Psalm LXXXIX
1 I WILL sing of the mercies of the Lord for ever!
With my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations.
2 For I have said, Mercy shall be built up for ever:
Thy faithfulness shalt thou establish in the very heavens.
3 I have made a covenant with my chosen, I have sworn unto David my
servant,
4 Thy seed will I establish for ever, and build up thy throne to all generations. Selah.
5 And the heavens shall praise thy wonders, O Lord! Thy faithfulness also in the congregation of the saints.
6 For who in the heaven can be compared unto the Lord?
Who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the Lord!
7 God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints. And to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.
8 O Lord God of hosts, who is a strong Lord like unto thee? Or to thy faithfulness round about thee?
*” Thy suffering Lord, believer, see,
And praise the heart that bled for thee.
The horrors of his hell-touched soul
From wounds of death hath made thee whole.” — Barclay.
9 Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them.
10 Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces, as one that is slain; Thou hast scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm.
11 The heavens are thine, the earth also is thine:
As for the world and the fulness thereof, thou hast founded them.
12 The north and the south thou hast created them:
Tabor and Hermon shall rejoice in thy name.
13 Thou hast a mighty arm: strong is thy hand, and high is thy right hand.
14 Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: Mercy and truth shall go before thy face.
15 Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound:
They shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance.
16 In thy name shall they rejoice all the day, and in thy righteousness shall
they be exalted.
17 For thou art the glory of their strength: and in thy favour our horn shall
be exalted.
18 For the Lord is our defence; and the Holy One of Israel is our king.
19 Then thou spakest in vision to thy holy one.
And saidst, I have laid help upon one that is mighty; I have exalted one chosen out of the people.
20 I have found David my servant; with my holy oil have I anointed him:
21 With whom my hand shall be established: mine arm also shall strengthen
him.
22 The enemy shall not exact upon him; nor the son of wickedness afflict
him.
23 And I will beat down his foes before his face, and plague them that hate
him.
24 But my faithfulness and my mercy shall be with Him: And in my name shall His horn be exalted.
25 I will set his hand also in the sea, and his right hand in the rivers.
26 He shall cry unto me. Thou art my father, my God, and the rock of my
salvation.
27 Also I will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth.
28 My mercy will I keep for him for evermore, and my covenant shall stand
fast with him.
29 His seed also will I make to endure for ever, and his throne as the days of
heaven.
30 If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments;
31 If they break my statutes, and keep not my commandments;
32 Then will I visit their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with
stripes.
33 Nevertheless my lovingkindness will I not utterly take from Him, Nor suffer my faithfulness to fail.
34 My covenant will I not break, not alter the thing that is gone out of my
lips.
35 Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto David.
36 His seed shall endure for ever, and his throne as the sun before me.
37 It shall be established for ever as the moon,
And as a faithful witness in heaven. Selah.
38 But thou hast cast oif and abhgrred, thou hast been wroth with thine
anointed.
39 Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant: Thou hast profaned his crown by casting it to the ground.
40 Thou hast broken down all his hedges; thou hast brought his strongholds
to ruin.
41 All that pass by the way spoil him: he is a reproach to his neighbours.
42 Thou hast set up the i-ight hand of his adversaries; thou hast made all his
enemies to rejoice.
43 Thou hast also turned the edge of his sword, and hast not made him to
stand in the battle.
44 Thou hast made his glory to cease, and cast his throne down to the ground.
45 The days of his youth hast thou shortened: thou hast covered him with
shame. Selah.
46 How long. Lord? wilt thou hide thyself for ever? Shall thy wrath burn like fire?
47 Remember how short my time is:
Wherefore hast thou made all men in vain?
48 What man is he that liveth, and shall not see death?
Shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave? Selah.
49 Lord, where are thy former lovingkindnesses, which thou swearest unto
David in thy truth?
60 Remember, Lord, the reproach of thy servants;
How I do bear in my bosom the reproach of all the mighty people;
51 Wherewith thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, Wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of thine anointed.
52 Blessed be the Lord for evermore. Amen, and Amen.
The title assigns this Psalm to “Ethan the Ezrahite,” as the last was by “Heman the Ezrahite.” These were probably called “Ezrahites,” i. e., sons of Zerah, as a name of honour, because of their skill in music. For, in 1 Chron. ii. 6, we find the grandchildren of Judah bear these names, and in 1 Kings iv. 31, they are spoken of as renowned for skill in song, being “sons of Mahol, i.e., sons of the choir.” Hence, in after times, Levitical singers who were conspicuous in this department were called “Ezrahites,” q.cl, Handels or Mozarts. And this is a “Maschil.”
The subject here is followed out in progressive development. He is to sing, verse 1, of the Lord’s mercies and faithfulness; in other words, of “the sure mercies of David,” spoken of by Isaiah Iv. 4. He seems to be revolving in his thoughts the
Lord’s words to David, 2 Sam. vii. 1 4-. Impressed with that solemn covenant, he sings, verse 2 —
“/ have said, Mercy shall he built up for ever.’”
Not as the tower of Babel, to be left unfinished, and then destroyed, but built up heaven-ward, a grateful sight to God and man —
“The heavens! thy faithfulness thozi wilt establish therein.’”
The Lord himself replies to this expression of faith in verses 8, 4, clearly referring to his word pledged to David in 2 Sam, vii. When his voice has uttered its sealing testimony, there is a solemn pause — “8elah!” The Lord has spoken! And then silence is broken by rapturous praise, verse 5 —
“T7ie heavens shall praise thy tconderful doing; Thy faithfulness, also, in the congregation oftJte saints.”
