May 5, 2014
Tom Lowe
Psalm 21 (KJV)
Title: Crown Him Lord of All
To the chief musician, A psalm of David.
1 The king shall joy in thy strength, O LORD; and in thy salvation how greatly shall he rejoice!
2 Thou hast given him his heart's desire, and hast not withholden the request of his lips. Selah.
3 For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.
4 He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever.
5 His glory is great in thy salvation: honour and majesty hast thou laid upon him.
6 For thou hast made him most blessed for ever: thou hast made him exceeding glad with thy countenance.
7 For the king trusteth in the LORD, and through the mercy of the most High he shall not be moved.
8 Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies: thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee.
9 Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.
10 Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.
11 For they intended evil against thee: they imagined a mischievous device, which they are not able to perform.
12 Therefore shalt thou make them turn their back, when thou shalt make ready thine arrows upon thy strings against the face of them.
13 Be thou exalted, LORD, in thine own strength: so will we sing and praise thy power.
Introduction
The contents of this psalm tells us that it looks far beyond David to great David’s greater Son. Psalm 21 belongs to that class of psalms we call “Messianic.” Both the Targum, which is the Chaldean paraphrase of the Old Testament, and the Talmud, which is the collection of ancient rabbinic writings on Jewish law and tradition teach that the king mentioned in this psalm is the Messiah. The theme is the ascension of Christ, but it also speaks of God’s judgment upon those who reject Him and His joy over His saved ones. It will show Him as the King of heaven, and picture His coming reign as the King on the earth. This psalm was undoubtedly used in temple worship. It was probably the praise psalm David and his people sang after the victories prayed for in Psalm 20 as they celebrated a day of national thanksgiving. They had prayed for specific blessings and God had granted them. The hymn opens and closes with praise for God’s strength granted to His king and the army (vs. 1, 13).
Since it is a Messianic psalm, it looks forward to the day when the Lord Jesus will return, put down all His foes, cause every knee to bow, and wear the diadem (crown) of the world empire, swaying His scepter from the river to the ends of the earth.
Commentary
1 The king shall joy in thy strength, O LORD; and in thy salvation how greatly shall he rejoice!
Although David is speaking of his personal experience, the primary reference is to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Referring to himself in the third person, David expresses his joy in the victories—the king shall joy in thy strength. He praised God for giving him the desire of his heart (v. 2). In Hebrews 12:2, it is said of the Lord, “. . . He was willing to die a shameful death on the cross because of the joy he knew would be his afterward.” He has ascended into heaven, and—“Now he is seated in the place of highest honor beside God's throne in heaven.” This verse speaks of the joy of Christ over having delivered us from the condemnation of sin and providing for our eternal salvation. He rejoices because of the power and strength that the Father has bestowed upon Him. He has gone to heaven, and the angels and principalities have been made subject to Him. Today, He is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through faith in Him: “Therefore he is able, once and forever, to save everyone who comes to God through him” (Heb. 7:25). The last part of the verse tells of another resource He provides for His saved ones; “He lives forever to plead with God on their behalf.” This is a wonderful psalm.
The word “salvation” in verses 1 and 5 means “deliverance, victory.”
2 Thou hast given him his heart's desire, and hast not withholden the request of his lips. Selah.
The people and their king address the Lord and thank Him for what He did for them in answer to their prayers. David had prayed that his life be spared (v. 4), and the Lord answered him, which this verse clearly shows (Also see 20:1, 6). This blessing was part of God’s covenant with David in 2 Samuel 7:16: “Your dynasty and your kingdom will continue for all time before me, and your throne will be secure forever.”
When the Lord Jesus was here on earth, He prayed this to the Father: “Father, I want these whom you've given me to be with me, so they can see my glory. You gave me the glory because you loved me even before the world began!” (John 17:24). This prayer will be answered in the future when we are with Him. He came to earth to make this possible. His Father has not refused any prayer issued from His lips.
Today, we know how gloriously Jesus triumphed on the cross. “In this way, God disarmed the evil rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross of Christ” (Col. 2:15). Jesus went into death in seeming weakness and defeat. But He went committing His Spirit to God, confident that all His foes were vanquished. He proclaimed it in His departing cry, “It is finished.” So then, the secret of the Kings strength is disclosed.
