Psalms 78

Section 2. (Psalms 78:1-72; Psalms 79:1-13; Psalms 80:1-19; Psalms 81:1-16; Psalms 82:1-8; Psalms 83:1-18.)The principles applied to Israel’s history. We have had, then, in the first section, the individual principles which manifest themselves in God’s dealings with men in general. The present one gives their application in detail to the history of Israel. The difference between the two sections is plain upon a brief examination. The very first psalm here (the seventy-eighth) takes up the history at large in this way. The eightieth and eighty-first are similar, though more partial in their review. The eighty-second is the setting right of government in Israel, that it may correspond with the divine one: while the last (the eighty-third) gives the great final confederacy against them; which is that He whose Name alone is Jehovah may be manifested as Supreme over all the earth. On the other hand the lack of generalization in this second section is as manifest as is its prevalence in the first. Along with this there lacks also the distinct Messianic character which we have in the seventy-fifth psalm; even God’s controversy with the people as to the rejection of Christ being found elsewhere, and the testimony given here being necessarily the Old Testament history and not the New; this ending, however, in times which are still before us, (in prophecy therefore, not in history,) that “end of the (Mosaic) age”,which we have often had presented to us as being of such intense interest and importance in connection with Israel’s blessing, and God’s disciplinary ways with them in connection with it. The principles brought before us in the first section are, briefly, these: in the seventy-third psalm; the mysterious suffering of the righteous, while the wicked so often flourish: a mystery understood only in the sanctuary, where God’s presence with us is realized on the one hand, and the holiness of His character who is thus present with us, on the other. In the seventy-fourth psalm the wicked one is not only flourishing, but seen in active hostility to God and to His people: a fact which gives, however, assurance of his final overthrow. In the seventy-fifth, all the foundations of the earth being in this way out of course, He must come who will govern for God in consistency with His character, and we must wait for Him. In the seventy-sixth, the whole earth is prostrate before Him: and this realized by faith beforehand, the wrath of man even now is seen to praise Him; nothing being suffered that will not do this. Lastly, the seventy-seventh psalm, in a deuteronomic summing up as to the divine ways, answers the deep perplexity of the soul occupied with these with the assurance that, while they are indeed in the sea at present, so that His footsteps are not known, they are yet in the sanctuary also: that is, not only holy, but in grace towards His people. Essentially, thus, God’s character is maintained as love and light; while it is seen also that as to the world all things are in disorder, and that faith is needed to discern the government of God, which yet exists and has absolute control over every single thing that transpires, and therefore makes all things work for good towards every individual among His people. Love acts, but often in disguise; the allowance of evil becomes a wholesome exercise and discipline for the soul; faith is practised and strengthened; we are called, as Peter tells us, “by glory and virtue” (valor), God developing in us the character which those must have who are by and by to be associated with Him who Himself takes the glory as the end of a path of suffering. Such principles apply, as is evident, to the life of faith in all dispensations, whatever the differences which result from the difference of these. We are to look at them now in their application to Israel’s history, taking in the past and the future for this, as necessary to its completeness. The rejection of Messiah, and the results of this to them; do not indeed appear: the reason for which we may in some measure apprehend, perhaps, but which it is not necessary to enter into now. That there is valid reason for it we may be sure beforehand; and this subject has had already some treatment in both of the preceding books of the Psalms.

Psalms 78:1-72

The consistency of God’s ways, in which His grace is sovereign still. Maskil of Asaph. The seventy-eighth psalm is most fittingly entitled a “Maskil” -an instruction. It surveys the history from Egypt until David: a sufficient sample, man being, as he is, the same at all times; and David’s history being also the type, as we are well aware, of that of his Son and Lord. We can understand, therefore, why with this gleam of brightness the psalm ends; grace in him seen sovereign and victorious, after the long course of failure, as it will be in the end foreshadowed by it. The six sections mark this victory of God’s grace, which is seen in measure all through, while everywhere His holiness and consistency with His character are conspicuous also.