Unfallen angels, and the great congregation of redeemed men, shall yet unite in praise to the God whose mercies have been promised to David. Messiah’s Second Coming will be the special season for that praise, when his gathered elect, “the congregation of the saints,” survey the foundation of their blessedness, and review the way by which he led them on. Every time an assembly of saints now, in this time of ingathering, unites in so celebrating the Lord, we have a tjipe of that coming day; especially when they so unite on the Sabbath of rest, itself a type. And the strains that follow are a specimen to us of what may be the topics of the Song of the Lamb.
Here are his praises. From verse 6 to verse 18, Ethan sings of the Lord’s incomparable glory and greatness, felt by saints, as well as by angels, the sons of the mighty. He is “God of Hosts,” irresistible in might, and yet never once unloosening the girdle of faithfulness to his covenant. “Faithfulness is round about thee!” (ver. 8). It is God in Christ whom Ethan praises; it is he who at his coming again bears the name, “Faithful and true” (Rev. xix. 11), and who has “faithfulness as the girdle of his reins,” (Isa. xi. 5). He is the ruler of the stormy sea, and of proud Egypt; the Creator of the glorious heavens, and of the earth with its fulness; the founder
WITH MESSIAH AND HIS SEED. 2(19
of Israel’s land, who appointed Tabor and Hermon * to stand in the midst of that land as witnesses of the Lord’s doings. This is Jehovah; and he is at once righteous and loving —
“RigMeousness and judgment are the platform on which thy throne stands, Mercy and truth stand before thy presence.” (Ver. 14.)
Happy they who know him! who have heard and joined in the “joyful sound,” i. e., the shout of joy raised by Israel to this king (Num. xxiii. 21), when they worship him at their solemn feasts (Lev. xxv. 9). Happy people! They walk in his light! They anticipate the day when the shout of joy shall be raised at his Coming, and when they shall have no other light to walk in than what beams from God and the Lamb. So they go on from day to day — “For our shield, it belongs to the Lord (^); And our king he belongs to the Holy One of Israel.” (Our protector is himself protected by the Lord.) (Ver. 18.)
A fuller and plainer declaration, however, is given at verse 19 and onwards, of the source of all this rejoicing. Israel’s shield and king was the type of another whom Jehovah gives to Israel and to earth —
“Thou spdkest in vision to thy holy ones,” i. e., thy people. (Ver. 18.) Thou revealedst to thy saints, by Nathan and others, thy purpose to send Messiah in David’s line; and from 1 9 to 28, this is sung of in lofty strains. He has made him the depositary of help; and he tells how he will uphold him, honour him, extend his kingdom, exalt his name to the highest. Nay (29-34), he shall not be disappointed of his glory and promised bliss even by his children’s unfaithfulness; for they even (35-37), when unfaithful, must be brought back to him, that he may want no joy. His truth is pledged to this, as surely as when he made the rainbow “his witness in the heavens” to Noah.
A “Selah”-Y>siuse follows. 0 that this scene were realised! O that all were come!
But, alas, as yet these things are not arrived. We must
* This is surely better than to suppose the allusion to either side of Jordan. Tabor on the west and Hermon on the north-east.
hang on his faithfulness. For at present (vers. 38-45) desolation and ominous disaster abound. Another” SdaK’-^sxise follows; the worshipper is mournfully pondering the scene, and wondering what he shall do; and soon the Lord’s lemembered faithfulness draws forth prayer from his lips, the cry (ver, 46) —
“Hoio long, Lord”
accompanied by the plea that days are passing away, and that the millions of earth are ever disappearing from the scene, none able to resist the stroke —
“What mighty man liveth and seeth not death? Shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave f Selah I” (Yqt. 48.;
It may be that this verse (with its “lilJ “0) points to the longed-for Messiah, as if saying —
“[JMiere is He that shall live and not die? That shall deliver his soul from the hand of the grave? Selah!”
Another burst of impassioned desire follows this pensive pause, verses 49-5], — an appeal to the Lord’s love in former days, enforced by the consideration that his name is reproached in his servants, and by a touching reference to Moses, in Num. xi. 12, and the gracious answer he got when bidden “carry in his bosom” that stiff-necked people —
“I bear the many nations in my bosom. For thy Joes, O Lord, have reproached. They have reproached th: footsteps of thy Messiah!”
They have been told of his Coming; but he tarries, and they scoff at this delay; they cast it up to me. “The footsteps” are explained by the Targum, and by Kinchi, to mean “the tardiness of his steps,”* but by others as equivalent to the whole movements or ways of Messiah. In either case the taunt of the scoffers, 2 Peter iii. 4, and Malachi ii. 17, is included — “Where is the promise of his coming? Where is the God of judgment?”
* M. Anton. Flaminius says, that it is by some understood of.’■coffers who derided the Jews — “Quod ii Christum liberatorem expectarcnt, cujns vestigia et pedes venientes nunquam visuri essent.”
But faith holds out, nay, realises the happy issue, (ver. 32) —
“Blessed he the Lord for ever I
Amen, and amen /”
Let it come, let it come? (jivoiro, yivoiro! Sept.) or rather, testifying its assurance that all this shall come, not one thingfailing; for the theme from beginning to end has been — The faithful covenant with Messiah and his Seed.