Psalms 92

Psalms 92:1-15

Sanctuary-praise. A psalm-song for the Sabbath-day. We have now an outburst of praise consequent upon this. It is not yet the full praise which we shall have before the book closes, and this for a very evident reason. Redemption and the work needed to accomplish this have not yet been seen with any sufficiency. The personal perfection of the Second Man could not of itself lift up the fallen creature. His own words in reference to this are plain, that “except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (John 12:24). Union with Him is not in incarnation; but as risen from the dead; and only thus can God become the Sanctuary-refuge of fallen men. Yet we have already had “Jehovah my refuge” from the lips of faith in the preceding psalm; and the present one is clearly sanctuary-praise. The means of accomplishment have not yet been brought out; but the One who accomplishes it has been before us: and as the poor man in Israel might bring his meat-offering for atonement, though “the blood that maketh atonement” was not found in it (Leviticus 5:11-13), so we are permitted already to rejoice in the fruit of what has not itself become our possession. By and bye we shall be taken out of the ranks of the poor, and enriched with the wealth which has been already secured to us, and able to bring to God the full sin-offering and burnt-offering too. Meanwhile God’s delight is in His Son; and as the Sabbath followed the manna in the wilderness (Exodus 16:1-36), so now already have we here a song. He is worthy; although the fullness of His glory has not yet been seen.

1. “Jehovah, the Most High,” are titles which connect the present psalm with the last; and the latter we know as God’s millennial name, when He shall be manifestly supreme over all the earth. The time is now in view, and in the next psalm comes: Jehovah reigns, and the earth is subject. Here already the soul celebrates Him in this way, and sees how “good” (or “right”) it is to celebrate Him: His loving-kindness in the morning, His faithfulness in the nights. In opposite circumstances He is the same still; in darkness as in light His love works and declares itself. The various instruments of praise are set in motion therefore: all that is responsive to man’s hand is made to praise Him. We can discriminate little between them; for nothing but an antiquarian interest seems to attach to them in men’s account. The experience of Jehovah’s work has loosed also the tongue in praise; while His works as the expression of the deep thoughts of God, give abundant exercise to all man’s faculties.
2. But there is conflict and opposition; as we well know: there are enemies to God among the creatures He has made. There are brutish men leveled with the animals below, who have shut themselves off from what none but themselves could deprive them of. They understand not even the lot of the wicked which is before their eyes, who spring up as the grass, but to be destroyed; while Jehovah remains the “high place” of His people for ever. To faith it is simple that Jehovah’s enemies must perish; and the workers of vanity incur the doom of vanity. “But my horn,” says the psalmist, “shalt Thou exalt like the horn of an aurochs:” the power conferred being not merely what men count that, but the power of the Spirit: “I shall be anointed with fresh oil.”
3. Finally, the portion of the saint is given in the last five verses. First, as to his enemies, he will see surely that which comes for them. It is not needful to say what, it is so evident. The common principles of right secure it: if God is, that which is right shall be. On the other hand. the righteous shall flourish like the palm and grow as the cedar of Lebanon. The soil of their planting is the best surely for this: planted in the house of Jehovah, they flourish in the courts of God Himself. And here we are made to remember that “in Him we live and move and have our being”; for their vigor abides in old age; they have sap and are green. All this is to declare, blessed be God, that Jah, to whom they have been brought back, is upright: -we see how He has pledged Himself to His people; “He is my Rock, and there is no perversity with Him.”