1. The first section gives us God’s provision for His people, illustrated by the one who here addresses them. God is not satisfied with giving a written word to them, necessary as this is, and the basis of everything. His will is that there should be preachers of the Word and of all the works of the Lord of which it testifies and from which it draws its precious instruction. Preachers were to be in every family in Israel, and these preachers not an official class, but the heads of the families themselves. Practically, those who were competent to speak, spoke: the things they heard and knew they were not to hide, and such capacity is always responsibility, and in the nature of things must be, -a responsibility which none can devolve upon another. But let us hear the psalmist. (a) He speaks with the authority of one speaking for God, -with the consciousness of the importance of what he utters. The language of conviction will ever be authoritative, and on that account held for assumptive and dogmatic by those who are either not near enough to God to know the secret of it, or not conscious enough of being afar off to want to change the confusion of twilight for the clear outlines of the day What comfort can there be for the soul, apart from the certainty of what it holds for truth? what happiness in the path, except there is full assurance of this being with God? Surely, none whatever. And the apostle Peter expresses what the goodness of God intends for us when he says: If any one speak, let him speak as oracles of God," that is, as God’s mere mouthpiece: while for the walk the Lord Himself declares: “If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” Thus the blessedness to which we are called is manifest. Oh that we may live up to the full privileges that are ours! He begins then with an exhortation to obedience: “Give ear, O my people, to my law”: or “instruction,” some would say; and that is, indeed, the primary meaning of the word; yet it is that regularly used for “law” (torah), and we must take it at least as implying the authority which truth ever has for the true. This is, in fact, what the numerical structure lays emphasis on the number being that which speaks of sovereignty, supremacy. Therefore, “incline your ears unto the sayings of my mouth.” This “instruction” needs, however, penetration and discernment: “I will open my mouth in a parable I will pour out deep things of old.” It is not, therefore, that only which is unmistakable at first sight that is authoritative. But how many excuse themselves from obedience on just such grounds! Thus Scripture, which is professedly oftentimes “deep,” as here, becomes a thing so far which may be unknown, nay, slighted, without blame. “Deep” things are for the deep, the people who have mind for it, or taste, or learning, or leisure, or all of these! Parables, types, prophecies, the larger part of what they too, with the rest, call “the word of God,” become so much spiritual bric-à-brac, which it is rather a proof of sobriety of mind to do without, or, at least, to value at a low rate. But is the psalmist commending to us these things, or the reverse, when he speaks of them as “deep things” or “parables”? Does he address himself to the many or to the few? to the people as a whole, or to some spiritual aristocracy? after all, not an aristocracy by spiritual qualities, but by natural, or even by circumstantial differences? For there is, let it be known, a spiritual aristocracy, (if you please to call it so,) but it is defined by devotedness and diligence of heart: and where these are found, the race of the prophets still is found, to whom the words of Amos will apply (Amos 3:7): “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets.” When we go on to look at the psalm which is thus characterized, however, we may have difficulty in discussing how it fulfills the titles which are thus given to it. From beginning to end it is historic, -an appeal to facts which we already have in books that are devoted to the “wonderful works” of the Lord in relation to Israel. For God never left such things to tradition merely. What would tradition be in the hands of those whose incompetency every way the history itself demonstrates so absolutely? But this history, being what it is, and of what it is, is just what is suited to utter divine secrets to the heart that is attentive. It is the ways of God put in connection with the men and their ways, to which these apply.

