The glory that has been will not be remembered, for the surpassing glory which will then be first and only seen in Him. With glory will be fame. His name will be remembered in all generations; therefore shall nations praise Him forever and ever. A sun we read of here which rises and never sets. None before Him have attained to that pre-eminence, nor will any after Him, for He will have no successor. In the last occupant of David's throne the glory will culminate, but never decline.
The marked difference between antichrist and the Lord we have briefly noticed. The portion of each, when God shall stop the reign of lawlessness and cut short the trials of His elect, the Word also foretells. Cast alive into the lake of fire will be the doom of antichrist (Rev. 19:20); anointed by God with the oil of gladness above His fellows will be the portion of the Christ (v. 7).
But some may ask, what part do we have in all this? Christ's glory and Christ's kingdom do concern us. The Psalm does not touch on the heavenly portion; but it does just intimate the existence of heavenly saints. It speaks of the King's fellows, and we know from Heb. 3:14 who these are. In Psalm 16 the Lord calls them saints; in 22 He speaks of them as His brethren; here they are styled His fellows; in each place the proper term is used for the subject in hand. If He speaks of the class with which He would associate on earth, He calls them saints, separated unto God from the evil around them. When about to leave earth for heaven, He surnames them His brethren that, though deprived of His presence outwardly, they might know the relationship which He acknowledges to exist between God Himself and them. And here, when the day of trial is looked at as over, and the day of His glory is about to dawn, we learn that those will not be forgotten in the time of His greatness who confessed Him in the days of His rejection. Saints, describes the class morally; brethren, describes the relationship between Him and them; and fellows, declares the association that will forever exist between Him and them. As His brethren, God, who is His Father, is theirs also; as His fellows, the kingdom, which belongs to Christ, they will share with Him.
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 8 - Psalm 72
Chapter 8—Psalm 72
In the song of loves or delight, as Psalm 45 is called, we have a description of the Lord's personal appearance on His return from heaven. In a Psalm for Solomon (72), which completes the prayers of David the son of Jesse, we learn the character of Messiah's reign—a subject of immense importance for the earthly people who will enjoy the favor of His personal rule. In Psalm 71 we are made acquainted with their wishes, and in Psalm 72 we are taught how God will respond to them. Some of their circumstances, similar in measure to those through which the Lord Jesus has passed, are recounted in Psalm 71, of which verses 1-3 are very similar to the first three verses of Psalm 31; verses 5 and 6, 10 and 11, and 12 Correspond very closely to the utterances of the Lord Himself in Psalm 22:9 and 10, 8, 19, and verse 13 to the words of Psalm 40:14. Their wish to be preserved in old age, preferred in Psalm 71:9-18, will be granted most fully, as Psalm 72:14 assures us. A new era then will have dawned upon this earth on which night has as yet only reigned, though we can now say, The night is far spent, and the day is at hand. (Rom. 13:12.)
Casting our eyes over this Psalm, we must own that a revolution will have taken place when that of which it speaks shall be fulfilled—a revolution like none that men have witnessed, a revolution such as the world most dreads, for judgment will have returned unto righteousness, and the reign of the true Solomon will indeed have commenced. God's people, God's poor, so long the object of men's contempt and hatred, will be the special subjects of the King's supervision and care. The poor and the needy, who have had so often to turn from judges and rulers on earth to invoke the aid and justice of the Almighty, will learn that the King in Zion will administer justice for them, and deal with them in righteousness. The helpless will find they have a judge to maintain their cause, and the once friendless will be so no longer.
When David penned these words this halcyon time had not arrived. Of his own day therefore the Psalm does not speak. David was the king and while he lived, what he described could not be enjoyed, for His Son must be the King, actually seated on the throne, and exercising the sovereignty which none but the monarch himself has authority to wield. No delegate deriving authority from the monarch, too old perhaps himself to discharge the duties of his office, could answer to the description here given, nor could David and Solomon together have fulfilled what the royal prophet has sketched out.
