Psalms 49
McGeePsalms 49THEME: The end of those who boast themselves in richesPsalm 49 concludes this first segment of the Exodus section of Psalms. We have seen the vindication of God’s ways in connection with the wicked and the righteous. We have seen that God leads His people who are away from Him and out of the land. He has made known His intention of bringing His own to Himself and keeping them during the time of great trouble, just as He brought His people out of the land of Egypt when they were in bondage under a dictator. Psalms 49 is designed to contrast the ways of God in dealing with the wicked and the righteous. It does not exactly philosophize about the uncertainty of riches, the shortness of life; it is not just a sweet little dissertation which bids us bear bravely our perils and our sufferings, and tells us that virtue is its own reward, and that justice will triumph at the end. Rather, this psalm shows us not only the vanity of riches but the end of those who boast themselves in riches. This psalm may sound a bit revolutionary to you according to the thinking of today, but it is one that should be given special consideration in the days in which we live.
Psalms 49:1
Or, as Dr. Gaebelein has translated them: “Hear ye this, all ye peoples, give ear, all ye inhabitants of the age, both low and high, rich and poor together! My mouth speaketh wisdom, and the meditation of my heart is understanding. I will incline mine ear to a parable. I will open my riddle upon the harp” (The Book of Psalms, p. 211). What the psalmist is doing in this psalm, and will also do in the next one, is issuing a call to God’s creatures to “hear.” We are going to see this same thing when we come to the first chapter of Isaiah. We have already seen this in the Book of Deuteronomy. You will recall that when the Lord was ready to put His people in the land which He had promised, He called heaven and earth to witness that He was not only giving His people the land, but the conditions under which He was giving it to them. He used the form of a song. “Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth” (Deu_32:1). This is the beginning of the song of Moses. In this song, God calls heaven and earth to witness the conditions under which He is putting them in the land.
At least eight hundred years later, God is ready to put His people out of the land because of their sin. Again, in the Book of Isaiah, God calls heaven and earth to witness that putting His people out of the land is just and righteous (Isa_1:2). Now here is God’s call to hear something that may be troubling you also, and it begins with a question:
Psalms 49:5
Immediately you wonder who is asking the question. Is it the psalmist? Or is this question asked by the self-confident rich? Perhaps it is asked by the righteous who suffer unjustly at the hands of the wicked, or asked by the people today who are in want. I believe it is the question of a poor man. I was a poor boy, and I confess that I have always considered the rich with a little bit of suspicion.
I question their motives. “Why does God permit some people to become so rich? What is going to happen to them? Why do they get by with so much and seem not to have the same troubles as other men? There is a clique today in this country that is made up of the rich and influential. At election time they talk to us and tell us how wonderful, intelligent, and lovely we are because they want us to vote for their candidates. The question is, Why does God permit them to get by with so much?
Why doesn’t God do something about it?” Let’s see what this psalm has to say about this subject.
Psalms 49:6
No matter how rich a man is, he cannot buy salvation. He and I go to the counter for salvation. I have nothing with which to buy salvation. The rich man has money, but he cannot buy salvation with it. We are both on the same par. The rich man is excluded from redemption if he is deluded into thinking that he can either buy, do something, or give something to obtain his salvation. Rom_4:5 says, “But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” Now we come to a parenthesis.
Psalms 49:8
They don’t have enough money to buy their salvationno one has enough to buy his salvation.
Psalms 49:9
Those who are rich will die just like everyone else. I think it was on the basis of this psalm that the Lord Jesus gave the parable about the rich man and Lazarus, the poor man, as recorded in Luk_16:19-26. No man, regardless of how rich he is, can redeem his (or another’s) soul so that he can have eternal life.
Psalms 49:10
I don’t care who you are, or how much wealth you have accumulated, some day you will die and leave it all behind. You can take all your treasures and put them in a safety deposit box, or in a vault, or bury them in the earth; you can say, “This is mine. Nobody can take it away from me.” You are rightno one can take it away from you, but there is Someone who can take you away from it. He is the Lord. One day death will knock at your door, and at that time you will be as poor as anyone. As the old bromide puts it, there is no pocket in a shroud. Years ago when one of the Astors died, some of the eager relatives were waiting outside. When the lawyer came out, they asked, “How much did he leave?” The lawyer replied, “He left it all.” He did not take anything with him. That is the first thing the psalmist observesthe rich “leave their wealth to others.” Friend, you may be rich while you are here on earth, but you cannot buy salvation, nor can you extend your life on earth forever. Someday you will have to leave, and that bundle you made here will have to stay. That is one reason we encourage people to leave what they have accumulated to Christian work to get the Word of God out to needy hearts. That is what is important.
Psalms 49:11
Many people try to perpetuate their names. I think it is interesting that the Rockefeller name is on buildings all over the world. People say, “My, wasn’t he generous.” In one sense that is pretty cheap advertising. I have never been able to pay enough money to have my name put in marble on a buildingI don’t want it there either. The point is that a name on a building doesn’t mean much. One of these days the buildings are going to come down, and the individual will be forgotten.
Psalms 49:12
Men who have held high positions will go into the grave and return to dust just like everyone else.
Psalms 49:13
Now here is a very interesting expression:
Psalms 49:14
The word grave in verse Psa_49:14 is “Sheol, or the world of the dead.” The rich, like sheep, are laid in Sheol. The literal rendering is: death is their shepherd. In contrast to this David said, “The LORD is my shepherd” (Psa_23:1) and He is life. “He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life” (1Jn_5:12). The false shepherd is death. “Death shall feed on them.” That is interesting. A shepherd should feed his sheep, but here is a shepherd who is eating his sheep. We are also told that “their beauty shall consume in the grave [Sheol] from their dwelling.” A person may spend a fortune in a beauty parlor. A person may put on all kinds of lotions, powders, and creams; but what they look like after a few years in the grave is not a pretty sight. I have seen several like that. Death is not a beautiful thing by any means.
Psalms 49:15
“Selah” indicates a pause at this point so that you can think over what you have read. God alone is able to redeem your soul. The important thing in this life is not whether you are rich or poor. In the final analysis, when you move out into eternity, the important thing is whether or not you are redeemed, whether or not you are a child of God through faith in Christ:
Psalms 49:16
Rich people today are getting away with murder, and with adultery, and with all kinds of things, and they are elected to office. Poor people are not getting a just deal in this world today. One of the reasons I cast my lot with the Lord Jesus is because He is going to judge the poor in righteousness. Some day I know I am going to get a fair deal.
Psalms 49:17
This is an interesting passage. We hear a great deal today about the theory that man has evolved from beasts and animals. The fact of the matter is that the Bible teaches the opposite. God created man in an upright position. God created man in His image. Man fell, and man can so live apart from God that he is like an animal in his life, and he is like an animal when he dies.
Man does not evolve upward; he devolves downward. He is not on the upward trail at all. His inclination is to go down. That is natural with anything in this life. Everything, in my judgment, contradicts evolution. Nothing goes upward by itself; it all gravitates downward.
The law of gravitation in the physical world pulls everything down. There is also a moral law of gravitation, which is immorality, and it will pull a man down. My friend, let’s not be disturbed when we see the wicked prospering.