Thus, since we are men, and the same God is ours and theirs, the history becomes a parable or similitude, -something by which, as we compare things together, what we are and what God is to us will be brought out. Thus the very history becomes a mirror for us, not merely of ourselves, but of ourselves in the light of God. How good thus to know ourselves! Then indeed, our own history and the history of God’s people at all times, become united in one glorious whole, which fills the soul with light and blessing. “What we have heard and known,” and what “our fathers have told us” come into the most instructive agreement. Our lives are seen not to be broken and disjointed, and so far, meaningless fragments, but are lifted into significance and power. The actors in all this human history become friends and counsellors. The precepts of the Word are powerfully enforced, illustrated, and fastened in their place by these vivid pictures, all the more fitted to lay hold of us by the exceptional magnitude of the events which come before us in them, -only made plainer, and not distorted by their magnitude. Were we thus more realizing the ways of God with us, the natural consequence would follow that we should be (how much!) more competent witnesses to those that come after us in the same path. “What we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us, we will not hide from their children, showing to the generations to come the praises of Jehovah, and His strength, and His wonderful works that He has done.” This is what secures the blessing that is in it, that it is His praises that are being thus sustained and spread abroad. God is in His place, and thus all else, in the same proportion that He is so. (b) The second part here declares this perpetual testimony to be designed of God, to maintain the memory of His acts and the authority of His commands, in view of the constant proneness upon man’s part to forget. The living voice of the preacher was to make, in the lower sense of this, the Word living. And the preacher was not to be official, but, as we may say, the one everywhere installed by nature. God, as the Author of nature, confirms its appointment. We may now pass on to the history. 2. The second section shows us now, in brief but decisive contrast, the ways of the people and the ways of God. As to the people, this is put in the most general terms, the tribe of Ephraim being taken as their representatives, for reasons which we shall have presently to consider. The ways of God are shown by reference to the great features of His intervention for them in Egypt and the wilderness. The miracles in Egypt are only referred to, and come up for review more fully afterwards; the others are not spoken of again in the psalm. (a) On the people’s side there is not seen merely failure. It is carefully explained that what might seem that was in reality much more. With God, they could not fail. If they did so, it was because they refused to walk in His law. At first sight, what is said of Ephraim also appears as if it were an incident only, but it is not so. Ephraim is but representative of the conduct of all the tribes; their action as typical as they themselves are. When Israel entered the land, it was under the Ephraimite, Joshua. When the ark came first to rest in the land, it was in Ephraimitic Shiloh that it rested. “Shiloh” is the name given to Messiah in Jacob’s prophecy as to the tribes (Genesis 49:1-33), and means He who gives peace": the rest of the ark might well seem to intimate that that peace was now at hand. The tribe of Ephraim, the younger of the brother tribes of Joseph, but in Jacob’s prophecy concerning these (Genesis 48:1-22) exalted to the first place, might well therefore in Joshua’s time claim the leadership in Israel. Reuben had lost the birthright which was his originally, and Joseph, the first-born of Rachel, had gained it: these two sons of his taking place with the sons of Jacob themselves, showing him to have the double portion of the first-born. Every way, therefore, in title as in fact, the preeminence then belonged to Ephraim. But the title under which they inherited the land at that time had, as we well know, one fundamental defect: it was this, that it was held according to the covenant of law, -the covenant which, in ignorance of themselves and of God, they had taken upon themselves to keep. Their failure therefore to hold this title was inevitable; although only by degrees did this become apparent. In Jacob’s blessing of the tribes Judah occupies a large place; but Joseph, it might be claimed, one still larger. If Shiloh is spoken of in connection with. Judah, the Shepherd and Stone of Israel is spoken of in connection with the other: what the connection, might still be doubtful. In Moses’ blessing, Joseph again has undeniably the larger place. No other tribe could claim precedence, if Judah failed. Apart from all typical significance, (which, of course, could not be pleaded in the case,) Joshua, therefore, was the natural leader in taking possession of the land, and might well seem to emphasize the claim of Ephraim. Thus Ephraim comes into the psalm here as the representative tribe: but it is no longer said of him; as of Joseph it had been, “his bow abode in strength.” The language might seem in designed opposition to this: “the children of Ephraim; archers equipped, turned back in the day of encounter.” Equipped they were, and therefore sufficient to have stood. God had not failed them; circumstances were not too strong for them. Nor lacked there any assurance of successful issue. They stood upon ground secured to them by the divine promise: “every place that the sole of your foot shall tread on shall be your own.” Yet in spite of all this, they turned back: it was no mere failure: “they kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in His law; and they forgat His works, and His wonders that He had shown them.” (b) This is a common history, and it was that of the whole nation. Yet what had He not done for them! It was no unknown God who laid claim to their obedience. He had manifested Himself to them in mighty miracles by which He had shaken to its centre what was then the greatest kingdom upon earth, which held them in its cruel grip relentlessly. He had made the sea to yield a path for their escape, the waters standing as a heap while they passed through. He had Himself led them by that which, always the opposite of nature, answered to their need, a cloud by day, the light of fire by night.

