Psalm 76: 1 – 12
The Stouthearted
To the Chief Musician. On stringed instruments. A Psalm of Asaph. A Song.
1 In Judah God is known; His name Is great in Israel. 2 In Salem also is His tabernacle, and His dwelling place in Zion. 3 There He broke the arrows of the bow, the shield and sword of battle. Selah 4 You are more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey. 5 The stouthearted were plundered; They have sunk into their sleep; And none of the mighty men have found the use of their hands. 6 At Your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the chariot and horse were cast into a dead sleep. 7 You, Yourself, are to be feared; And who may stand in Your presence when once You are angry? 8 You caused judgment to be heard from heaven; The earth feared and was still, 9 When God arose to judgment, to deliver all the oppressed of the earth. Selah 10 Surely the wrath of man shall praise You; With the remainder of wrath You shall gird Yourself. 11 Make vows to the LORD your God, and pay them; Let all who are around Him bring presents to Him who ought to be feared. 12 He shall cut off the spirit of princes; He is awesome to the kings of the earth.
Most of you are aware that for most of my life I have lived in Philly, PA. It is the only place where you can say where you live without saying or spelling the whole location and refer to you state in two letters -PA.
The city which means ‘brotherly love’ which more likely should be called ‘brotherly shove’ must possibly be to your astonishment have had some tremendous culture. For example, in 1927 an operetta called The New Moon debuted in Philadelphia.
It was later turned into a movie in 1940 and the hero was Nelson Eddy whose key role rallies the troops with the song Stouthearted Men.
Even though it is an old movie you can find it on UTube.
What impressed me, and I hope you also were these lyrics.
You who have dreams, if you act they will come true.
To turn your dreams to a fact, it’s up to you.
If you have the soul and the spirit,
Never fear it, you’ll see it thru,
Hearts can inspire, other hearts with their fire,
For the strong obey when a strong man shows them the way.
Give me some men who are stouthearted men,
Who will fight, for the right they adore,
Start me with ten who are stouthearted men,
And I’ll give you ten thousand more.
Shoulder to shoulder and bolder and bolder,
They grow as they go to the fore.
Then there’s nothing in the world can halt or mar a plan,
When stouthearted men can stick together man to man.
Give me some men who are stouthearted men,
Who will fight, for the right they adore,
Start me with ten who are stouthearted men,
And I’ll soon give you ten thousand more.
Shoulder to shoulder and bolder and bolder,
They grow as they go to the fore.
Then there’s nothing in the world can halt or mar a plan,
When stouthearted men can stick together man to man.
This thought my friends are extended to us as we glean from verse 5 which reads, “5 The stouthearted were plundered; They have sunk into their sleep; And none of the mighty men have found the use of their hands.”
This Psalm was almost certainly written in order to celebrate the great deliverance of Jerusalem from the Assyrians in the time of King Hezekiah when the angel of YHWH ‘went forth and smote the camp of the Assyrians’ (2 Kings 19.35).
To the Chief Musician. On stringed instruments. A Psalm of Asaph. A Song.
The Psalm is dedicated to the Chief Musician and may have formed part of a collection in his name. It was to be played on stringed instruments and was a Psalm of Asaph and a popular song. It divides up into four stanzas of three verses each:
. God, Who dwells in Zion, has made Himself known by breaking the power of the Assyrians (verses 1-3).
. He has revealed His glory and excellence by leaping on the enemy and ‘putting them to sleep’ (verses 4-6).
. He is to be feared because of His mighty judgment revealed on them (verses 7-9).
. He is to be honored by all as the Great Deliverer (10-12).
The Psalmist celebrates the fact that God dwells among His people in Mount Zion, and has made His greatness known in Israel by breaking the power of the enemy,
1 In Judah God is known; His name Is great in Israel. 2 In Salem also is His tabernacle, and His dwelling place in Zion.
The Psalmist points out that God has made Himself known in Judah, and that His Name Is great in Israel, because of what He has done in delivering Jerusalem. When the whole city was in fear He had brought about the impossible. Please notice how the terms Israel and Judah can both be applied to Hezekiah’s kingdom. His influence had reached out beyond the borders of Judah.
He rejoices in the fact that God is in ‘His Tabernacle’ (the Temple), dwelling in Mount Zion. He probably saw this as the reason why God had delivered Jerusalem (Salem). Such an idea would result in the false idea that God would not allow Jerusalem to be destroyed because He dwelt there. Jeremiah had to combat such an idea. But it was certainly a comfort to His people that He was present in the Temple in terms of His ‘Name’ being there (Deuteronomy 12.5). There was a sense in which He was directly among them. The ‘name’ to an Israelite represented what someone was.
