Psalm 69: 1 – 36
No tidings of comfort or joy
To the Chief Musician. Set to “The Lilies.” A Psalm of David.
1 Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. 2 I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing; I have come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me. 3 I am weary with my crying; My throat is dry; My eyes fail while I wait for my God. 4 Those who hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of my head; They are mighty who would destroy me, being my enemies wrongfully; Though I have stolen nothing, I still must restore it. 5 O God, You know my foolishness; And my sins are not hidden from You. 6 Let not those who wait for You, O Lord GOD of hosts, be ashamed because of me; Let not those who seek You be confounded because of me, O God of Israel. 7 Because for Your sake I have borne reproach; Shame has covered my face. 8 I have become a stranger to my brothers, and an alien to my mother’s children; 9 Because zeal for Your house has eaten me up, and the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on me. 10 When I wept and chastened my soul with fasting, that became my reproach. 11 I also made sackcloth my garment; I became a byword to them. 12 Those who sit in the gate speak against me, and I am the song of the drunkards. 13 But as for me, my prayer is to You, O LORD, in the acceptable time; O God, in the multitude of Your mercy, hear me in the truth of Your salvation. 14 Deliver me out of the mire and let me not sink; Let me be delivered from those who hate me, and out of the deep waters. 15 Let not the floodwater overflow me, nor let the deep swallow me up; And let not the pit shut its mouth on me. 16 Hear me, O LORD, for Your lovingkindness is good; Turn to me according to the multitude of Your tender mercies. 17 And do not hide Your face from Your servant, for I am in trouble; Hear me speedily. 18 Draw near to my soul and redeem it; Deliver me because of my enemies. 19 You know my reproach, my shame, and my dishonor; My adversaries are all before You. 20 Reproach has broken my heart, and I am full of heaviness; I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; And for comforters, but I found none. 21 They also gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. 22 Let their table become a snare before them, and their well-being a trap. 23 Let their eyes be darkened, so that they do not see; And make their loins shake continually. 24 Pour out Your indignation upon them, and let Your wrathful anger take hold of them. 25 Let their dwelling place be desolate; Let no one live in their tents. 26 For they persecute the ones You have struck and talk of the grief of those You have wounded. 27 Add iniquity to their iniquity and let them not come into Your righteousness. 28 Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous. 29 But I am poor and sorrowful; Let Your salvation, O God, set me up on high. 30 I will praise the name of God with a song and will magnify Him with thanksgiving. 31 This also shall please the LORD better than an ox or bull, which has horns and hooves. 32 The humble shall see this and be glad; And you who seek God, your hearts shall live. 33 For the LORD hears the poor and does not despise His prisoners. 34 Let heaven and earth praise Him, the seas and everything that moves in them. 35 For God will save Zion and build the cities of Judah, that they may dwell there and possess it. 36 Also, the descendants of His servants shall inherit it, and those who love His name shall dwell in it.
Today’s selected verse for our consideration is verse 20, “Reproach has broken my heart, and I am full of heaviness; I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; And for comforters, but I found none.”
As we have just finished off the Christmas holidays and thinking of today’s scripture my thoughts steered to composing a poem which I call ‘No tidings of comfort or joy.’
You came into our office hopping on a bum leg.
You said if not for charitable assistance you’d surely have to beg.
I’ve got bad news for you
but there’s some good news too.
All we have here are some restaurants, chain stores, and grocery store gift cards.
But since now they have closed all that remain I am afraid are their security guards.
You said you were disabled and if you can’t get help that you would die.
But our team of crack financial managers have determined that excuse is a lie.
They tell me there are lots of jobs if one really wanted to work
Even for someone that says he has a physical problem can at least be a store clerk.
I regret that your request has been denied.
However we have great faith that you will still get by.
We regret that we cannot offer any joy or comfort on this Christmas Eve.
So let me walk you to the exit because I am late for a dinner and now I surely must leave.
To the Chief Musician. Set to “The Lilies.” A Psalm of David.
We have here another Psalm dedicated to the chief musician or choirmaster and set to ‘Lilies’.
The thought in the Psalm indicates that the Psalmist was clearly going through deep searchings of heart, with his mind in turmoil as he switches rapidly from one idea to another. This is no calm soliloquy, but the cry of a man under pressure.
The Psalm divides up as follows:
1). The Psalmist pleads with God to deliver him from those who would dishonor him (verses 1-6).
2). He draws attention to the fact that he is being persecuted because of his loyalty to God and His House (verses 7-12).
