By J.G. Bellet
Psalm 47
The God of Jacob, who had been celebrated in the preceding Psalm in His warrior character, or as God of battles, is in this greeted in a further stage of His glorious ways. His Jewish people here speak as conscious of the place and dignity in the earth to which He has now called them; and He Himself is addressed by them as having come to Zion, and there taken His seat as King of the whole earth; and all the nations are called to worship before Him. He has "gone up." The gates have now lifted up their heads to let this King of glory in. (Psalm 24) Jehovah-Jesus, God of Israel, is now King of all the earth; there is one Lord, and His name one. (Zechariah 14)
Some, competent to speak on such matters, have suggested that in the 9th verse, we should read "the princes of the people have joined themselves to the people of the God of Abraham."
Psalm 48
The same God of Jacob is looked at in a still onward stage of His glory. In the last Psalm He had just "gone up" to His throne, as after victory--here He is seated, as King and Priest, in His temple and on His throne. And because of this, Zion is the joy of the whole earth, as it has just proved itself the terror of all evil confederacies. Hope is now realized, and faith has become sight. "As we have heard, so have we seen."
The beauty of Jerusalem in the day of the glory is celebrated by the prophets, as well as the beauty of Messiah--the comeliness of the city as well as that of the Son of David--of the queen as of the King in the days of the kingdom. (See Ps. 45) So here we are told to walk round her and survey her wall.
Isaiah 60 sets forth her honour and praise in these days. For David and Jerusalem were by ancient decree linked in one covenant of peace and joy,--the Lord of Israel saying, "Howbeit I will not rend away all the kingdom; but will give one tribe for thy son, for David my servant's sake, and for Jerusalem's sake which I have chosen." (1 Kings 11: 13)
Psalm 49
The dealings of the Lord with His Israel having been traced, and their course from sorrow and degradation up to settled glory and joy (Pss. 42-48), the Prophet of God addresses a word of wisdom and admonition to all the world, taking these ways of God with Israel as his text. He seems to look at them as a parable, and in this Psalm gives us the moral or application of that parable. He shows that God resists the proud, but raises the lowly, and that the upright alone have an abiding portion. And this is, indeed, the great moral of the world's history, as well as of Israel's. All shows that what is done "under the sun" is vanity; and that resurrection, comprehending what leads to it in grace, and what follows it in glory, is the only reality. (See Ecc. 12: 13, 14) All honour in the world will perish like the beasts (v. 12). Wise and brutish ones alike die (v. 10). Wealth is unequal to accomplish redemption from corruption (6-9). All beauty, short of that which the God of resurrection imparts, shall be consumed in the grave; but there is a morning to arise for the joy and glory of all who are His (14, 15).
Resurrection will interpret all. It is the Lord's witness. And Israel delivered in the latter day will be Israel as in resurrection.
Psalm 50
This magnificent Psalm presents the Lord conducting the judgment of the house of Israel in the last days. The judgment is set (vv. 1-6), and then the books are opened, and out of them two distinct charges are read, as we shall presently see. The remnant are separated from this judgment by one simple characteristic: "Those who had made a covenant with God by sacrifice." He does not describe them by any lengthened account of what they had either done or suffered for Him; but He speaks of them as believers, as sinners trusting in the blood and sacrifice of the Saviour. This is enough for the purpose. As Jesus, introducing the saints to the notice of the Father, tells of them in the same one character, saying, "They have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me." (John 17)
Jehovah then prefers His charges against Israel. He indicts them for ignorance of His true worship,--in the same particulars as St. Paul charges the Gentiles in his sermon at Athens. (Acts 17) And it is simply this: man in his religion treats God as one who is to be ministered to and to be appeased, instead of as the blessed giver and reconciler himself. This is the grand difference between human and divine religion. God's religion is grace, man's religion is works. Israel had loaded the altar with offerings, but did not use God as a deliverer (7-15). Such is the first charge read out of the books when the judgment is set. The second is then moved against them. It concerns their practical life and conversation, as the former did their religion and worship. It condemns their conduct as astray also. Religious they were, but unrighteous also (16-21).
Upon all this the Lord addresses a word of warning' of rebuke, and of exhortation, that Israel may heed it in time, ere the judgment thus announced enters, and there be no escape. Let them learn the religion of praise, and the conduct of righteousness, and thus be duly and happily on the road to salvation or glory (22, 23).
It is well, we may say on this Psalm, that the heart be established with grace, not with meats. God's sanctuary is furnished with grace,--man's with meats or carnal observances. If it be God's sanctuary we enter, we shall do so with Praise, and leave it to walk in a well-ordered conversation onward to salvation or the kingdom as here shown us. If it be man's sanctuary we enter--the "spirit of bondage" will fill us--"meats" or religiousness will occupy us, but no real renewed devotedness to God. God's truth will free the conscience, and make us happy in Him through boundless riches of grace, and obedient to Him in ways of righteousness. Man's lie or man's religion will keep us in fear, and leave us unrenewed.
Psalm 51
This Psalm appears to come very expressively after the preceding one. It exhibits a soul giving heed to the doctrine and warning delivered there. It is a call on the Lord (50: 15) in the day of trouble--in the day of deepest trouble too--soul trouble. The poor sinner here flees to grace, flees with his burden to God alone. And this is what the rebuke on the legal religion of Israel in the last Psalm would warrant and lead to.
It is not alone the utterance of David, penitent for his sin touching Uriah and Bathsheba, but the utterance of the repentant remnant in the latter day. (See Ps. 38) The confessor brings a broken heart to God--the only present acceptable offering. But when accepted and pardoned, then will his thanksgiving and burnt offering of praise be rendered and received.
And it is in God alone, as I have said, that the afflicted soul here seeks its relief. He repudiates other confidences. Even ordinances are not his refuge. Sacrifices and offerings which he might bring he renounces as the remedy for his guilt; but it is God's washing, God's salvation and righteousness alone he pleads for and looks to.
And this is blessed. For ordinances are resorted to by a convicted soul ofttimes, as a good heart or a good life would be trusted in by a mere moralist. But it is only another, though more subtle, form of self-righteousness.
And further we may observe this Psalm tells us that as God was all David's relief and repose, so was He all David's object: "Against thee, thee only, have I sinned." As he says to Nathan, "I have sinned against the Lord." This was the thought in the heart of the true penitent then, and must be still. And from the history we know that the Lord did become David's object. All his behaviour after his conviction showed this; for he would let the Lord do with him just as He pleased--bring him back to gladness as and when He pleased (2 Sam. 15: 25), and plead for him Himself with his reviler and persecutor. (2 Sam. 16: 12)
How does all this tell us to cultivate the habit of walking with God. "Little to be judged of man's judgment," says the Apostle. May we be so minded! May we desire to prove our own work in God's presence, so that we may have rejoicing in ourselves alone, and not in another! May we give the Lord His place in us! He had no place in Judas's heart, he had in Peter's; He had none in the heart of Saul, He had in David's. And so will He have in the affections of His Israel by and by, when they learn to own their sin against Him, as in the language of this Psalm, while the nation, with apostate heart, will be saying, "It is vain to serve God." (Mal. 3)