One person, not two, is here before us as invested with supreme command; and to fix the readers' eyes on the One whose rule is depicted, the limits of His kingdom are stated in verse 8, the boundaries first mentioned by God when He made a covenant with Abraham (Gen. 15:18), and confirmed by Him when Israel entered into a covenant with Him at Sinai (Exod. 23:31). Again mentioned after the wilderness journey was over (Josh. 1:4), for no failure on Israel's part could annul God's unconditional covenant with Abraham, the whole land was, however, never subdued till the reign of David, and two only of the kings who have reigned at Jerusalem could affirm that this Psalm states the limits of their dominions; namely, David and Solomon. If then the Psalm has been fulfilled, Solomon is the only one to whom it could apply, for he was the king's son, and he reigned, as 1 Kings 4:21 states, from the Euphrates to the southern extremity of Canaan. But he died, whereas of this King it is stated, "He shall live," (vs. 15); for death will not cut short His days, nor ever terminate His reign.
Bright indeed was the commencement of Solomon's reign, and his name became ever after a synonym for those gifted with more than ordinary intelligence and acquired knowledge; but its end was very different. He began full of promise, like the dawn of a summer's day, with nothing on the horizon to portend the approach of the least cloud to dim the brightness of the sun; but, ere he breathed his last, lowering clouds, ominous of a coming storm, announced the break-up as near at hand of that empire, which David, under God, had formed, and Solomon had enjoyed.
Of whom then does this Psalm speak? No writer in the New Testament has quoted from it to cast the light of a fuller revelation on the words of the Holy Ghost by David. But, if we cannot turn to the New Testament for help, we can appeal to the Old, and there find confirmation' of the thought, the Messiah, the Lord Jesus, is the One whose reign is here so beautifully described. To Abraham God had said, just after the offering up of Isaac, "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." Gen. 22:18. From Gal. 3:16 we learn who the seed was, of whom the angel of Jehovah, who called to Abraham out of heaven, really spoke—"thy seed, which is Christ." To this promise our Psalm refers in the words, "men shall be blessed in Him" (vs. 17); the Holy Ghost, by David, taking up that record, applies it directly to Messiah, which Paul, centuries after, was permitted to explain.
To the patriarch God had spoken of a seed; in this Psalm God speaks of a Person, the king's Son, whom the Holy Ghost in Galatians directly affirms to be the once humbled and crucified, but now risen and glorified One, the Lord Jesus Christ. As David then, referring thus to Genesis, connects the subject of his theme with the seed of Abraham, to whom the promise was given, Zechariah, another prophet, writing long after David's throne had been overturned, applies what is stated in verse 8 of our Psalm to the Lord Jesus, as Jerusalem's King. One sovereign, it is true, then reigned over all the country between the Euphrates and the river of Egypt; but, whereas David and Solomon had their throne at Jerusalem, and could speak of their kingdom as on this side of the Euphrates, the king of Zechariah's day spoke of this same country as beyond the river to him, reversing the condition of things as they existed in David's time.
God's word, however, cannot be broken; so His unconditional covenant with Abraham will not be abrogated, as the son of Iddo reminds the returned remnant, retracing the boundaries of Messiah's kingdom, and showing that by not one inch of ground, of which God spoke to Abraham, shall its area be diminished (Zech. 9:10). So, though this Psalm is never quoted in the New Testament, the reference in it to Gen. 22:18, and the quotation from it in Zech. 9:10, make it very clear about whom it was written. And since the Lord, though He has entered Jerusalem on the ass's colt as the King, has not yet occupied the throne in the manner here predicted, it is manifest that we have from the pen of David the Holy Spirit's description of events still future.
The question being settled as to whom the Psalm refers, let us now turn for a little to examine of what it speaks. God's judgments and God's righteousness having been requested for the king's son, what will follow, on their being granted, form the subjects of this inspired composition. As a young monarch, Solomon had asked of God something similar to these petitions (1 Kings 3:9), "and the speech pleased the LORD, that Solomon had asked this thing"; and riches, and wealth, and honor were also granted to him. How suited was his prayer, David's prayer for the king's son illustrates, while proving that, though entitled, "For Solomon," it looked on to One beyond him. For Solomon did not plead for the fulfillment of David's request on his behalf, but asked, as we read, for himself for Wisdom and intelligence, conscious of what he needed to govern God's people aright. For it was not a limited monarchy which David established, and Solomon inherited, but a monarchy absolute in its character, and in which all depended upon the king who sat on the throne executing judgment and justice for all Israel. David and Solomon being monarchs of this class, it is clear that He too must be absolute as King when He reigns on earth, who can now sit on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens. When He reigns all will depend on Him, as of old when the kings of Judah were faithful, the kingdom prospered, and hence we can understand why all David's desires center in God's gifts to the King, who, receiving God's judgments and God's righteousness, will act as God acts, and peace and order will be the result—peace, not the effect of compromise with evil, but peace in righteousness, so little known, though surely often desired.