When we see the word “Selah” we should pause to carefully weigh the meaning of what we have just read or heard, lifting up our hearts in praise to God for His great truths.
3 For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.
4 He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever.
5 His glory is great in thy salvation: honour and majesty hast thou laid upon him.
6 For thou hast made him most blessed for ever: thou hast made him exceeding glad with thy countenance.
The word “prevent” (here “preventest”) in verse 3 means “to see to it beforehand.” The Lord met Joshua before the battle of Jericho (Josh. 5:13-15); and God went before David and “welcomed” him to the battlefield and victory. It is a great encouragement to know that God goes before His obedient people and guides us along the path leading to victory: “For that is what God is like. He is our God forever and ever, and he will be our guide until we die” (Ps. 48:14).
The crown in verse 5 is probably of God’s special “blessings of goodness” (v. 3) upon David (v. 5)—“For you made us only a little lower than God, and you crowned us with glory and honor” (Ps. 8:2). If a real crown is meant, it is probably the crown of an Ammonite king (2 Sam. 12:30{4]). To David, the victory God gave was like a second coronation, assuring that he was indeed God’s anointed. “Length of days forever” (v. 4) and “blessed forever” (v. 6), remind us of God’s covenant with David that was ultimately fulfilled in Christ—“Don't be frightened, Mary," the angel told her, "for God has decided to bless you! You will become pregnant and have a son, and you are to name him Jesus. He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. And he will reign over Israel forever; his Kingdom will never end!” (Lk. 1:30-33).
The Lord Jesus Christ came to give His life a ransom for many down here. On earth you find Him in humiliation, and you find Him pleading again and again in prayer. He agonized in the Garden of Gethsemane. Psalm 102:23-24 says of the Lord: “He has cut me down in midlife, shortening my days. But I cried to him, "My God, who lives forever, don't take my life while I am still so young!” He asked for life. He died in the very prime of life. He was 33 years old. He prayed, “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will, not mine” (Lk. 22:42). In Hebrews 5:7 we are told: “While Jesus was here on earth, he offered prayers and pleadings, with a loud cry and tears, to the one who could deliver him out of death. And God heard his prayers because of his reverence for God.” How was He heard? He died! But God raised Him from the dead. Now He lives in His glorified human body for ever and ever. He is now at God’s right hand. “His glory is great in thy salvation.” Oh, the glory that is due Him because He saved you, and He saved me!
I said previously that David understood the secret of the Messiah’s strength, but he also saw three things resulting from the King’s secret of strength.
1. Sovereignty (v. 3)
When Jesus comes back to reign, riding His white horse to the battle of Armageddon, He will be wearing many crowns—“His eyes were bright like flames of fire, and on his head were many crowns. A name was written on him, and only he knew what it meant” (Rev. 19:12). Absolute, omnipotent sovereignty is to be His and His alone. David is looking forward to this: “thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.”
2. Salvation (vs. 4-6)
The King’s secret of strength also results in salvation, everlasting, ennobling, and exciting salvation. God did save Him in that He brought Him back in triumph from the tomb and gave Him life, “even length of days for ever and ever” (v. 4). Eternal life! It’s all bound up in the crown-rights of Jesus. It’s a life filled with honor, majesty, happiness, and bliss. Life on God’s terms! The years when Jesus reigns on this planet will be the most exciting years in all the history of mankind.
3. Security (v. 7)
The king’s trust in God is twofold: it is in God as Jehovah and in God in His character of Elyon. His trust is in God as the God who redeems His Word and as the God who rules the world. It is in Jehovah, the God of promise, the God of covenant, the God who never fails to redeem His given Word. His trust in Elyoh, the God of possession, the possessor of Heaven and earth, the One alone has the ultimate right to divide up the nations.
No wonder Jesus turned down Satan’s offer! “All these,” Satan promised, “All these kingdoms, with their glitter, glamor and government—all these will I give thee, if thou will fall down and worship me.” The whole offer was a gigantic fraud; Satan could give no guarantee that the kingdom he offered would be secure. But God does, and it is from Him that Jesus receives the throne. So there it is—the secret of the Kings strength is rooted and grounded in God himself.
7 For the king trusteth in the LORD, and through the mercy of the most High he shall not be moved.
8 Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies: thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee.