3). He intensifies his cry for assistance, declaring his dependence on God as a saving God (verses 13-18).
4). He describes to God the inhuman behavior of his persecutors (verses 19-21).
5). He outlines their behavior and calls on God to bring on them the judgment that they deserve (verses 22-28).
6). He looks forward with confidence to God’s deliverance for both himself and his persecuted followers and calls on creation to praise God because He will deliver Zion and rebuild the cities of Judah on behalf of those who are truly His (verses 29-36).
1 Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. 2 I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing; I have come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me.
The stark nature of the opening cry brings out the depths of feeling that the Psalmist is experiencing. He is in great distress and feels that he is going under. He feels that only God can help him. So, he reaches out desperately, crying from the heart for deliverance. ‘Save me O God!’ No one can help me but You.
He pictures himself swallowing water like a drowning man as he is carried under the waves. Life is choking him, and he feels himself to be sinking and going under, something which most of us experience at one time or another, especially if we are engaged in spiritual battles. He is drowning with no one to help him.
He feels that he is being swallowed up as in a swamp or quicksand, desperately seeking solid ground as he sinks and is unable to find a firm footing. Such swamps and quicksand were a common feature in Palestine, especially round the Jordan from Dan to Tiberias.
His thought is also of wading through a river and suddenly encountering a deep spot and finding himself floundering in deep waters.
The overall picture is of a man wallowing in deep waters, swallowing large amounts of water and choking, unable to find firm ground for his feet, and finally fully immersed in water, and finally feeling that he is drowning.
3 I am weary with my crying; My throat is dry; My eyes fail while I wait for my God.
Meanwhile he cries out to the only One Whom he feels can help him. He cries out to God continually, and he does so until he is wearied with the effort, and his throat is parched. But God does not always answer immediately and the waiting gets to him, and his ‘eyes fail’. He is discouraged and does not know where to look.
4 Those who hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of my head; They are mighty who would destroy me, being my enemies wrongfully; Though I have stolen nothing, I still must restore it.
He now provides a reason for his distress. He is undeservedly hated by large numbers of his compatriots, who are seeking to destroy him. They are so many that they are more than the hairs on his head, in other words they are a great many. And what is more they are powerful and with great influence. As a consequence, they are stripping him of everything, not only what they think he has wrongfully taken, but also his own personal possessions.
5 O God, You know my foolishness; And my sins are not hidden from You.
David does not deny that he also has been at fault. He openly admits to God that he has been foolish and has to some extent brought his problems on himself. He thus admits to God that he had sinned. He dares not claim total innocence, for he knows his heart too well.
So, a lesson for us is that if we would seek the Lord’s help with confidence we must always be ready to acknowledge our own failings and weakness, and to own up to where we have been at fault. David’s point is that he had been somewhat at fault, but not to the extent that his enemies claimed.
6 Let not those who wait for You, O Lord GOD of hosts, be ashamed because of me; Let not those who seek You be confounded because of me, O God of Israel.
He is especially concerned lest through his own folly others of God’s servants might be put to shame, and he prays that those who seek God might not be dishonored because of what he has done. He prays to ‘the sovereign Lord, YHWH of hosts’, and to Him as ‘the God of Israel’. He seeks both to draw on His power, and to shelter them in the covenant between God and Israel.
He recognized that what he was facing had partly arisen because he had been so zealous for God’s truth and worship. Thus, David claimed that part of the reason for his suffering was because of his zeal for the house of God, and that a consequence of it was that he was secretly mocked because of his religious activities.
Those who dedicate their lives to God, and then live by it, will usually find this to be the case. A little zeal for ‘religion’ can be tolerated. But to base your life on it is seen as going too far. Everything you do is watched, and your Christian activities derided, especially when they involve what is seen as eccentric. And in many countries becoming a Christian result in being ostracized.
7 Because for Your sake I have borne reproach; Shame has covered my face.
He points out to God that he has been reproached and put to shame for His sake. Because of his true love for God, and because of his zeal in worship, he had been opening to being mocked behind his back. He had become a subject of derisive comment. And boy did it hurt.
8 I have become a stranger to my brothers, and an alien to my mother’s children;
Even his whole blood brothers had distanced themselves from his activities. It was as though he was a stranger to them.
9 Because zeal for Your house has eaten me up, and the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on me.
And much of it was because of his zeal for the ‘house’ of God, which would at this time be the ornate tent that he had set up at Jerusalem which contained the Ark of the Covenant. His zeal may have expressed itself in opposition to some unseemly practices or symbols which were being introduced which he saw as alien to the Torah, and which were thus a reproach to God, but which were popular, or it may have been because insisted on requirements which they saw as too stringent.
