Psalms 20–22

Psalms xx., xxi., as remarked elsewhere, present to us the third witness presented to the responsibility of men — Christ. But this is not our only subject here: psalm xx. shows us the profound interest which the heart takes in watching the Faithful One in His sorrows — in a Jewish form no doubt. Still, as elsewhere, the substance in the same for us. It is still confidence in Jehovah which characterizes the feeling of Him who speaks; for the Goji of Jacob is before His thoughts. There is faith in Him in this relationship. Yet Messiah is seen in the trials and questions of His life here below, walking but in piety towards Jehovah, and in dependance on Him. Nothingcan show Christ more completely as a man than this. The Anointed is saved, i.e., delivered, and heard. The whole heart of the godly is wrapped up in this. But the remnant see yet further here, as Israel ought to have done; they see Ilim answered in His demand for life, by a most glorious one for ever, in the immediate light of God’s countenance, with which lie is made glad, and after that, His right hand finding out all His enemies, and destroying them. But. even in all this, (as in John xvii. where one sees at the same time that In’ must be one with the Father,) Messiah receives all from Jehovah, as a man, and is so viewed by the godly. And so was He presented by Peter. His privilege is the favour of Jehovah; His piety, confidence in Jehovah. This link is what occupies the godly, who are thus profoundly attached to Messiah, and this was in effect what characterized Christ — seeking His Father’s glory, and in nothing His own. So Jehovah associates nimself entirely with Him as xxi. 9, as the godly does on his side also. And as Messiah is exalted by Jehovah in spite of His enemies, so is Jehovah exalted in His glory in doing it; and so it is, the remnant, equally interested, exalt and praise the power of Jehovah. This linking up the interests of the godly, bound in heart to Messiah — Messiah and Jehovah, as characterizing the piety of the godly, is full of beauty and interest. Yet, in His life, Christ never took this title with His disciples. He would lead them further. He was Son of man, and spoke of His Father as being Himself Son of God. My Father,” said He to the Jews, of whom ye say that He is your God. All the moral qualities of Messiah, Son of God, He had, but He was weaning His disciples from the earthly associations to higher and heavenly ones; and this shows us the need there is in all our use of the psalms to make this difference. We see with the profoundest interest the sorrows and sufferings of Christ, but it is from a higher point of view; we look not at His official place and then humiliation, but the divine and perfect love in which He emptied Himself and came down and took the form of a servant, and was found in fashion as a man, and passed with a purpose of love across the trials and sorrows of this world of sorrow. and we see LTis glory in it. The truth is much more deeply taught in the New Testament. Still the way Christ is presented as a true dependant man, and His piety in this dependence is most instructive to us who can add the deeper truth from the revelation of the Son of God. The word of life in it is seen.

In commenting on psalm xxii., our part here is not to unfold the blessed doctrine contained in it, in the introduction of grace on a wholly new footing, (viz.. redemption, and the death of Christ,) which rose above and closed all mere human responsibilities in grace. We have rather to pursue the feelings and thoughts of Christ. For the piety of this part of the Psalms is the piety of Christ Himself. Nor is anything more instructive or sanctifying. Nothing deepens our own piety so much.

This, then, shall be our subject now. The Lord enable us to tread reverently here!

We find what called out the special cry of the Saviour — a cry which, till that bitter cup had been fully drank, could not be heard. There is progress and completeness in the utterance of these sorrows. Violence, unrestrained and full of rage, surrounded Ilim — bulls of Bashan — ravening and roaring lions. It was no haughty strength of man which met this. He must meet and feel it in the meekness of His nature, and know the weakness, though never the sin. of human nature, save in bearing it. He was poured out like water — all His bones as out of joint — His heart melted like wax in the midst of His bowels.