Righteousness and judgment thus administered, the salvation of the needy and the destruction of the oppressors will attest to all the new character of the rule established by divine power in Zion, which, so different from what history can speak of, will tend to make men fear God throughout all generations (v. 5). Observe that this is the first effect of His reign, as stated in the Psalm. When this righteous rule is established, God will be feared as long as the sun and moon endure -a condition of things never known before. Then follow the beneficent results of His rule, and the place on earth which powers and authorities will accord to Him -God first, Himself next, for here, as man, the king's son, does He take His place and reign.
Refreshing like the rain to the mown grass will His presence prove, a simile all can understand, reviving and reinvigorating what will have appeared as burned up and withered; for Israel's hopes, which may have seemed vain, will then be fulfilled to the uttermost, His presence introducing and insuring their blessing to all generations. To give them rain is the Lord's prerogative, a standing witness in all ages that He alone is the Creator and true God (Jer. 14:22). Then too will it be proved that He alone can make that descend upon men, which answers to the softening, reviving showers in the world of nature; added to this, the righteous shall flourish, and abundance of peace so long as the moon endures.
Every step that we take in this Psalm only brings out in bright relief the contrast of that day to all that has been before it; and greater surely will the contrast appear to those who will have passed through the time of Jacob's trouble just previous to the Lord's millennial reign, having experienced the misery of being under godless power, unchecked for a while in its career of lawlessness and opposition to all that is of God. Then peace, that blessing of which men have often promised themselves a continuance, but always have found that they could not ensure its permanence, will at last be established on this earth, to abide while times and seasons shall run their appointed course.
The King viewed here as Messiah, the limits of His kingdom are announced, whom all kings will serve, made God's First-born higher than the kings of the earth (Psalm 89:27); and those nomad, lawless tribes, whom no government has yet tamed, inheriting the temper and disposition of their ancestor, Ishmael, will yield to Him obeisance, while His enemies will lick the dust. What problems in government will then be solved, but only by Him who is God's King. The unruly and turbulent who now so often baffle the best intentioned monarchs, will find in Him a ruler whose will must be obeyed; and again in the history of Israel will it be recorded that to the One reigning at Jerusalem tribute and homage must be paid by the kings of the earth, all acknowledging His superiority, who will deliver the "needy when he crieth; the poor also, and him that hath no helper."
Let us stop here for a moment, and survey the scene presented to us. Satan will have attempted to establish a supreme power, to whom kings will give allegiance, while the nations under their rule will wonder at its might. But after all, Satan's masterpiece, his last great effort before he shall be bound in the bottomless pit, will have results transient only in duration and limited in extent. The boundaries of the Roman earth will mark the extent of that supremacy, which a power outside it (the King of the North) will refuse to admit. Here, however, all kings shall fall down before the king's Son; all nations shall serve Him. And, whereas no deliverance will have been wrought by the beast, full deliverance for those who want it will be obtained and maintained by the protecting scepter of the Christ of God. The poor and afflicted will rejoice in His delivering power; the weak ones and the orphans will experience the strength and shelter of His arm; and the needy, those having a wish which none else can satisfy, will be satiated never more to want. Death for His own will be abolished, and deceit and violence no longer succeed against them.
Compare this, the settled order of things to be introduced by Him, with Psalm 79:1-5. The blood of His servants so often spilled, will be spilled no more. Precious in His sight will be the blood of those then living upon the earth. Peace, which the world under fallen man has never yet fully known, and also immunity for His people on earth from man's oppression and Satan's restless activity, with all earthly powers paying homage to God's King ruling in righteousness—these are features of that day of blessedness and glory, which will abide while sun and moon shall last, throughout all generations; for as all will rest for stability on the King, and "He," we read, "shall live," a settled order of things will be established, such as has never yet been witnessed.