The consequence of his zeal was that he had been ‘eaten up’. that is, ‘devoured’. All that had been taken from him. He was a fugitive. His zeal had caused him to be ‘eaten up’ (‘devoured’) by his adversaries. The idea of being ‘eaten’ by people in the sense of being caused harm or being in danger of death from them. It occurs for example in 14.4; 53.4, as ‘they eat up My people as they eat bread’.
The Psalmist was aware that much of what was happening was because his adversaries were ‘reproaching God’ by preferring their own way of worship to God’s, or by merely nominal worship, which is an insult to God. They were against purity of religion, and against David’s attempts to maintain it. They perverted religion to their own ends and tried to justify it by arguing that God’s way as revealed in the Torah was unsustainable and unreasonable. And because David stood firmly by the word of God, they poured out their reproaches on him.
Men have been doing this with true Christianity for 2,000 years. When the medieval Roman Catholic church put tradition before Scripture, they persecuted those who wanted to return to Scriptural truth. Many a martyred reformer could say, ‘zeal for your house has eaten me up’.
10 When I wept and chastened my soul with fasting, that became my reproach. 11 I also made sackcloth my garment; I became a byword to them.
He now describes three activities which brought reproach on him, and which were examples of his zeal for God. The first was weeping over sin, the second was fasting and the third was wearing sackcloth and ashes. They were activities which his adversaries could not understand in a king. He was expected to be above such things as YHWH’s anointed. The weeping should be left to those who had come into his disfavor. The fasting to those who were desperate. Their idea of religion was that it was a useful prop, but not something that should be taken too seriously, especially if you were well off. Let the poor weep, and fast and wear sackcloth, they thought. For the noble such things were demeaning.
So, when David wept over his sins, or his people’s sins, or fasted as a sign of mourning and repentance, he came under their reproach. ‘Such things diminished his authority,’ they whispered. ‘They tarnished the image of his royalty.’ And they despised him in their hearts.
The world will always mock those who lay emphasis on repentance and who truly repent. To them it is unnecessary and demeaning. But the Christian recognizes that it is at the heart of his experience with God. God is great and holy and just, and we are weak sinners before Him. Thus, even the most important of men are not above repentance, for they too must remember that they are dealing with an offended God and Judge.
When he wore sackcloth in repentance over sin they talked about him behind his back, demeaning him. He became a byword to them. It became a joke. Absalom had no doubt drawn the attention of the people to such ‘weaknesses’ in David’s royalty, making clear that they would never see him demeaning himself like that.
12 Those who sit in the gate speak against me, and I am the song of the drunkards.
Because of his piety he became the talk of the town. Those who gathered at the open place in and around the city gateway whispered to each other and mocked him, and the drunks sang insulting songs about him. It was in the city gateway that Absalom spoke to those who gathered there or came through it, making clear what a superior king he would be (2 Samuel 15.1-6). And so, the whisperings would continue. They suggested that David was too interested in his religion and in his psalm singing to bother much about the people. And so, they talked about him disparagingly, and made up drunken rude songs about him. What a contrast these drunken rude songs were to the psalms that came from his pen. As Paul would say, ‘do not be drunk with wine but be filled with the Spirit’ (Ephesians 5.18).
With intensity of feeling he calls on God as ‘a saving God’, a God of salvation, and thus prays to be delivered, and not swallowed up by the things that sought to drown or destroy him. He calls attention to God’s covenant love and declares his dependence on it, calling on Him to redeem Him from his troubles.
13 But as for me, my prayer is to You, O LORD, in the acceptable time; O God, in the multitude of Your mercy, hear me in the truth of Your salvation.
Those who sat in the gate talked scandal and listened to the voice of drunkards. In contrast David talked with YHWH and listened to His voice. ‘As for me,’ he said, ‘my prayer is to you.’ But he recognized that God would not always answer immediately. God has greater purposes than we know. And so, he asked for a response ‘in the time that pleases You’. Yet at the same time he had the certainty that God would answer him, because God was bound by His covenant love. God was the God with Whom he was in covenant. Thus, in the abundance of that covenant love, a love which knew no bounds, he was confident of response at the due time. History had demonstrated that God had always saved those who trusted in Him, and so God’s saving power and purpose was a firm truth to which he could hold. God’s salvation was no arbitrary or doubtful thing. It was true as steel. It was one of the great realities about God. And it was on this basis that he called for an answer.