9 Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.
The reason for this great deliverance in answer to prayer is that the king trusted in the unfailing love of the Lord Most High. The king trusted in the Lord (v. 7) and so did the people, and they affirmed their faith as they addressed these words to the king. The emphasis now changes from past victories to anticipation of future victories (vs. 7-12) God will now give David and Israel because they have faith in the living God—“Some nations boast of their armies and weapons, but we boast in the LORD our God” (Ps. 20:7). “God’s right hand” (v. 8) is more than a symbol of power; it actively works for His people and brings defeat to their enemies (Ps. 89:13{1]). “Find out” (v. 8) means “dispose of.”
We have a rather anemic view of God today, because we have lost sight of the righteousness and holiness of God. We have forgotten that God’s holiness is outraged at man’s sin, that the Bible says that God is angry at the wicked every day. The psalmists and the prophets of the Old Testament never lost sight of that side of God’s character.
We are not living in the day of wrath today, but in the day of grace. However, there is to be a day of wrath. After the rapture of the Church, the Day of Judgment will begin, and God will passionately destroy those that destroy the earth and persecute His people. War, famine, pestilence, persecution, earthquake—these are all weapons available to Him. The man who refuses the forgiveness of God will have to face the fury of God.
Not only is He a God of salvation, but because of His death upon the cross for sinners, He is a God of Judgment. Those who have rejected Him are His enemies. You say you don’t believe there is a hell. The Bible teaches it. If you don’t believe there is a hell, you are in disagreement with the Bible.
Hell is not a pleasant subject. Who said it was? God does not take any delight in the lost. God’s judgment is called His strange work. His wonderful work is salvation. He wants to save. If you won’t come to Him His way, or if you don’t want His salvation, then there is nothing but judgment that remains.
“Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them (v. 9). This verse is clear. Fire is fire, and judgment is judgment. Just as fire devours what it touches (Ps. 79:5{2]), so the Lord will devour David’s enemies like a cook burns fuel under a stove. The nation of Israel and David’s posterity would be preserved (Ps. 18:50{3]), but there would be no future for their enemies. He will also destroy their offspring from off the face of the earth, and their descendents from the human race. “Fruit” (v. 10) refers to posterity.
The phrase “he shall not be moved” (v. 7) asserts that while he reigned, David would not be shaken by his enemies, because his faith was in the Lord (v. 7)—“I know the LORD is always with me. I will not be shaken, for he is right beside me” (Ps. 16:8). What a comforting verse this is! Just imagine that the Lord is always so close—right beside you! This declaration of faith is the central verse of psalm 7.
10 Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.
11 For they intended evil against thee: they imagined a mischievous device, which they are not able to perform.
12 Therefore shalt thou make them turn their back, when thou shalt make ready thine arrows upon thy strings against the face of them.
13 Be thou exalted, LORD, in thine own strength: so will we sing and praise thy power.
God did give David many victories and He greatly extended Israel’s borders and brought peace to the kingdom. The nations might get together and plot against him, but David would still win the battle.
In this marvelous psalm we see Christ’s cross and suffering. He endured the cross “. . . because of the joy he knew would be his afterward” (Heb. 12:2). His prayers have been answered. Now the king is in heaven. We see Him there crowned in glory and honor. He is there on behalf of His people. He is there in unspeakable joy and waiting for His manifestation and kingly glory.
Also, this psalm gives us a picture of judgment, which is amplified greatly in the Book of Revelation. That is a serious picture that is given to us there. Paul the apostle mentions it also in 2 Thessalonians 1:7-8: “And God will provide rest for you who are being persecuted and also for us when the Lord Jesus appears from heaven. He will come with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, bringing judgment on those who don't know God and on those who refuse to obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus.” This is a picture of the Lord coming in judgment upon His enemies. 2 Thessalonians 1:9-10 goes on to say: “They will be punished with everlasting destruction, forever separated from the Lord and from his glorious power when he comes to receive glory and praise from his holy people. And you will be among those praising him on that day, for you believed what we testified about him.” In the Garden of Olivet, Christ’s gentle “I am He” overthrew the soldiers (John 18:6). How will it be when the wrath of the Lamb flames against His enemies—who shall be able to stand? (Rev. 6:16{5])
This is a glorious psalm of the ascension of Christ. What is your relationship to Him today? If He is not your Savior, if you have not trusted the One who came down here to die, then judgment is coming upon you someday. But today He is filled with joy up yonder at God’s right hand, because He has provided for your salvation and for mine. This wonderful ascension psalm makes very clear the glorious grace of God in Christ Jesus.
