Psalms 47

1. O CLAP your hands, all ye peoples; Shout unto God with the voice of triumph. 2 For the LORD Most High is terrible; He is a great King over all the earth. 3 He shall subdue the peoples under us, And the nations under our feet. 4 He shall choose our inheritance for us, The excellency of Jacob whom he loved. [Selah 5 God is gone up with a shout, The LORD with the sound of a trumpet.

6. Sing praises to God, sing praises: Sing praises unto our King, sing praises. 7 For God is the King of all the earth: Sing ye praises with understanding. 8 God reigneth over the nations: God sitteth upon his holy throne. 9 The princes of the peoples are gathered together To be the people of the God of Abraham: For the shields of the earth belong unto God; He is greatly exalted.

All Nations Worship Jehovah as Their King. The subject of this Psalm is the joyful acknowledgment by all nations of God’s absolute sovereignty in the world. It embodies, therefore, the Messianic idea of the fulfilment of the promise to Abraham that he should be the father of nations, and so points forward to the time when this idea and promise should be fully realized in the ascension and exaltation of our blessed Lord. De Witt.

A hymn of triumph, in which the singer calls upon all the nations of the earth to praise Jehovah as their King, and joyfully anticipates the time when they shall all become one body with the people of the God of Abraham. In this sense the Psalm may be called Messianic, a prophecy of the final triumph of God’s kingdom upon earth. P.—The Psalm has every appearance of having been composed in reference to some particular event; but as this is not indicated in the Psalm itself, it can only be conjectured. A.

Most obviously this Psalm celebrates some victory in which God had signally subdued Gentile nations before His people Israel. The tone of it throughout is that of exulting triumph and high praises to the God of their salvation. It lacks the data for determining with certainty its historic occasion. C.—But it is very clear that both the present sovereignty of Jehovah and the final victories of our Lord are here filly hymned, while His ascension, as the prophecy of them, is sweetly gloried in. S.

1. O clap your hands. The immediate result of God’s judgments was described in the preceding Psalm. That was terror and awe. Then the strain changes; the ultimate effects are realized, and in the establishment of peace and justice all nations are called upon to recognize His goodness. The order of the two clauses should be reversed, “All ye peoples, clap your hands.” Cook.

1-4. The real and final victory gained by Jehovah does not consist in the subjection of the peoples, but in changing their hearts so that they joyfully worship Him. In order to become the God of all peoples in this sense, He has first become Israel’s God; and Israel also earnestly desires that this design of its election may be attained. It is from this longing that the summons in v. 1 proceeds. The peoples are to manifest their joy in the God of revelation in acts and words; for Jehovah is exalted absolutely, and His dominion has Israel as its centre, not its limit, but extends to the whole earth. D.

2. The God with whom we have to do is a God of awful majesty. The Lord most high is terrible. He is infinitely above the noblest creatures, higher than the highest; there are those perfections in Him that are to be reverenced by all, and particularly that power, holiness, and justice that are to be dreaded by all those that contend with Him. He is a God of sovereign and universal dominion; He is a King that reigns alone, and with an absolute power; a King over all the earth; all the creatures, being made by Him, are subject to Him, and therefore He is a great King, the King of kings. H.

4. “Choose our inheritance” is to do again what He did in covenant with Abraham and in fulfilment through Joshua, i.e., give us Canaan and plant us securely therein. C.—“He shall choose our inheritance for us,” means that He who knows what is better for us than ourselves hath chosen—that is, hath appointed, and that of His own good will and mercy toward us, our inheritance; not only things meet for this life, but even all other things concerning the hope of a better life, a kingdom that cannot be shaken, an everlasting habitation, an inheritance which is immortal and undefiled and fadeth not away, reserved for us in heaven. Boys.

The constant interference on the part of God regards everything relative to our condition in this finite state of being. The appointment of our prosperity, adversity, sickness, temptations, infirmities of body or mind, personal or relative, the connections we form, the places we choose for residence—in fact, every circumstance relating to our present condition, however minute or apparently unimportant—these all form parts of the Divine choosing, however hard it may be to reconcile superior determination with the free and unrestrained choice which every individual makes for himself. This superintendence is as extensive as it is minute. He telleth the number of the stars, and he counteth the hairs of our head. In its operation it touches the springs of human determination, without at all infringing on individual liberty; and directs man to the choice, while man chooses for himself. In its vast and boundless efficiency, it comprehends the little circle of our own agency—bounds it, checks it, controls it, and renders it subservient to the purposes of infinite wisdom and benevolence. R. Hall.

The Divine choice proves itself by Divine love. “The excellency of Jacob, whom He loved.” We are the illustrations of the Father’s will, we are the excellency of Jacob whom He loved, and so God is justified daily by the verification of human experience. Take, then, the Divine consolation in the text: “He shall choose our inheritance for us.” The soul respires amid such serene and invigorating airs; this is the staple truth of the Book of God. God is the portion, the inheritance, of His people. Let us live in this great faith, in the great and infinite reservations of God. E. P. Hood.—“Selah,” pause and dwell upon the marvellous lovingkindness of the Lord our God. C.