His strength is dried up like a potsherd: His tongue cleaves to His jaws. But here there is no stopping, nor could He do so, at second causes. He is down in the dust of death; but Jehovah has brought Him there. The point here is His state — the dust of death: only He looks at the real source of all, at the thoughts and counsels of Jehovah. This is perfection in this respect: entire sensibility as to, and moral perception of, the character of the enemies, who are the instruments of our suffering; but looking, through it all, to the -ways and wisdom and will of God, and God in faithful relationship to us, the true source of all. But besides the violence which, instrumentally, had brought the gentle and unresisting Saviour, dumb as a sheep before His shearers, to the dust of death, had violently dragged away and mocked Him whose simple presentation of Himself had made all fall to the ground — there was the manifestation of the character of men, when, through His own giving Himself up, He was in their power. Dogs encompassed him — creatures without heart or conscience — without shame or feeling, whose pleasure was in the shame of another, and insults offered to Him who made no resistance, in outrages to the righteous. They were wicked as well as violent. They stared and looked upon Him. How must the Saviour have felt their shameless and heartless insults — His exposure, naked to the hardened eye of those that rejoiced in iniquity and in His shame! They amuse themselves with appropriating His garments. The vesture of the Innocent was an affair of dice or casting lots. No eye to pity — none to help. Trouble was there: He looks on Jehovah, entreating- Him not to be far from Him, and, if He has no strength, Jehovah, as His strength to be near. And here we approach the deeper part of this solemn hour. In the utmost trials from man, when no eye was there to pity, no hand to help, lie looks to Jehovah, the covenant God of Israel’s and Messiah’s faith. But here, 0 mystery of mysteries! there was no help either, but only infinite perfection (for infinite it now must be) in the Blessed One. He is still associated here with Israel as to Ilis place in the psalm, whatever the efficacy of that work in which, in this great turning-point of divine history, this central definition and solution of the question of good and evil, that in which it was settled for eternity. The God of Israel was to leave Him and destroy the enmity, and rend the veil which, in Israel, concealed God; that, in the full result of divine love by righteousness, grace mighl reign through righteousness unto eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord, for every believer, Jew or Gentile, and for the complete glory of God in heaven and earth. We still, remark, find the necessary difference of Christ in the psalms and in the gospels. There it is as Son (save in His forsaking) lie speaks, saying, “father, forgive them;” and afterwards, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.” Here it is: “Be not far from me, 0 Jehovah.” He seeks help for Himself from the God of Israel, His God. And such is the result. It is the remnanl gathered, and then all Israel, the niilleuial nations and the people to be born — those who are the called and blessed fruit of this work. AVo do not rise up to heaven. Having made this remark, as important to the right use of the psalms, which we find has its place even in what is said of the cross itself in the psalms, I turn to the character of faith and piety found here in the Blessed One, in His trust as come in the midst of Israel, in Jehovah. “For of Israel, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is God over all, blessed for evermore.” There is the deepest consciousness of His own outwardly-abject state and desertion, and that in painful

contrast with every faithful soul — a circumstance wonderfully calculated to produce in the human heart irritation and despondency, i.e., a forgetfulness of what God was — if this had been possible with Jesus. “I am a worm, and no man — a scorn of men, and despised of the people.” Nor was this all. The blessed Saviour, He who had been cast upon Jehovah from the womb, whose hope Jehovah had been from His mother’s breast, who had sought His will and glorified His name, had to declare before all, and in presence of the taunts and mockery of His adversaries, that God had forsaken Him. How deep this trial was morally, none but He could tell who passed through it. It was in the proportion of the love He enjoyed and lived in, and His faithfulness to it. We speak of trial and piety, not of expiation here. In all this, and through all this, the blessed Saviour is perfect towards Jehovah. First, His trust is perfect, ne says not Jehovah; for the relationship was not then in exercise as it was with His Father in Gethsemane; but He says, “My God, my God.” Whatever the dreadful forsaking was, His perfect faith in God and devotedness to God, as the only one He owned, remains absolute and unshaken. He is perfect, absolutely perfect, as man, subjectively. But this is shown in another point. Whatever the sufferings of Christ — notwithstanding the fact, that in His path, there was no cause for His being forsaken, — His testimony to God, His sense of the perfectness of His ways and nature, remains 1 lie same, yea, more elevated. “But thou continuest holy, thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.” Let God abandon the righteous, the rig-hteous One is sure He is perfect in doing so. Nothing can express more completely the perfection of Christ as man, His position as such — how He had taken the place of “my goodness extendeth not to thee.” He is not here contemplating the counsels of God, and understanding their accomplishment, which He had Himself undertaken. It is the dependant man feeling the trial as it reached Himself as man, but perfect and faithful when, as regards His feelings, there was no answer of God in trials, wherein lie counted on it, and it alone was to be counted on.

We can answer the question, “Why hast thou forsaken me?” We shall answer it, who believe in Jesus, with everlasting adoration. But it is of the last importance for us, not only to know that Christ lias, by Himself, purged our sins, having drank the cup of wrath, but to know Christ as suffering personally under this forsaking of God — nis own entrance as man into the sense, as regards Himself, of this forsaken — His own personal Borrow in it; because though He were wholly alone in i(, it leads lis to that joy which He felt in entering, again and more than ever, into the fall, enclouded light of His Father’s countenance — consequent on, and according to, the value of redemption, and the full resting of the necessary delight of God in Him, and His acceptance, as having perfectly glorified Him, when sin had put all in confusion. So that all that God was, as brought out by sin, (for sin brought out sovereign love, righteousness, truth, vindicated majesty,) was perfectsrevealed and glorified. His own sufferings, I say, lead us to that joy into which Christ entered with His God and Father as man; and which, as all this was accomplished in a work wrought for our sins, He communicates to us, introducing us into the full blessedness into which He is entered as man. In the work, He was alone; but it was for us, while for the divine glory; and He introduces us into the blessedness, as that which He enjoys in consequence of it.