In the wilderness He had cleft the rocks for them; at Horeb and at Meribah, and given them drink abundantly, as out of the depths. Nay, He had brought streams out of the rock, and caused the waters to run down like rivers.*
3. (a) The third section shows how the people had sinned in the very presence of God so manifested to them. It was not a later generation merely that did so, with whom the knowledge of these things had grown dim in the years that had elapsed since their recurrence, but the very generation among whom such miracles had been displayed. People scoff now, because they see no miracles; but so they did when the miracles were before their eyes: they sinned yet more against Him, and provoked the Most High in the desert," -there where His supremacy over all nature had been unequivocally demonstrated in their behalf. Miracles did not repress the craving of hearts away from God, for which one thing denied could turn the bounteous Giver into one incompetent to secure the blessing of those with whom He had charged Himself. Yet in the same breath they own what He had already done in bringing water out of the rock. To provide flesh, they thought, was a more difficult thing, and transcended His ability. Thus they turned His hand against themselves: “fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger went up” in the flame that rose against Israel." Unbelief was the only sin with them; as it always has been the sin that provoked judgment: unbelief that came not from lack of evidence, for of that there was abundance, but from wills that rebelled against His easy yoke. (b) As in the book of Numbers, when the people are murmuring about the food which God has given them, and craving flesh, as we are here reminded, the Spirit of God turns to describe this manna which they are rejecting, so now does the psalmist, though in a different manner. He especially dwells upon it as bread from heaven, and then upon the strength given by it, for that is surely what is meant by calling it “the bread of the mighty” -bread that produces might. Nor are we to think of any figurative sense of the words, or any typical significance of the manna itself. The purpose to which he applies the history forbids any thought of this in the case, as is evident. The marvel was great indeed, and fitted to appeal to the heart, that the food which the desert soil denied should come to them from heaven! When we think of the precisely measured quantity, on the sixth day double every other day, following them wherever they journeyed for forty years, until it ceased, just after passing Jordan, -it was a stupendous miracle.

No wonder that imagination should picture it, (as the Septuagint, but not the Hebrew, does) as “angels’ food.” No wonder that it should be really -prepared in such a manner, with such abundant care, -“bread of the mighty”; like the food in the strength of which Elijah went forty days and forty nights, through this same wilderness, “to Horeb, the mount of God.” “Provision to the full” it was, excluding any possible need of any other. And that is the point here. God had provided for them; and how then could that provision be other than perfectly adapted to their need? In fact, it was the food to nourish a race of mighty men. Yet that wilderness-food was but the type of ours. This spiritual manna, what ought it not to produce in us in the way of strength and courage! what spiritual heroes ought we not to be! Nay, we should say rather, what will there not be in this way, if God’s food be really partaken of in faith and simplicity. Communication with Christ, -the entering into that self-sacrificing love which brought Him down to us, and gave Him for our sins! what manner of men must this make of us, in all holy conversation and godliness!

If this be lacking, it is not that God’s provision has failed, for that cannot be, but that we have despised and turned away from it: and who can doubt that this is largely the case now? Plenty of activity in benevolent work there may be, where this is true; and the very enthusiasm for this work which leads professing Christians to associate for such ends with the deniers and despisers of Christ Himself, is the surest evidence of this. (c) The people, however, have turned from the manna: they desire flesh; and, their craving being ungratified, they have questioned even the ability of God to give it. He will not therefore permit this. They shall see that His hand is not shortened, and that the creatures that He has made are subject to Him, though sin has made man a rebel. Once more the powers of heaven therefore are in activity: the east wind unites with the south wind to accomplish His will, and flesh is rained upon them more plentifully than manna was. Nor is there the least trouble in procuring it: it is all round about them; at their very doors: “He let it fall in the midst of their camp, -round about their habitations.” The manifestation of His power and goodness is complete. (d) But this necessarily becomes a new test for the people. God cannot be manifested to them without its being that. What will they do now, when His power and love to them are so perfectly demonstrated? Will they judge themselves for all these murmurings, and give Him the glory due to Him? Have they hearts capable of being touched by this new grace, which comes so entirely in the way which they have themselves indicated for it? Alas, there is no response. This mercy is to them only the satisfaction of their lust. They eat to repletion of the food, hardened and stupefied by it, instead of blest; and the judgment of God falls upon them. It is, in fact, now the only remedy which even mercy knows. Judgment therefore picks out the fat ones, and the choice men of Israel are stricken down: and with what effect? “For all this, they sinned yet, and believed not His wondrous works.” The genesis of unbelief, as rather in the heart than in the head, is perfectly apparent. 4. This ends the detailed story of the wilderness, to which we have only a general reference again (verses 40, 41), and the place is reached in which we may now survey man, this fallen creature. and ask, what is he? It is a question very necessary to be faced and answered, if we ourselves are to go on with God. If we trust in man, it is ourselves we trust in: for we are men. If we trust in ourselves, in that exact proportion will God’s ways be dark to us, and Himself unknown. The Cross it is in which together man finds his judgment, and God manifests Himself in the glory that is His.