And then, what may appear to be stranger than all, will be seen the complete revolution of feeling in men's minds about the Lord Jesus Christ; for they will pray for His continuance (v. 15), against whom, but a short time previous, the beast and his armies will have been arrayed to keep Him out of His kingdom. The counsels of the rulers against the Lord and His Christ, first developed at the cross, will never succeed. God's purpose about His
Son, in spite of all opposition, will be made good. "Men shall be blessed in Him: all nations shall call Him blessed." And so surely will this be the case that we have portrayed in this Psalm that time of blessedness, as if from the pen of an eye witness. The time of the restoring of all things will arrive, but not without the presence of the central figure and the pillar of it all, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is now in heaven, but will return to earth for that era of blessedness and brightness to commence, in which the whole creation will be interested, for earth's fruitfulness (at present restrained by man's sin) will then return. "There shall be a handful [abundance] of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon: and they of the city shall flourish like grass of the earth." How many new things will in that day be seen! Where men now look not for fertility, there will it appear; and Christ's name, so often the subject of execration, shall be perpetuated, enduring forever.
With these thoughts the psalmist concludes. Beyond them his desires for the king's Son cannot go, and as on another occasion (2 Sam. 7) he could only find vent for his feelings in worship, he here winds up with a doxology—"Blessed be the LORD God, the God of Israel, who only doeth wondrous things. And blessed be His glorious name forever: and let the whole earth be filled with His glory. Amen, and Amen."
This is a fitting conclusion to so wondrous a theme. The prayers of David, the son of Jesse, having been ended, the last tones of his lyre which fall on the ear are those of praise!
An Exposition of Messianic Psalms Entitled God's King: Chapter 9 - Psalm 8
Chapter 9—Psalm 8
"On His head were many crowns" or diadems (Rev. 19:12). These words form part of the description of the Lord Jesus as John in vision saw Him, and as earth will one day behold Him, when arrayed in all the insignia of power with which His Father has invested Him; for no one crown, nor any one title, however exalted, can express all the dignities and the glories which belong to Him.
We learn that John saw seven diadems on the dragon's head (Rev. 12:3), and ten diadems on the beast's horns (Rev. 13:1); but these, while attempting to rival in power and glory God's King, fall short surely, even in number, of the glories which He has conferred on His Son. What the dragon and the beast possessed could be counted, but the glories and dignities which belong to Christ are unnumbered. John tells us He will wear many diadems; and we must add, He is worthy of them all.
In the Psalms already looked at, one of the glories which belongs to Him, that of Messiah, King of Israel, has been considered. In the Psalm before us we have another glory presented, which is His as Son of man; for the names by which He is known are not mere verbal designations or empty titles, but each expresses something definite and distinctive. Christ, Lord, King, Son of man-these are some of His titles in connection with His supremacy. "The Christ," that is, the anointed One, connects Him with God's people, whether the earthly, Israel, of whom He is King, or a heavenly company, the church, of which He is the Head (Eph. 5:23). "Lord" brings to our minds His relation to all intelligent creatures, whether unfallen, saved, or lost (Phil. 2:10-11). "King of Kings" denotes His superiority to all rulers among men; and "Son of man" tells of His headship over the universe, animate and inanimate.
At times in the world's history we have shadowed forth in certain people, placed in authority upon earth, something of the different official positions to be filled, and the dignities to be enjoyed by the Lord Jesus Christ. Thus, David and Solomon were anointed kings over all Israel. Nebuchadnezzar, the head of gold, was a king of kings (Dan. 2:37). Adam was head over all creatures upon this globe; but Adam was neither anointed like David, nor a king of kings like Nebuchadnezzar. In the Lord however, all these glories and offices meet. He will be seen to be what each of the above mentioned was, and all will be centered in His Person, of whom they were in this respect but shadows.
Again, to these three, and to three only, has God ever given dominion over the animals and men; namely, to Nebuchadnezzar, to Adam, and to the Lord Jesus Christ. Alike in this, they stand out, however, each one different from the other two. To Nebuchadnezzar God gave dominion over earth and air, for wherever the children of men dwelt, the beasts of the field and the fowls of heaven were given into his hand (Dan. 2:38), and he was made ruler over them all. With him was set up something new-the image which still stands. As head of it this Gentile monarch had this remarkable place in creation, connected, it would seem, with headship on earth. But great and remarkable as was the dominion given to Nebuchadnezzar, far exceeding that which any other monarch involved in Adam's fall has, or will enjoy, it was, compared with what God gave to Adam, restricted in extent, and limited in duration, though not conditional for its continuance throughout its allotted time on the obedience of the proud builder of Babylon (Jer. 25:11-12; 27:6-7).