5. God has gone up with shouting, Jehovah with sound of trumpet. He is here described as returning to heaven after the conquest of His enemies and the rescue of His people, as in Psalm 7:7 he does the same, after sitting in judgment on the nations, and asserting the right of His own people. The shouting and sound of the trumpet represent the ascension as a public and triumphant one. The ideal scene is typical of the actual ascension of our Saviour. A.—What has taken place is a prelude of the final and manifest assumption of the kingdom, the proclamation of which the seer hears there. God has come down, and now that by the destruction of Israel’s foes He has obtained recognition for Himself, He has gone up again in manifest royal glory. Accordingly this Psalm has in the course of history acquired a prophetic meaning which far transcends its most immediate occasion, a meaning which the Ascension of Christ has first fully disclosed. D.—God is said to come down when He interposes for the deliverance of His people, or the overthrow of their enemies; and “to go up,” returning to His heavenly throne, when that work is accomplished. All these expressions have their special and literal fulfilment in the Son. Compare Psalm 68:18 and Eph. 4:8-10. Cook.

With a shout. This mention of the “shout,” and the voice of the “trumpet,” serves to connect together past and future events in the history of the Church and of the world, and carry our thoughts forward to Christ’s coming to judgment. C. Wordsworth.—Having been down to do battle for us and having gained this complete victory, leaving nothing more for us to desire and having nothing more for Himself to do, what should come next but His glorious ascending to His throne in the heavens? Let Him ascend therefore with shouts of triumph, amid the pains of victory! C.

The resurrection of Christ is the absolutely unique fact of Christianity, the majestic demonstration of its infinite certainty. This it is which proves it to be a gospel indeed—good tidings of great joy unto all peoples. Accordingly, the resurrection of Christ stands forth in the apostolic theology as the epitome and very label of Christianity itself. And well it may; for it involves the whole story of the incarnation. He who has risen must have died, and He who has died must have lived, and He who has lived must have been born. Jerusalem’s empty tomb proves Bethlehem’s holy manger. And so it comes to pass that belief in the resurrection of Christ is the touchstone of the Christian faith, the key to the kingdom of heaven. If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ gives us a present, living, communing Saviour. For what, after all, was the death without the life? Let us take care lest in our devotion to the mighty doctrine of the cross we make too little of the mighty doctrine of the crown. We need not only the atoning work of Christ’s historic death; we need also the sanctifying work of Christ’s risen, present life. We want the inspirations of a risen, exalted, vitalizing, loving, communing heavenly Friend. And this the resurrection of the Lord Jesus gives us. If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. Because He lives, we live also. G. D. B.

By the cross forgiveness is assured to us, but by the resurrection Christ’s energy on high for our purification is also made certain, and so the one supplements the other, rests upon it, but carries it to its transcendent completeness. If to forgiveness be added the expectation and assurance of a purifying energy, sent by the Son of God to give both life and inspiration to every mental force, to purify the whole spiritual nature within us and bring us into fellowship with angels and fellowship with God, then, indeed, forgiveness is consummated by the resurrection of Christ. By the cross He represents to us the Divine temper of self-sacrifice; by the resurrection He represents to us the Divine power and majesty. That Divine power and majesty must be apprehended that we may understand the self-sacrifice which was in the cross, there revealed in its new glory unto the majesty itself. And it is these two revelations of God, in self-sacrificing love and in the power that breaks the tyranny of death itself, which faces the last enemy of life and says, “Thou art conquered;” it is no other than these two, Divine self-sacrifice and Divine majesty, which give glory to every promise. When I see the infinite love of the cross and the infinite power of the emptied sepulchre, and know that I have in Christ my Brother and my King, I know that a spirit of love which never deceives, which gives more than it offers, is always behind the promise, and I know that a power which the world cannot weary, which death cannot break, which eternity cannot exhaust, is behind and beneath the promise, ready to fulfil it, ready to surpass it. So the cross answers to the sepulchre broken, and the tomb, with its doors swung open by the Divine power, answers back to and illustrates the darkened cross on Calvary. The one appeals to our deepest affection, and so most intimately searches and draws to itself our moral life; but the other appeals to our noblest hope. And there is no power which really aggrandizes human nature, augments its force, exalts its level, expands its reach, except the power which at once touches the heart and inspires hope. R. S. S.