This is the second part of the psalm, as to which I will only now refer to the sentiments of Christ. He has been heard from the horns of the unicorn, transpierced by the power of death; God’s judgment against sin being executed and passed. I have remarked, elsewhere, the very instructive fact, that Christ never speaks in the gospels, during His life, of God as His God, but always as the Father. This was the impression of His own personal relationship, the name, too, that He revealed to His disciples. He never directly calls Himself the Christ, in the gospel history; not that He was not presented as such to Israel, for He was, but it is not the place and name He takes Himself with God and His Father, which is the way we have to know Him. When the Jews say to Him, “If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly,”

He says, “I have told you already;” but as revealed to us, lie is Emmanuel, the Prophet that should come, the Son of man, the Sou of God. The word lie uses with, and of God, is ever, Father, and My Father: with His disciples, Son of man. In the psalm we are studying, we read, My God, My God. He is man with whom God deals in judgment, but man, even if forsaken, perfect in his own relationship with God in faith: lie says, My God. Now He declares the name of God to I lis brethren, and employ s both these titles — man gone to the extreme of trial with God, standing as regards all that God is in righteousness, truth, majesty, love. My God — all that God is in His own perfection and majesty, and claim, He is necessarily and obligedly, though in the delight of His love for us as in Christ, doubtless according to His own counsels, but righteously, and thus necessarily, and unalterably for us. What He is as God, He is as our God, for through Christ — Christ proved on the cross — He is for us, and that, sin being put away by Christ’s sacrifice of Himself. The cloudless perfection of God shines out on us, in His own proper blessedness, as on Christ in virtue of His having glorified Him, in the perfection in which He thus shines out. This name, (that is the true reality of this relationship.) is declared to us. The gracious name and nature of God was declared mi earth by Christ, who was the only begotten Sun in the bosom of the Father. But with that, sinful man, at enmity with God, could have no part or association. The light shines in darkness; the darkness comprehended it not. Yea, man saw and hated Him, and His Father, But Christ was made sin for us. F stood as man responsible before God, with God in all these attributes in which He dealt with sin, but was perfect there; that love might righteously have its free course. Hence He. says, “I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!” For He was that love — God, in Christ, reconciling, till it could flow out according to the perfection of God in righteousness; but it could not flow out freely where sin was. This, through the cross, through Christ’s perfection, when He was made sin for us, it could; yea, love was exalted and the very character of God made good in and by it — His name, the very name which was to be revealed, made good by it. Hence Christ could say “therefore doth my Father love me.” But then Christ entered in a still more supreme degree, into the joy of His Father’s love, and all this as man. He does so when heard. It was publicly made good and evident in resurrection. He was raised by the glory of the Father. Then He declares this name to His brethren. For now sin being man’s only place with God, out of Christ, he who believed had, in Christ, Christ’s place as raised from the dead, in the relationship in which He stands with the Father; and, death having come in, no other. Go and tell my brethren, said the Lord, “I ascend to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God.” Now ‘He employs both titles and applies them both to us, both because all that God is, He is in righteousness for Him as man in glory, and He is re-entered into the joy of His Father’s communion, and places us, in virtue of this work, wrought for us, in the position in which He is; as His brethren, partakers of the favour and heritage which is His, through grace.

I have entered more into the doctrine connected with the psalm, than I intended, though it has been practically; for the feelings and affections of Christ are my object now. Remark that the first thought of Christ, when heard from the horns of the unicorn, is to declare the name of God and His Father, to His brethren — now glorious, but not ashamed to call us brethren. Perfect in love, attached to these excellent of the earth, He turns when once He is entered into the position of joy and blessing, through a work which gave them the title to enter, to reveal to them what placed them in the same position with Himself. Thus He gathered them; and then having awakened their voices to the same praise as that which He was to offer, He raises the blessed note as man, and sings praise in the midst of the assembly. Oh with what loud voices and ready hearts, we ought to follow Him! And note he who is not clear in acceptance, and the joy of souship with God, in virtue of redemption, cannot sing with Christ. He sings praises in the midst of the assembly. Who sings with Him? He who has learnt the song, which he has learnt to sing as come out of judgment into the full light and joy of acceptance. The first chapter of Ephesians shows us this place, in verses 3 and 4. Here we have the saints led by Jesus in praise, according to His own joy. The grace of this position is perfect. The further results of the work, I do not enter on here, save to renin rk, that all is grace, no judgment (it is founded on it,) and that nothing goes beyond earth here.