Psalms 75

Psalms 75:1-10

Christ the Interpreter of God in the day of manifestation. To the chief musician: Al-tashcheth; a psalm of Asaph, a song. The seventy-fifth psalm is the announcement of the divine answer to this prayer, presently to be given in the day of manifestation and Christ is the Interpreter of God, upon the throne of the world, -the anti-typical Joseph of days near to come. The psalm is easily understood as “a psalm of Asaph,” and “a song.” The Al-tashcheth “Destroy not,” which we have had also in the title of Psa 58:1-11, I cannot apply with any more certainty here than there. The ten verses of the psalm divide into two sections of five verses each in the first of which Christ, whose voice is heard throughout the whole, anticipates the kingdom that is to be His at the appointed time. In the second we find Him as the “faithful Witness,” the Representative of God on earth, testifying for God: as Judge exalting and abasing, according to grace and holiness alike. But His heart is only manifest in blessing, and the heart of the saved goes forth to Him in joy and praise.

1. Accordingly in the first verse, as the connection with the second shows, He it is who is the Leader of Israel’s praise. The name of God is near: that is, it is going to be displayed. The wondrous works of His hand are what shall declare it. During all this time, God has been declaring His name in the grace of the gospel, but men at large will not hear: “Let favor (or grace) be shown to the wicked,” says the prophet, “yet will he not learn uprightness;” “when Thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness (Isaiah 26:9-10). The gospel dispensation therefore passes away, and with it the day of man: the day of the Lord follows, putting in the dust the glory of man, and forcing his reluctant ear to hear. Messiah now speaks alone: — “For I will take the set time,” He says: “I will judge uprightly.” The common version has “when I shall receive the congregation;” but the word, though capable of this, is the regular one for Israel’s “seasons” or “appointed times,” and has here the deepest significance. The typical Ruler among men is Himself the obedient One, and as such speaks in the gospel of Mark, -the gospel of the Servant, -as not knowing this “time.” “Of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels that are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father” (Mark 13:32). It is as the Son in service, that He speaks here, and thus the words are omitted in the parallel place in Matthew: for (as His own words are) “the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth.” In this character, His Father’s will is (as it were) not His business: He waits until His enemies are made His footstool. When the appointed hour has struck, He takes it and comes forth: the perfect Servant still, to do the will of God upon the throne now, as He has waited upon it hitherto. Thus, indeed, will He “judge uprightly.” He has not a separate interest to divert Him from it, -not a thought that is not in harmony with the divine mind. And so, if the earth be in dissolution with its corruption, -men’s hearts away from God, and therefore at strife with one another, He can set up again its pillars in truth and righteousness. Thus the license given to vanity is at an end: “I have said,” -using the prophetic style of anticipation, -“I have said unto the boasters, Boast; and to the wicked, Lift up not your horn.” Man out of his creature place, exalting himself, has led to all the misery in the world. How perfect is the rebuke of it by the One who took up obedience voluntarily in a world which disobedience had ruined, by this to redeem it! The next verse, though it be so similar, carries this to its necessary issue; and observe with what definite precision the numerical structure emphasizes the point here. The previous verse, as the fourth, simply speaks of the frailty and vanity of this poor creature, boasting himself to be what he is not. The present, as a fifth, shows him in relation to God, and thus points out his lifting his horn on high (comp. Psalms 7:7; Psalms 68:18), -his exalting himself against God, and his impudent neck. And this, let us remember, is shown out in the fullest way in the man of sin. the wicked one, whom at the very time that He comes forth, “the Lord shall consume with the breath” (not “spirit”) “of His mouth, and destroy with the brightness of His coming” (2 Thessalonians 2:8). Thus Christ the Lord, then, comes into His kingdom.
2. Now we have His testimony, given in judgment, discriminating and diverse, to destruction or to exaltation, from this throne which He is taking. And first of all, as is clear, the people for whom He interferes is addressed: “For not from the east,” (“the going forth” of the sun,) “and not from the west,” (“the place of evening,”) “and not from the wilderness,” (which lay south of the land,) “is exaltation.” The position of Israel is most plainly marked here, at the time of the attack of the king of the north upon Jerusalem (Daniel 11:45). The north, therefore, is not mentioned, because from the north there is no hope. In other directions help might possibly be found; but in fact it is not coming from any point of the compass. God is coming in: “for God it is that judgeth; He abaseth one and exalteth* another.”
   But who will be able to stand when God comes in? All the earth will be consumed with the fire of His jealousy: “for a cup is in Jehovah’s hand, and the wine foameth: it is full of mixture, and He poureth out of the same; surely the dregs of it,” -that which remains for the last, and is the strongest part,’` shall all the wicked of the earth drain off and drink.” It is the day of wrath and of the ban upon iniquity, -the day which abases all the pride of man. Abasement one can understand, but how can there be “exaltation?” and is it not written: “the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day?” Ah, but when the Lord is exalted, all His character must be exalted. If this be the day of the manifestation of His Name, judgment alone can surely not manifest it. Judgment is the strange work to which He is forced, but where He is free to express what is in His heart -what then? Here then the voice of Christ breaks out into distincter utterance. He must not leave it for a moment doubtful with what the joy of His soul links itself. If the shepherd’s rod has beaten down the enemy, there are sheep of His in whose behalf He has acted, and a people with whom that God whom He represents has linked His Name: “But I will declare forever,” He says; “I will psalm unto the God of Jacob.” Here is a people whose God He is not ashamed to declare Himself. Who, then, is this Jacob? and what is he, that such a portion should be his? Nay, his name speaks of nothing but what is poor and lowly; it speaks not of strength but of weakness. More than this, it speaks of sinfulness; not merely of the weakness of the creature, but of a fallen creature. It speaks of one with whom God had had to strive and to cripple him, and put him into the place of weakness, that, no longer striving but clinging, he might have “power over the angel and prevail,” and acquire that new name “Israel” in which his new link with God could be expressed. For there is a strange power with God in human weakness, and He who is the Creator has a marvelous respect unto His creature, just in that place of creature. Nor does sin itself affect this, when only the arms of conscious need are flung upwards towards God. Notice again that this is just what the numerical structure once more emphasizes here, the creature weakness which, even in his craft, makes itself felt in him. And this name he must own, to get the blessing: “and he said, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel.” He must acknowledge the name first, that he may lose it.

And yet God delights to recall it still, and link Himself with it, and as here, be called the “God of Jacob.” And this is the Name that Messiah now declares, and which He celebrates in psalm -that is, making all nature sympathize with Him. And this as the King in glory. Righteous and wicked get thus a definition here. The nature of God is not sacrificed, but shown out in His grace; and the work of the Mediator in its necessity and power for men while still the government of God is maintained in its eternal principles: “All the horns of the wicked also will I cut off; and the horns of the righteous shall be exalted.”