Christ rises not alone. A resurrection life fills His Church, touching the lives of His people in the most secret places and to the finest issues. They are raised up with Him, and made to sit in the heavenlies with Him. No base earthward desires need prevail over their spiritual life, which is quickened through Him because of “the power of His resurrection.” By many phrases and forms of thought the apostles labor to emphasize the unbounded significance of the resurrection and its far-reaching effect on human life—on human lives. It is not to them an isolated fact of history; it is a very truth of spiritual experience. He is the firstfruits of them that slept, and all are to be made alive through Him unto God. Being risen with Him, we are therefore to set our affections on things above, because our life is hid with Him in God. S. S. T.

7. For King of all the earth (is) God. Perform a maschil, i.e., sing and play a didactic Psalm. The maschil here meant is the Psalm itself. The designation may have been omitted in the title for the very reason that it is contained in the body of the composition. The doctrine taught is that of Jehovah’s universal sovereignty, and of the ultimate subjection of all nations to His peaceful sway. This idea is realized in the reign of the Messiah, so that the Psalm is, in a wide sense, Messianic. A.

Sing ye praises with understanding. Let sense and sound go together. Let your hearts and heads go with your voices. Understand what you sing, and feel what you understand. A. Clarke.—To make melody in our hearts to God in singing of Psalms, we must sing “with understanding.” We must mind the matter more than the music, and consider what we sing as well as how we sing; the tune may affect the fancy, but it is the matter affects the heart, and that God principally eyes. The Psalmist adviseth us in this particular, and so doth the apostle (I Cor. 14: 15). Otherwise this sweet duty would be more the work of a chorister than of a Christian, and we should be more delighted in an anthem of the musician’s making than in a Psalm of the Spirit’s making. John Wells.

Worship is an act of the understanding, applying itself to the knowledge of the excellency of God and actual thoughts of His majesty; recognizing Him as the supreme Lord and Governor of the world, which is natural knowledge; beholding the glory of His attributes in the Redeemer, which is evangelical knowledge. This is the sole act of the spirit of man. The same reason is for all our worship as for our thanksgiving. This must be done with understanding: “Sing ye praise with understanding;” with a knowledge and sense of His greatness, goodness, and wisdom. It is also an act of the will, whereby the soul adores and reverences His majesty, embraceth His goodness, enters itself into an intimate communion with and pitcheth all his affections upon Him; we must worship God understandingly; it is not else a reasonable service. . . . We may be truly said to worship God, though we want perfection; but we cannot be said to worship Him if we want sincerity; a statue upon a tomb, with eyes and hands lifted up, offers as good and true a service; it wants only a voice, the gestures and postures are the same; nay, the service is better; it is not a mockery; it represents all that it can be framed to; but to worship without our spirits is a presenting God with a picture, an echo, voice, and nothing else; a compliment; a mere lie; a “compassing Him about with lies.” Charnock.

The great function of hymns in public worship is to bring before our hearts as well as our memories, in an attractive and moving form, the great facts of our holy faith, and also to help us to apply these great facts and doctrines to our own particular wants. Hymns teach a lesson as to the unity of believers. They belong, not to one century or another, not to one Church, or one sect, or one class, or one part alone of the kingdom; but from every section of our fellow-Christians have been found gifted servants of God pouring forth their adoration, their penitence, or their trust in language which is not of a party, but simply Christian. H. M. Butler.

8. 9. God has begun to reign over the heathen; has seated Himself upon His high throne as King of nations—of which we have the evidence in the wonderful victory we this day celebrate. Already the poet-prophet sees the glorious consummation of God’s future Gospel triumphs, saying: “for the princes of the people”—the noble-hearted, those high in power over the heathen nations—gather themselves together as the people of the God of Abraham, i.e., as being such; or without the word “as,” we may translate, being the people of the God of Abraham. C.—The poet reads in what has just happened the great final historical fact of the conversion of all peoples to Jehovah. The nobles of the peoples, the “shields” (i.e., the patrons, protectors) “of the earth,” enter into alliance with the people of the God of Abraham; the promise of the blessing of the nations in the seed of the patriarch is fulfilled, for the nobles draw after them the peoples protected by them. D.

9. The shields of the earth belong unto God.** Here we have the rulers of the earth set forth by a double relation; and both these noting two things, their dignity and their duty. They belong to God, it is their honor that He hath sealed them; they belong to God, it is their duty to be subject to Him. They are “shields of the earth,” it is their honor that they are above others; they are “the shields of the earth,” it is their duty to protect others. Bishop E. Reynolds, — Magistrates are said to bear the sword, not to be swords; and they are said to be shields, not to bear shields; and all this to show that protection and preservation are more essential and intrinsical to their office than destruction and punishment are. Caryl.

The insignia of pomp, the emblems of rank, the weapons of war, all must pay loyal homage to the King of all. Those who are earth’s protectors, the shields of the commonwealth, derive their might from Him, and are His. All principalities and powers must be subject unto Jehovah and His Christ, for “He is greatly exalted.” In nature, in power, in character, in glory, there is none to compare with Him. Oh glorious vision of a coming era! S.