3 There He broke the arrows of the bow, the shield and sword of battle. Selah
It was there that He had broken the power of the enemy. This is depicted in terms of the breaking of their weapons by rendering them useless rather than by destroying them. Their lightning like arrows, their shield and their swords, were rendered useless. It was those who used those weapons whom He destroyed, although many such weapons were no doubt left behind by those of the Assyrians who were left alive and able to retreat and were smashed by the Israelites. ‘And the battle’ may indicate the siege weapons (the battle engines) or the battle formation or may simply be summing up by saying He broke all who had come against Judah in battle. He destroyed their attack.
4 You are more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey.
As we saw verse 2 could be seen as describing God as being ‘in His covert and lair’ as the Lion of Judah, and it is this thought that leads on to God being ‘glorious and excellent’ in ‘the mountains of prey’ (the place where prey is to be found). He had, as it were, been in the mountains of prey, prowling in glory and excellence, waiting to leap on His prey from there. In this case the mountains of prey were the mountains around Judah on which the Assyrians had been encamped, unaware of what was about to leap on them and that they were the prey.
5 The stouthearted were plundered; They have sunk into their sleep; And none of the mighty men have found the use of their hands.
And when the Lion of Judah had leaped, the stouthearted soldiers of Assyria had been made a spoil, they had ‘slept their sleep’, the repetition indicating the finality of their sleep. The might men had been rendered.
6 At Your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the chariot and horse were cast into a dead sleep.
Because of the rebuke of the God of weak and helpless Jacob, all the Assyrian chariots and horses had been cast into a deep sleep. They too had been rendered inoperative.
In a vivid picture the Psalmist sees God as seated on His Judgment Throne in Heaven, angry and irresistible, passing sentence against the Assyrians in the hearing of the world so that all the world waited in awe, and then as arising in judgment to save ‘all the meek of the earth.’
7 You, Yourself, are to be feared; And who may stand in Your presence when once You are angry?
After considering what God had done to the Assyrians, the Psalmist declares that God is to be feared, because when He Is angry no one can stand in His sight. He Is all-powerful and irresistible. ‘You, even you’ emphasizes that this was true of God, and of God alone.
8 You caused judgment to be heard from heaven; The earth feared and was still,
For when God caused His sentence to be heard from Heaven, the whole world stood in awe, watching and waiting in stilled silence for God to act.
9 When God arose to judgment, to deliver all the oppressed of the earth. Selah
Now our Holy God did act in judgment in order to save ‘all the lowly ones of the earth’. Notice how the situation has become generalized. God’s concern is not only for lowly Judah, but for all who are lowly on whose behalf He will one day act, the ‘meek and lowly in heart’ (Matthew 11.28-30). This deliverance of Judah was the forerunner to God’s deliverance of all who wait on Him.
God Is the One Who turns all men’s puny efforts of wrath to His own ends. He utilizes them to bring praise to His Name, and wears what remains as a sign of His sovereignty. Thus, all should submit to Him and offer Him tribute, because He Is the One Who Is over all princes and kings.
10 Surely the wrath of man shall praise You; With the remainder of wrath You shall gird Yourself.
The point here is that when men exercise their wrath on earth God turns it to His glory, as He had done with the Assyrians. Man’s puny efforts to obtain vengeance fail in the face of God’s power. What remains of their wrath God will use as clothing to manifest His glory.
11 Make vows to the LORD your God and pay them; Let all who are around Him bring presents to Him who ought to be feared.
The thought is that in the time of trouble the people had made vows to God. Now they are to make their vows good and pay to YHWH their God what they vowed. The use of the Name YHWH emphasizes the personal nature of what they are to do. They are to pay what they vowed as to Judah’s covenant God. All who are round about Him, living in and around Jerusalem, are to bring their tribute ‘to the Fear’, that is to their awesome God Who strikes terror into the hearts of their enemies.
12 He shall cut off the spirit of princes; He is awesome to the kings of the earth.
For even princes and kings are not safe from Hs hand. He cuts off the spirit of Princes (causes them to die) and is terrible to the kings of the earth, who are right to fear Him.
The whole Psalm is testimony to the fact that God watches over the weak and lowly and deals severely with those who would harm them.