As in 20:9, the psalm concludes with a statement addressed to the Lord and expressing praise for His greatness. David fought battles and won victories, not to exalt himself, but to magnify the Lord, and his people knew this. David showed the same spirit as a youth when he killed the giant Goliath (See 1 Sam. 17:36, 45-47). Psalm 20 closes with David and the people asking God to hear their prayers, and psalm 21 closes with the prayer that God would be “lifted up on high” and exalted. “ . . . But I will honor only those who honor me” (1 Sam. 2:20).
“Be thou exalted, LORD!”—Every loyal heart must join in that devout wish. But we must ask ourselves if we have exalted Him in the inner kingdom of our heart. God has exalted Him to be Prince and Savior; and we shall not have peace until we have done the same (Acts 5:31{6]). And so, once again, we are made to see a “Messianic hope” sounding forth on this happy occasion, the hope that someday a true and sinless King will come who will truly be the right hand of God.
A coronation Psalm?
While it cannot be proved beyond question that some of the psalms were written to be sung at the coronation of Israel’s kings, some even for the occasion when the king was recrowned on the anniversary of his coronation, we shall assume that that is possible in the case of this psalm. With that in view, let’s note the following issues arising from the psalm:
i. The king himself is not worshipped, as he was, say, in Egypt.
ii. The king rejoices in the strength of the Lord, not in his own strength.
iii. God has been gracious to the king throughout the past year, and has answered his prayers. This is what Solomon discovered. (See 1 Ki. 3:11).
iv. God had responded to his deepest needs, and fulfilled his inner most longings, and brought good even out of his stained behavior in the past.
v. God had gone ahead of him with goodly blessings. This is the word meet (v. 3). The king, as a human being, is traveling down the road of life in the one direction all of us must go, from birth to death. But now God has reached down out of eternity and has met him coming from the other direction, so to speak.
vi. The king does not crown himself. It is the Lord who is King, not he. On the other hand, the king is head of all Israel. He sums up all the people in himself. In this way, then, ordinary people learned that the Lord God is also King of Israel, and even more so!
vii. He asked for life, as we all do, and got love as well! He asked for human life and received immortal life (See 2 Sam. 7:15).
viii. God had now illuminated his life with something of His own glory, just as He had done before to Moses (Ex. 34:29, 35). Actually the splendor of the royal buildings and of the temple was a gift from God in all His splendor.
ix. But above all, his great reward was God’s personal presence in his life (v. 6). There are those today who suppose that one has to go out and search for faith—even go off to India and set at the feet of a guru in order to find salvation for one’s soul. Our psalmist would have been puzzled at such unbelief. God, he knew had chosen and called this king, and had promised to make him most blessed for ever. So all that the king had to do was simply accept the miracle with joy: “For the king trusts in the Lord.”
x. From all this and the fact that the king was the king and head of Israel, all Israel was thus being reminded that they two had been chosen, and that God was making them most blessed forever; for they two “trusted in the Lord.”
SCRIPTURE REFERENCE AND SPECIAL NOTES
{1] (Ps. 39:18) Powerful is your arm! Strong is your hand! Your right hand is lifted high in glorious strength.
{2] (Ps. 79:5) O LORD, how long will you be angry with us? Forever? How long will your jealousy burn like fire?
{3] (Ps. 18:50) You give great victories to your king; you show unfailing love to your anointed, to David and all his descendants forever.
{4] (2 Sam. 12:30) David removed the crown from the king's head, and it was placed on David's own head. The crown was made of gold and set with gems, and it weighed about seventy-five pounds. David took a vast amount of plunder from the city.
{5] (Rev. 6:16) And they cried to the mountains and the rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of the one who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb.
{6] (Acts 5:31) Then God put him in the place of honor at his right hand as Prince and Savior. He did this to give the people of Israel an opportunity to turn from their sins and turn to God so their sins would be forgiven.