To Adam in the garden the Lord God gave the place of head over earth, air, and sea; for, besides earth and air, he had dominion over all in the sea (Gen. 1:28). Unrestricted therefore in extent, as regards earth, it was unlimited also as to duration, though conditional for its continuance (as it afterward appeared) on his personal obedience to God's command. He fell, and no man after him has ever held such a place in creation as he, while in innocence, filled. For what Gen. 1:28 describes is not the position given to men in relation to the rest of created things upon this globe, but the special sphere accorded to Adam as head of this creation, "the figure of Him that was to come" (Rom. 5:14). A comparison of what God said to Adam, with His word to Noah and his sons after the flood, confirms this. Adam was to have dominion over all creatures, while for Noah and his son, their fear was only to be placed on all animals on earth, in air, and sea; for we miss in the divine communication to the patriarch and his sons the important words "and subdue it," part of the terms of the conveyance of supremacy over earth bestowed on our forefather Adam (Gen. 1:28; 9:2). Now, had the words addressed to Adam been intended for men after him, there would have been no need for Daniel to tell Nebuchadnezzar that the beasts and birds were given into his hand; no, the prophet's communication would have been an insult to the king, as limiting man's dominion where God had not restricted it, for Daniel mentions nothing about the sea. Adam's place then in creation was peculiar to himself, which, when lost through the fall, none of his descendants could regain.
But since Adam enjoyed his place by virtue of a grant from God, and Nebuchadnezzar was invested with dominion by a fresh exercise of the divine prerogative, the Son of man has been appointed to wield the scepter throughout the universe by a deed of the same validity-God's sovereign will recorded in the written Word. And though the simple exercise of the divine prerogative announced to the individual, as in the cases of Adam and Nebuchadnezzar, without any written communication about it, must always have been a sufficient warrant to fill the office of head on earth, God has been pleased to reveal for the instruction of His people and of the world, His counsels concerning the Son of man, that all may learn from Him who is the One whom He delights to honor.
Comparing the grant to the Lord as Son of man with those given respectively to Adam and to Nebuchadnezzar, while it has something in common with each, it differs from both. It is unrestricted and unlimited; in this it resembles that given to Adam. But it is also unconditional as to its continuance, and in this it resembles that given to the head of gold, for the Son of man is to be set over all creation, without limitation as to time, or conditions as to continuance.
Thus, as we pass each type in review, we have to say that the antitype far exceeds each and all in glory and greatness. David and Solomon reigned over all Israel. This the Lord will do; but they never bore the title of King of kings. Again, Nebuchadnezzar could boast of a title sanctioned by God, which Adam had not; but he must yield precedence to Adam in respect of the extent of his dominion on this earth. And Adam, who had a place which no fallen man had or will have, must give way before the Lord Jesus, when the greatness of their respective positions in the universe is compared; for, by the light of the New Testament we, learn to read aright and to give its full value to the statement of the psalmist-"Thou hast put all things under His feet."
Of the Lord then the Psalm speaks, and of Him alone; for whereas Adam could only boast of a supremacy resembling that herein described, though man, he was not the Son of man; and during the time he held his place as head of creation on earth, he could not have understood such a term. Thus, apart from the New Testament scriptures, we can see that David was not writing of Adam, nor of the race in general; but with the New Testament writings before us we are taught to put a definite meaning on the language he used, and to discern a dominion and supremacy here hinted at, the extent of which he was surely ignorant of, as he sang, "Thou madest Him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under His feet."
Psalm 8 is clearly a millennial Psalm, and brings before us Israel lost in wonder as they behold the development of God's counsels and the display of His wisdom in thus exalting the Son of man. "0 LORD our Lord, how excellent [glorious] is Thy name in all the earth! who hast set Thy glory above the heavens." The heaven of heavens cannot contain God, as Solomon at a later date declared, yet God deigns to make this small globe-earth-the theater for the display of His wisdom and power; and man, whose normal sphere is earth, He will place in the Person of the Christ over all created things, the hierarchy of heaven included. In connection with this two points are specially brought up; namely, the principle on which God acts, and the great manifestation of it.