14 Deliver me out of the mire and let me not sink; Let me be delivered from those who hate me, and out of the deep waters. 15 Let not the floodwater overflow me, nor let the deep swallow me up; And let not the pit shut its mouth on me.
We must not lose sight of the fact that David was still overwhelmed by what was happening and was praying out of deep intensity of feeling. He felt as though his world was collapsing around him. At times when we feel the same we, if our trust is in Him, can join with him in this prayer with the same confidence of delivery in due time.
He felt himself being sucked down by a quagmire and prayed desperately that he might not finally sink into oblivion. He was surrounded by hate, and the activities that resulted from that hatred. And he wanted to be delivered from the consequences of that hate. It was like floodwater that was threatening to overwhelm him. It was like a deep sea that wanted to swallow him up. It was like being in a deep pit which threatened to close about him.
16 Hear me, O LORD, for Your lovingkindness is good; Turn to me according to the multitude of Your tender mercies. 17 And do not hide Your face from Your servant, for I am in trouble; Hear me speedily.
In his distress he cried out for an answer, on the basis of the soundness of God’s covenant love. And his hope was that in the multitude of His tender mercies God would turn to him.
18 Draw near to my soul and redeem it; Deliver me because of my enemies.
With a deep sense of need he cried out for deliverance. He asked God to draw near to him and redeem his life from the threatened fate that awaited him at the hands of his enemies, by the payment of a ransom. He wanted Him to act as his kinsman redeemer, the kinsman who stepped in and used his own wealth and position to deliver a relative from debt or slavery, or some other form of impediment, by means of a ransom. We are not told what form that ransom would take here, but when used of God the idea usually indicates the expenditure of great effort. Thus, he was calling on God to actively intervene, and exert great effort in his deliverance. That was the ‘price’ that God was to pay.
But we know now that underlying all God’s actions of mercy was the payment of a price beyond man’s calculation (Mark 10.45) and imagination, the suffering of His own Son on the cross. It was because of that redeeming sacrifice that He could justly show mercy to the undeserving who truly looked to Him, both in Old Testament times and in New.
It must have been a great shock to David when he discovered that even Jerusalem was not on his side. Most of those whom he had trusted were looking the other way. It left him with no option but to flee. There were few he could depend on. (Had Jerusalem been reliable he could have held the fortress city while sending out men like Joab to rally his own supporters). His words here demonstrate how deeply he felt it.
19 You know my reproach, my shame, and my dishonor; My adversaries are all before You.
The threefold description expresses the completeness of his exasperation. He was under reproach, he was shamed, and he was dishonored. He could see it on the faces of those around him. Apart from his own men, and a few close adherents, all had deserted him. His own people Israel had turned against him, and while the people of Jerusalem dared not openly shame him, they did so by making it clear that he could not look to them for support. Their half-heartedness rent his heart. And he now calls on God to take note of the situation, and especially of those who are the ringleaders of the rebellion. He was assured that God saw and knew them all.
20 Reproach has broken my heart, and I am full of heaviness; I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; And for comforters, but I found none.
He describes the depths of his feelings. What was happening was breaking his heart and weighing him down. His people Israel, of whose loyalty he had been so certain, had rallied to Absalom, his own beloved son. The people of Jerusalem were clearly looking on him as a has-been who had failed them. He found no comfort from them. Absalom had done his work well. Apart from his own men there was no one to whom David could turn. All were thinking of their own wellbeing, and what would be most beneficial to them. Absalom had won them over. Betrayed and forsaken by most, no wonder his heart was heavy within him.
The same would later be true of Jeremiah. He also suffered deep reproach and shame, was borne down by grief, looked for someone to pity him, and found no comforters. It has been the lot of many who have stood firm for truth and found themselves forsaken.
21 They also gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
This is not to be taken literally. It is metaphorical. The response to his grief was bitter and heartless. Gall (possibly the Palestinian poppy) was bitter and poisonous, and no one in his right mind would eat it. The idea is that life was made so bitter, that it was like partaking of gall. And all that they could give him for his thirsty heart was the equivalent of acrid vinegar. The thought was possibly of wine that had become nauseous and unfit to drink. The point is that life was made very bitter for him in his inner being.
This was not the wine mingled with gall which was offered out of kindness and had a soporific effect (Matthew 27.34. Matthew does not cite it as a quotation). It was acrid and poisonous to the soul.
