Psalms 132

Psalms 132THEME: A messianic psalm looking forward to the time Christ will be King in JerusalemThis is another pilgrim psalm that speaks of a rest on the promises of God, and faith becomes all important. There has always been a question about the authorship of this psalm. David is mentioned four times, but I do not believe he wrote it. Those of real scholarship question that David wrote it. Delitzsch says, “It is suited to the mouth of Solomon.” Perowne says, “It is perfectly natural that Solomon should write a song for such an occasion, speaking of the earlier efforts made by his father to prepare a habitation for Jehovah.” It is his belief that this psalm was composed by King Solomon when the ark of the covenant was removed out of the tent of habitation that David had prepared for it in Jerusalem, and was now being moved into the temple that Solomon had built. This idea seems to fit in better with the contents of this psalm, and the only mention we have of the ark in the Psalms is here. We need to note, however, that the son of David in this psalm is not Solomon, but the greater Son of David, the Lord Jesus Christ. With this as a background, let us look at this psalm. Now that the pilgrims are there in Jerusalem, they have come to the temple where the mercy seat is above the ark, the place where they can approach God.

Psalms 132:1

You will recall that in 2 Samuel 7 it was in David’s heart to build God a house. You can see from this passage that this was the overwhelming ambition of his life. His one great, pulsating thought was that he might build a temple for the ark of God.

Psalms 132:8

This evidently was the song that they sang when the ark was moved into the temple that Solomon had built, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple as it had the tabernacle of old.

Psalms 132:11

This is a reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. Can we be sure of this? Yes, because David’s children did not measure up to the description of the One who one day would sit upon the throne of David. In the Books of Kings and Chronicles you follow the line of David, and you will see one sinner after another sitting upon the throne. Very few were good kings, and only five of them saw revival come to the nation.

Psalms 132:12

But, you see, David’s children did not keep God’s covenant and testimony. That is the reason they were put out of their land and sent into captivity in Babylon. Even though the line of David sinned, God’s covenant was not destroyed, and the time will come when the fruit of his body will sit upon his throne. That is what the New Testament speaks about when it opens with, “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (Mat_1:1). The Lord Jesus is the “Son of David” that the psalmist is writing about.

Psalms 132:13

This prophecy is not fulfilled in Jerusalem in our day. I walked up on top of Mount Zion one day with a friend, and when he saw what was there, he said, “I wonder if it was worth the walk?” I told him, “I guess David and the Lord thought so, but there is something in the future that they can see and we do not see.” It is apparent that this is a psalm that the pilgrims would sing as they came to Jerusalem and to the temple where God promised He would meet with His people.