If it be not man’s due, then is the cross mere martyrdom; and Christ at best but Prince of martyrs. If it be man’s due, and by a death under His wrath on sin God alone could save us, then how completely must man be put out of sight, in order that there may be a righteous ground for our salvation, -that God may be righteous in it. And Christianity is not the restoration (even by grace) of this ruined creature. It is the setting aside -the crucifixion of the old man, that Christ may be now the New Man, in whom God sees us, and in whom we see ourselves, -that I may live, no longer I, but Christ in me (Galatians 2:20). Faith, which is but the turning of the back on self, being now the only principle of fruitfulness and power, we walk in Christ as we live in Christ. They are the true circumcision who worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh (Philippians 3:3). The review here is of the greatest importance, and we have it with such completeness as man’s history thus far could give it, in seven sections, in which there is not omitted the pitifulness of God’s estimate, while He is truthful in it. True, “He consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror;” yet it was the only thing that would in any wise recall them to Himself: for “when He slew them, then they sought Him, and returned, and sought diligently after the Mighty One.” It was might that they needed to be put forth for them; and the memory of former deliverances wrought with them: “they remembered that God was their Rock, and the Mighty One, the Most High, their Redeemer.” Something now was surely accomplished. Their need had been most real, and the remembrance of God was also real; the days of the Judges come to our mind, when “the children of Israel cried unto Jehovah, and Jehovah raised them up a deliverer.” Yet how constantly had fresh captivity followed deliverance! Alas, it was manifest that when they turned to God it was but halfheartedly: the greatness of their need had constrained them, and not a love responsive to the love that had been shown them. They had flattered Him with their mouth, and lied unto Hint with their tongue, and their heart was not firm with Him, and they were not steadfast in His covenant." What hope then in man, whom judgment brings but to a forced and temporary amendment, and mercies move but to forgetting Him altogether? Yet He went on still in mercy manifest, or chastening with what was mercy in disguise: “He was compassionate, and forgave their perversity, and destroyed them not; and often turned away His anger, and did not stir up all His wrath.” And why? Ah, “He remembered that they were flesh: breath that goeth and returneth not.” Frailty and transience could not be more perfectly characterized than by that which is the sign and accompaniment of the life within man. Flesh, too, is that which in all its waste and renewal teaches the same lesson; while as the lowest part of him; and yet into which he seems altogether sunk, it speaks of ruin, which, to be such for a creature such as man, must be moral ruin. The Lord’s argument from this condition is, that he “must be born again.” 5. The following section shows Israel’s history in conformity with this; and God’s dealings with them until everything seems gone; His link with them broken, the ark in captivity, the priests that served it slain. It is the history of centuries of long-suffering on His part, though compressed in so brief a space. But in truth the elements are few and simple, and the history in its general character monotonous enough. It is prefaced by a longer detail of how he had acted on their behalf in Egypt to deliver them: showing to them and to men at large in impressive detail the complete dependence of all things upon Himself. Hence in the world’s insubjection to Him, the subjection of things to man is lost, and the course of nature is turned against him.