The words that follow help to bring out the difference that our Lord Jesus Christ has made to men’s thinking. They are based on the ancient principle of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, and that of obtaining vengeance against an enemy. There is a certain justice in them, but they are very much contrary to the teaching of our God Jesus Christ, such as, ‘love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who use you badly’ (Luke 6.27-28).
David was constantly surrounded by political intrigue, and possible violent reaction, and was speaking when he, and those who were faithful to him, were in dire danger from these very men. At the official level he was responsible to ensure the welfare of the nation, and especially of his trusted followers, and to deal with evildoers. Furthermore, they were violent times, and what might seem horrific to us was not seen as horrific then.
22 Let their table become a snare before them, and their well-being a trap.
His plea was that as they have given him poisonous gall to eat, so let their table similarly become a snare to them by causing them to become ill, trapped by the food they eat. Anyone who has experienced severe fish poisoning will know exactly what he meant.
They are anticipating nothing but good, but their food turns on them. In other words, the prayer is that the pleasantness of their lives be interrupted by devastating effects (1 Thessalonians 5.3).
23 Let their eyes be darkened, so that they do not see; And make their loins shake continually.
He prays that their eyes, which have gloated over his misfortunes, will suffer blindness, and that their strong loins, with which they have acted against him, may end up diseased, with their limbs shaking with fever or palsy.
24 Pour out Your indignation upon them, and let Your wrathful anger take hold of them.
It is now made clear that behind David’s prayer lay a sense of God’s attitude towards these men, and indeed towards all whose ways have made Him angry. He recognized God’s indignation against them because of what they were doing. We are reminded by this that God does deal with men in His indignation over their sin and behavior, and in fierceness of anger because they have gone against His will. Terrible things still come on the world. It is a warning that all men should take to heart. If we reject God’s offer of mercy we can only expect judgment. And we must remember that these men had rebelled against the Lord’s Anointed and were thereby disobeying the covenant. So David is not necessarily speaking out of personal spite, but out of a deep awareness of how grave their sin has been. They have offended God and show no signs of repentance. So, let them suffer the consequences.
25 Let their dwelling place be desolate; Let no one live in their tents.
The great fear of every Israelite was that his family name should cease from the earth, and that the land given to his family by God after the settlement in Canaan might pass into the hands of strangers. That is what the prayer has in mind here. The wholesale destruction of their family name. Their name is to be wiped out from the earth. This was something that regularly happened to traitors. Their names would be blotted out, their possessions would go to others. So, he is asking for the just sentence on traitors.
26 For they persecute the ones You have struck and talk of the grief of those You have wounded.
The reason for the indictments is now given. Such terrible things are to fall on them because they persecute the one who has been smitten by God and talk about the sorrow of those whom God has wounded. To David this was deeply important. He considered that the one who has been smitten by God should be exempt from such treatment. It is enough that God has smitten him. To add to his woes is to go beyond what God has purposed. And to talk lightly or derogatorily about it is to is to treat God lightly. What God is dealing with, man should not interfere with, or add to.
27 Add iniquity to their iniquity and let them not come into Your righteousness.
He asked that iniquity might be added to their iniquity. Adding iniquity to iniquity results from the behavior of those who disregard God’s commandments and covenant. As they disobey God, so they become hardened in disobedience and as a consequence they disobey more. But it is men who choose to do this. How then can God be asked to bring it about? The answer is that this process is also part of God’s sovereign working. ‘He has mercy on whom He will, and whom He will He hardens’ (Romans 9.18). He causes men to add iniquity unto iniquity by not intervening and letting nature take its course. God does not cause men to sin. People are self-destructive because sin has made them that way, not God. But He does control whom He will call. It is God who refrains from acting to bring their position home to them. He withholds His Holy Spirit. Thus, what is described here is the natural course for rebels against God. And such people will never come into God’s righteousness.
The question is, was David asking that they should be prevented from repenting (certainly something hinted at in Scripture, although based on their own hardness of heart - Matthew 13.14-15)? Or was he simply saying that they should be impelled to follow the regular way of the unrighteous, unless they repent. It is difficult to believe that the former can be true. David had himself learned the necessity for even the godly to repent. He especially would have been delighted if such men had truly repented.
To come into God’s righteousness is to enter the path of God’s righteousness by repentance, the offering of genuine sacrifices, and obedience. Then they are accepted by God and come under His tuition and chastening and learn to walk rightly. Such behavior only occurs through God’s working by His Spirit. David’s point was not that he would not want that, but that he did not want them to be allowed a feigned outward righteousness. He did not want to be dealing with men who acted a part but were not genuine at heart. There are many today who appear to have entered into God’s righteousness but have not really done so. They are like the seed that flourished for a while and then died away (Mark 4.16-17).