The principle on which He acts is this: He uses instruments, humanly speaking, inadequate to effect His mighty purposes in creation. Thus His wisdom and power are both displayed. Were He to act directly, in the greatness of His might, without the agency of any creature, all would behold His power, but His wisdom might not be developed. But He acts in wisdom as well as in power; for, taking up the feeblest creatures and adapting them as instruments for the work that He has in hand, He thereby shows His knowledge of the suitability of the instrument, and His power in rightly making use of it. This He has done and will do. The Psalm (v. 2) speaks of the principle on which He acts, and the little children in the temple at Jerusalem were an illustration of it (Matt. 21:16). He can and does use the feeblest creatures to effect His purpose of stilling the enemy and the avenger. "Our Lord," the remnant will say, acts thus; and the thoughts of their hearts have been prophetically announced, that souls, till the day of Christ's glory arrives, may be led to trust in God. Then the principle enunciated will receive its full and final manifestation by the Son of man, as set over the works of God's hands, destroying all God's enemies.
This leads to the second point. Comparing man, as a creature, with the orbs of heaven, his insignificance and weakness become apparent, and the psalmist might well say, "What is man [Enosh, mortal man], that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man [Adam], that Thou visitest Him?
For Thou hast made Him a little lower than the angels [gods], and hast crowned Him with glory and honor." Heb. 2:8 makes plain to whom these words are to be applied, pointing out at the same time, how far the Psalm has yet received its fulfillment. The moon and the stars appointed to rule by night (Psalm 136:9) are far greater than man-the lowest in rank of God's intelligent creatures-yet the Son of man is to appear some day, set over all things, the director and ruler throughout the universe. Made lower than the angels, He will be seen placed above them. Their relation to man now, 2 Pet. 2:11 sets forth; their present service to the saints, Heb. 1:14 makes plain; their former ministrations to the Man Jesus Christ, the evangelists recount (Matt. 4:11; Mark 1:13; Luke 22:43). They have been, and ever will be, God's servants. Their status never alters. They are ministering spirits (Psalm 103:20-21) and will be, doing God's commandments now, and executioners of His judgments by and by (Matt. 13:41-49). Man's status, however, in the Person of Christ, does alter-and, through Him, that of all God's heavenly saints-for the better; for the future habitable world, we learn (Heb. 2:5), is not put under angels, but under man; and the One who is to have the chief place in that economy, appointed thereto by God, is His own well-beloved Son, the Son of man likewise, who, as man on earth, received the ministrations of angels, but as Son of man in power and glory, will send them forth as His messengers to do His bidding. As yet these counsels of God are unfulfilled; but the fact of the Lord Jesus Christ having been crowned with glory and honor, points Him out as the subject of this Psalm, and therefore the destined ruler of the universe.
Thus, as we read it, we learn what will be the thoughts of the godly remnant of the Jews on beholding the development before the world of the divine counsels about Christ, and we must surely own how different is God's written Word from everything else. To read the thoughts of men's hearts when they are not expressed is the prerogative of God alone; and when the Lord did it, His disciples confessed that He must have come from God (John 16:19-31). Here, however, we have the thoughts that will arise in His people's hearts revealed ages beforehand. None could do this but He who forms the heart and knows the end from the beginning. What Herod, Pontius Pilate, and the Jews would do to Christ and His people, Psalm 2 beforehand announced; and the disciples in Acts 4:24-28 bore witness to the accuracy of that prophetic word. What this Psalm expresses will, in like manner, in its appointed time, be made good.
Reading Heb. 2, we are assured of this, being made acquainted by it with that which God has been pleased to communicate to us about the present position and glory of His Son, as well as the great gap in time between verses 6 and 7 of the Psalm. Writing for the earthly people the psalmist enumerates the living creatures on earth, in air, and sea, as subjected to the sway of the Son of man. Instructing heavenly saints, the Apostle acquaints us with the breadth of meaning which lay concealed in those words. Angels elect and apostate, men lost and saved, saints above and saints on earth-all are to be under Christ's rule, as well as all living creatures and all created things. The joy of God's heavenly saints at this, the feelings of the elect angels at the mention of it, as well as that of all living creatures in heaven or earth, and under the earth, and the expression of the earthly people at beholding it, the Word has beforehand announced (Rev. 5; Psalm 95-98). What a place then in the universe has God assigned to Him, who received the ministration of angels in the wilderness when an hungered, and the support of an angel in the garden when in the agony!