Such lessons learned at the start, how much would have been spared them! How strange that each generation must needs learn by experience what the combined experience of the race has been ineffectual to teach it! Israel is in all this a constant example to us. (a) The wilderness is first of all glanced at, to remind us how they rebelled against Him there, -how “they turned back, and tempted the Most High, and set limits to the Holy One of Israel.” One would imagine rather that it would be said, that they set limits to the Mighty One, -that is, to His power; but the thought is that it is His holiness which, in view of their sin, hinders Him from coming in for them. Is it not so, that God’s “delights are with the sons of men,” and that, as we see in Christ come down among us, He would give free way to His love, but that unbelief on our part forces Him behind the veil, puts “bounds around the Mighty,” in His very love to us? Alas, so can His redeemed ones act, though partakers of a better redemption, that Israel of old should he their sign: for they remembered not His hand, -the day when He redeemed them from the oppressor: how He set His signs in Egypt, His miracles in the field of Zoan." Signs of this kind are for His people to read, that they may escape them. They take effect as to the world, the state of which they reveal as away from God, and the contrast between it and His people; who are yet warned by them of the things “on account of which the wrath of God cometh upon the children of disobedience.” (b) Such an application of the plagues of Egypt follows in the next section: in the very first of which we see, as before remarked, nature rebelling against those in rebellion against God. The river, in its various channels by which the land was watered, and which was the very sign of their independence of heaven, -which they adored as a god, and yet could claim as their own making (Ezekiel 29:3) -things which to all idolatry agree well together, -the river was turned into blood, so that they could not drink of it. The support of life becomes the very symbol of death, and of death by violence, the infliction of the penalty. It is, in fact, not merely the insurrection of nature that is here, but penalty from the Creator of nature -death from the Life-giver. Next, in another order from that in Exodus, and two miracles being classed together to make the lesson clear, -the pride of Egypt is abased by two of the meanest instrumentalities, the “swarms” (no doubt, of insects) and the croakers of the marsh," as the word for frogs seems to mean in Hebrew. Then the fruit of their labor, as that of unclean hands, is put under the ban and destroyed by what Joel calls the army of the Lord. And then nature itself is smitten by that which speaks of the withdrawal of God from it. Afterwards nature as in subjection to and sympathy with man, of which the cattle naturally speak.*
Next, we find “a mission of messengers of ill,” the more open manifestation and fullness of evil as from Him. And then death itself, and by pestilence, as the end of all, closes the list. No doubt, the death of the first-born is here included, though this is given in another connection, separately, as it stands in the book of Exodus itself, apart from the other plagues. (c) We now find Israel put in possession of the land, toward which the death of the first-born is the first decisive step; the deliverance of the people follows, with which is connected God’s guidance of them in the wilderness. The wilderness is no more mentioned. Then we have their safety from the presence of God with them; their enemies being buried in the sea; and then at once they are at the land: “He brought them to His holy border, this mountain which His right hand acquired.” Last comes the governmental award of the land, of which for their sins He dispossessed the nations of Canaan. All this is briefly told, but more effectually for its very brevity. God is now for them, and nothing can even delay His progress, except the unbelief and folly of those with whom He has charged Himself. In fact there was on this account a delay during the lifetime of the whole generation; but this is not now in question, and has indeed been already considered. The psalmist designs all this but as introduction to the story of their defection in the land, after all this power displayed for them. (d) The departure is now, still in the concisest manner, told out. There is nothing new in their course except the new opportunities afforded by the high places of the land: the departure is, first, negative rebellion, “they observed not His testimonies.” Then, more positively and decisively, “they turned back, and dealt faithlessly, like their fathers: they turned aside like a deceitful bow.” The next verse shows a direct attack upon the central worship: high places which the one sanctuary was intended to displace rose up again, and graven images moved the Lord to jealousy. (e) The recompense follows in the next two sections: first of all, in His removal of the profaned sanctuary. Shiloh is given up, and the tent He had in wondrous loving-kindness pitched among men. And He gave His strength" the ark of His strength" (Psalms 132:8) into captivity among the Philistines; and his beauty (or splendor) -still the ark, but in another aspect of it, -into the hand of the oppressor of Israel. Thus God, in every visible sign of relationship, had departed from Israel, and Ichabod, according to the declaration of the dying wife of Phinehas, was written upon the nation at large. Every regularly constituted link was snapped asunder. God might still speak by a prophet, and in fact did so, for this depended upon a grace which was sovereign with Him; His inalienable prerogative, whenever He was pleased to exercise it.