28 Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous.
David now asks that their name be blotted out of the book of life. This book of life is not the Lamb’s book of life (Revelation 13.8; 17.8) which determines men’s eternal destinies. It is the book of the living mentioned by Moses (Exodus 32.32; Isaiah 4.3), that is of those who are alive on earth (or in Israel - Ezekiel 13.9) at the time. When a man died his name would be blotted out of it. Such ‘books of the living’ were maintained by many large cities, and alongside them books which contained the names of those who had done great things for the city. Moses would not have been willing to face eternal judgment. But he was willing to face death for his people. So what David is asking here is that such men may die. That is what being blotted out of the book of life entailed. Although it may be that being ‘blotted out’ might be having some stigma attached to it as a kind of positive action by God.
David’s saying ‘And not be written with the righteous’ may simply be the other side of having the name blotted out. Once a man died his name was erased and he was thus not written with the righteous who still lived.
29 But I am poor and sorrowful; Let Your salvation, O God, set me up on high.
David compares the arrogance of his adversaries with his own humility before God. He comes before Him as one who is poor and sorrowful, especially in his present predicament. And so he prays that God’s saving power might set him on high. To be set on high is to be set in a place of safety and security where the enemy could not reach him. The mountains were often refuges for those who were being pursued. His whole dependence is not on what forces he might be able to gather in Gilead beyond the Jordan, but on God’s intervention on his behalf. It is God Who is his high tower.
30 I will praise the name of God with a song and will magnify Him with thanksgiving.
Thus he declares that he will praise God with a song (so typical of the sweet Psalmist of Israel) and will magnify Him with thanksgiving. His open praise and worship will make known the glory of God.
31 This also shall please the LORD better than an ox or bull, which has horns and hooves
Such praise and thanksgiving coming from a human being who is truly offering himself to God, will please YHWH better than a brute beast with horns and hooves offered in sacrifice. Choice specimens were in mind. To have horns denoted power and strength and maturity. To have cloven hooves rendered them clean and acceptable to God. The ox and the bullock were important sacrifices, and certainly required by God, but his point is that the offering of them was as nothing unless they were accompanied by the offeror having a true heart towards Him. It was that true heart which most pleased God.
32 The humble shall see this and be glad; And you who seek God, your hearts shall live.
All who are truly meek, seeking God humbly with a contrite spirit, will see David’s offering of praise and thanksgiving and will be glad. They will rejoice in it. For they are the ones who truly seek God, and their hearts will come alive as they contemplate his praise.
33 For the LORD hears the poor and does not despise His prisoners.
They are to let their hearts live because they know that YHWH hears the needy, among whom they are numbered. Those who are needy are made full in God. But prominent among the needy was David himself. It was ever a wonder to him that God heard his cry.
And He does not despise those whom He has bound. The needy and the prisoner were the two types who needed God most. None were meeker than these. They had no one else to look to. Again, prominent among these was David. Fleeing for his life, and in danger of being hounded down, he felt himself a prisoner of YHWH, and on the verge of literally becoming so, while many a man professing loyalty to David would have been imprisoned by Absalom. But the central idea is that YHWH hears the cry of the lowest, even David and his followers.
34 Let heaven and earth praise Him, the seas and everything that moves in them.
In contrast with the praise of the poor and needy is the praise of heaven and earth and seas. All creation joins with those who are poor and needy in praise before God, and this includes everything that moves in heaven and earth and seas.
35 For God will save Zion and build the cities of Judah, that they may dwell there and possess it.
The reason for their praise is because God will hear the cry of His true people. He will save Zion, the city that He has chosen for His dwelling place, and He will rebuild the cities of Judah. They will be delivered from the rebels. The cities of Judah would have been those most affected by Absalom’s rebellion which was centered on Hebron. And the needy and the prisoners, David and his followers, will once again abide there and have it in possession. This was David’s certainty as they fled for refuge across the Jordan, because he trusted in his saving God.
36 Also, the descendants of His servants shall inherit
David’s vision was that God’s true servants would inherit it. and that those who loved His Name would dwell in it. He saw an idealized future. The New Testament makes clear that his vision will be fulfilled in terms of a greater Zion (Hebrews 12.22). Then it will be indwelt by all the true people of God.