But we have more particulars about the Lord Jesus Christ, and His fulfillment of this Psalm, than what Heb. 2 supplies; for both 1 Cor. 15 and Eph. 1 refer to it, the former telling of the gradual accomplishment of God's mind about His Son, the latter of our special interest in it. The gradual accomplishment we say, for while 1 Cor. 15 declares the purpose for which He is to reign; namely, to put all enemies under His feet, and develops the order in which that will be effected, death being the last enemy whose power He will annul, Rev. 20 which reveals to us the exact duration of His millennial reign, acquaints us also with this fact, that not till after the close of His thousand years rule will death and hades be cast into the lake of fire. That done, He will deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father, God's purpose having been effected by the
Son of man; that is, the subjugation of all His enemies. Nothing then will escape His eye, or remain independent of His scepter; and the Lord will overthrow all that has held man captive, who, as man, visited different regions of His extensive dominions; for in hades, as well as on earth and in heaven, the path of the Son of man can be traced (Eph. 4:9-10).
On earth where Adam was head, in other parts of the universe where Adam's authority was unknown, the Lord's power will be felt, and God, by Him, be glorified. God will set Him over the work of His hands. But this, be it observed, is not mere exaltation above all created things, but the subjection of all things to Him who was made a little lower than the angels, nothing being left that is not put under Christ, except Him by the fiat of whose will all this is to be effected. To resist the Lord Jesus therefore must end in complete discomfiture. And since men, as creatures, will exist forever, sooner or later they must be subject to the lowly Son of man, for God's purposes about Him will be fulfilled, however long they may be of accomplishment.
Viewing then the world's opposition to God and to His Christ in the light furnished by the prophetic announcement of the divine plans, what can we say of it, how describe it, but as, folly and madness in their most intense form, not to speak of the rebellious spirit it displays, and the mutinous character of its acts? Nothing can defeat the establishment of God's purpose; no power arrayed against the Lord can succeed; for the binding of Satan at the commencement of the Millennium by angelic agency, and his final doom at the end of it, as well as the Lord's victory over death (Rev. 20); tell us of powers greater than that of man, which must finally succumb to Christ.
When the Lord God placed Adam in the Garden of Eden as head upon earth, He brought to him all the animals for His creature to name, standing by, as it were, as a listener, to hear what the man, endowed by Him with intelligence, would call each one as it passed before him in review, thus manifesting His delight and satisfaction in the head which He had placed over that creation. With what delight then will He behold the Son of His love set over all the works of His hands!
For Satan there is nothing in store but judgment, final and everlasting. Not so for man, if he will hearken to God's message (2 Cor. 5:20-21). Shall souls have their part forever with Satan, or with Christ? That is the question for those yet unconverted. The portion appointed for the devil, Matt. 25:41 plainly sets forth. God's counsels about Christ and those who believe on Him have been revealed in Eph. 1:9-14. What they, who shall be with Christ forever, were once, Eph. 2 declares in no dubious language, thus pointing out the class, viewed morally, from which the Lord's "fellows" are drawn, and answering at once the question of a sin-convicted soul, Can I ever hope to be with Him in whom all things are to be headed up, both things on earth and things in heaven?
As Messiah, King of the Jews, the Lord was crucified. Israel's King was rejected and cast out of the world, to return when He shall have received a dominion coextensive only with the universe, and before whom, as their Lord and Judge, Pilate, Herod, and Caiaphas must one day stand. "Your King," said Pilate, addressing the Jews- King of a territory very circumscribed and insignificant in comparison with that empire of which Pilate was a servant and representative. But a dominion more extensive than that of the Caesars, and more enduring than that of any earthly dynasty, will be His who stood at that bar of judgment, and was sent there from to the cross. For a thousand years He will reign, and reign too forever, even forever and ever. How blessed will those be then, and are now, who have obtained in Him a full, a rich, and an enduring inheritance!