But the established order of things was at an end. Nor was the ark restored to its place till David’s time (1 Chronicles 13:3; Psalms 132:6). (f) If things went on otherwise well, man might feel little, alas, the loss of his great treasure. But because God will not give them up to this, more sensible chastening must ensue. Therefore, in very acknowledgment that in the thoughts of His heart they were still His people, He delivered them up to the sword; their young men were consumed in the fire of His anger, so that the maidens went unwedded. Their priests also fell by the sword, making the sanctuary doubly desolate; and their widows were dumb with a grief that went beyond the grief of widowhood. This is the end, then, in fact, of the legal covenant, in one important aspect of it. The people had failed under it as first given -failed utterly at Sinai itself. Priesthood was then a resource, and with a modification of the first unsparing severity of law, they were put under it a second time, in the hands of a mediator: first, Moses, but then the family of Aaron. Now these, too, had utterly failed, and all was gone once more. Samuel may be in this strait another Moses, and introduce one last method of trial after the legal sort, by the king. But the issue cannot now be any more doubtful, for “as in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man.” The song of Moses had indeed foreseen it all from the beginning; and he who would take God’s estimate of things could never at any time have been in doubt.

Now it was proved, however, by ample experience, in the national history. Thus a momentous conclusion had in fact been reached. Man is “flesh,” and of man in the flesh here is an end. Though David follow therefore in this psalm; this is not put now as if it were a new trial. David is but the expression of a grace in God which will need indeed Another in whom rightly to manifest itself; but the grace is here, and with David in this way seen, the psalmist ends. For faith there is left an open secret, to which his own last words bear witness. (2 Samuel 23:1-7.) 6. The sixth section is clearly therefore a fresh division of the psalm; and not a continuation of the former one. It is also, beautifully, as we know, a trumpet-note of victory after defeat, but the Lord’s victory, and not man’s. And so, exactly, its opening words declare. Two verses are devoted to this thought. (a) The Lord -not Jehovah, but Adonai, the Sovereign Lord -awakes, as the strong figure puts it, as one out of sleep; and His full strength is manifest at once with Him. He is “like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.” The excited energy of man is needed to furnish the figure: “He smote His adversaries backward; an everlasting reproach He inflicted upon them.” (b) But the new grace must have new experience. It must be seen that this is not a reinstating of the old conditions. The first-born, the primacy of nature, is once more rejected. The tent of Joseph is not restored; God’s sovereignty of choice cannot be properly shown out in the taking up again for His abode the tribe of Ephraim. His new relation is one that depends solely upon the love that is in His own heart, and thus Zion becomes unchangeably the destined seat of His earthly kingdom, and Judah the tribe with which this is connected. And now the “tent” correspondingly gives place to a permanent dwelling. He builds as for eternity: “He built His sanctuary like the heights, -like the earth, which He founded for ever.” From these thoughts He has not departed. From this free choice he could not depart. In His counsel Zion is still, according to its name, the “fixed,” and Judah the worshiper. Yet a little while, and His old abode shall he revisited in His love, in a favor no more to be withdrawn, as all the prophets witness. And thus we see how true a beginning of grace is exhibited here. (c) The psalm ends with the “Anointed.” The structure emphasizes this, and not merely the King: though he is King, and must be anointed, to be this. The eyes of the prophet are afar off, though David is in immediate sight: David, the “Beloved,” here too God’s heart has chosen, and will not give up its choice. David, first of all, His servant, proved in the lowly service of the flock, by and by to serve His true flock on the throne: to be shepherd to Jacob -well known as that, yet “His people,” and “Israel His inheritance.” And God’s thought was realized -though but partially indeed -in David. It is easy to hear the Voice that speaks to us in it with how much deeper meaning: “And he tended them after the integrity of His heart, and guided them with the skilfulness of His hands.”