By J.G. Bellet
Psalm 56
This is still the cry of the same sufferer, by reason of the pressure of the same enemy. He is here under the sense of being completely shut up, having no present resources, while his enemies are many, their plots against him daily, their enmity to him the subject of all their thoughts. Gatherings, hidings, and waitings of them against him are now what he sees or apprehends continually.
The word or promise of God is all his resource--not present strength, but the word of promise--God's remembrance of him; God's bottling of his tears; telling his wanderings or sorrows. This is all he has now, the remembrance of God, as Noah had it in the ark, (Gen. 8: 1), and as this same afflicted people will have by and by, according to Malachi's anticipation of them. (Mal. 3: 16) The word is the hope of the sufferer here, and he assures himself that the chief occasion of his praise by and by will be the word also, or the accomplishing of what he now believes and hopes. As the apostle says, "I know whom I have believed." It is not that there is present deliverance, but there is promise, and faith can listen to that and receive it as the pledge of future praise.
Such should just be the state of our souls. They should rest in the promises, knowing that they will be made good, and become the theme of constant delight. We are never straitened in "the word" or the promises. They are all we want. We need only the faith to enjoy them with full ease of heart. As this poor sufferer anticipates occasions of praise and the payment of his vows, in the light of the living.
Psalm 57
The spirit of this Psalm is much like that of the preceding, and is another utterance, without doubt, of the same sufferers, at the same season.
There are fuller and brighter anticipations of deliverance here; and there is, as afterwards in Psalm 144, expectation of that deliverance by some mission or ministry "from above," or from heaven. The scene in Rev. 19 is the answer of this expectation: there the heavens open to let down the deliverer here desired and expected.
How this collection of Psalms, contemplating strongly, as has been said, the wilful king or apostate of the last days, presents the sorrows of God's people in this world! Indeed all Scripture does,--"we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God." How could the Christ or the saints of God count but on resistance and martyrdom in a world that ever abides in full enmity against Him. "No man should be moved by these afflictions, for yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto."--"As it were, appointed unto death." But it is rest that remaineth. And so this Psalm blessedly anticipates God's exaltation, and His people's praise and songs, when the enemy is gone for ever--when the divine "mercy and truth" and the mission "from above" have accomplished the deliverance. The saint prepares his instrument for a thankful song to the Lord--as David prepared music for the days of Solomon. (1 Chr. 25)
Psalm 58
The rulers and judges of the earth are challenged, as again in Ps. 82. But they are here called "sons of men" (see John 5: 27); but there, "gods."
Under their hand, the world is left in all its native wickedness. The evil state of it is awfully described; and the Prophet calls solemnly for judgment upon them.
And there is this also set forth in the Psalm--the ground of the triumph of the righteous when the judgment of the world comes. We have that triumph itself, for instance, in Isa. 30: 32, and in Rev. 19: 1. But here we have the ground or principle of all that righteous joy in the judgment of God. "The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance: he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked, so that a man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous: verily He is a God that judgeth in the earth." The saint could not as yet, in this present dispensation, triumph in judgment, because the Lord is publishing His name and praise in grace; but by and by he will learn to triumph in it, because the Lord will vindicate His divine glory by vengeance, and establish His government of "the world to come" by the judgment of "this present world."
All this is perfect in its season. We now rejoice in the redeeming grace of our kinsman; by and by we shall be able to triumph in the avenging power of the same kinsman. For both belonged to the Goel under the law, and both are the ways of our Jesus in their seasons Rev. 5 shows the saints in the first of these joys or triumphs; Rev. 19 shows them in the second.
This judgment of the earth and its gods or rulers will not, of course, take place till the apostate or wilful one of the last days be manifested. So that this Psalm is the utterance of the Spirit of God in the Remnant, and contemplates the same time and circumstances as the preceding ones, as we have seen from Psalm 52.
Psalm 59
This is still the cry of the same godly, consciously innocent sufferer, against the confederacy of mighty wicked ones, who, in infidel pride, despise the judgments of God. They are called "the heathen," regarded as infidel, while God is all the hope of the poor afflicted one. The language may remind us of Psalm 2: 1, and Joel 3: 12. It is to be read as the cry of the suffering Remnant in the latter day against the confederacy. Signal judgment upon it is sought for (v. 11); as Jesus desires the same on His Jewish persecutors, in Ps. 69. And as the Jewish nation are at this present time under signal judgment, so will this Gentile confederacy be in the coming day of vengeance. (See Isa. 66: 24)
The disappointment of the enemy is strikingly conceived in verses 14, 15, contrasted with their temporary advantage in verse 6. In their prosperity they belched through satiety, but now they grudge as unfed beasts.
The morning comes for the joy of the Remnant, after the evening rapine of these unclean ones has ended in their destruction (v. 16).
Messiah, to whom "the people" belong (v. 11), seems to lift up this cry for His Remnant against "all the heathen." And His confidence in God is strongly expressed in the cry He utters, and in spite of the enemy's strength and malice.
Psalm 60
Here the Jewish Remnant desire the return of the Lord's countenance, which, as we know (Isa. 8: 17), is now turned away from Israel. And they are conscious that till then, the earth will all be out of order. For Israel is the centre of the Lord's earthly arrangements
Zion is the place of His earthly rest.
They own that they had been drinking the wine of astonishment, or gathering the bitter fruit of God's righteous displeasure. But in the midst of all that, they equally own that those who had continued in His fear had known Him, because of His truth and faithfulness, to be a banner to them.
With increased confidence they claim the hopes of beloved ones (verse 5). Then God answers from the sanctuary. Their cry awakens Him, as it were, to a sense of His glory, or inheritance in the earth. For He now surveys His earthly possessions. Shechem, Succoth, Gilead, Manasseh, and distant parts of Moab and Philistia are now owned by Him, and He triumphs in the sight of His glory. He rejoices over them all as His possession, anticipating, in the midst of this, His insultation over Edom. This may call to mind the exulting action of the mighty angel (Christ) in Rev. 10: 1-3; He there anticipates His inheritance of the earth in a spirit of triumph.
And thus it often is. The touch of the poor woman in the crowd at once awakened Jesus, and the repentance of the prodigal opened new joys in the Father's house. And so here. The desires of the Remnant, the hopes and claims of the beloved one uttered on earth, call God's thoughts toward His possessions here, and give Him a joy and triumph over them.
Messiah, on listening to this voice in the sanctuary, in spirit enters this scene of deep and strong affections, longing for the day of battle in the land of Edom, over which His shoe is to be cast. (See Isa. 63: 1) He is "expecting till His enemies be made His footstool." He is zealous to meet the enemy, assured of victory through the help of the God of Israel.
