CHAPTER 40

A PSALM OF DAVID: PRAISE FOR ANSWERED PRAYER

¹I waited patiently for the LORD; and He inclined unto Me, and heard My cry. (The word patiently directs our attention to the thought that God, at times, does not answer immediately; however, the latter portion of this Verse encourages us that ultimately He will answer and hear my cry.

The theme is threefold: 1. As the/our Redeemer: He atones for our sins, having loaded them upon Himself and having confessed them as His Own; 2. As our High Priest: He burdens Himself with our sorrows, encourages us to follow Him in His life of absolute confidence in God, teaching us to believe in Promises which never fail, and furnishes us with perfect forms of confession, prayer, and praise; and, 3. As our Commander: As such, He engages to deliver us from the powers of darkness, which, in fact, He has already done at the Cross [Col. 2:1415].)

²He brought Me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set My feet upon a rock, and established My goings (the words here are figurative of the state of sin and death out of which God Alone can save; He does so by the means of the Cross; trying to extricate ourselves by our own means, we only seek deeper into the miry clay; trusting in Him and what He did at the Cross will bring us out).

³And He has put a new song in My mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD (the doctrine of this Psalm is Christs Perfect Obedience to the Will of God as the Sin-bearer of His People, and His Perfect Patience in waiting on and for God to deliver Him and them out of all afflictions).

⁴Blessed is that man that makes the LORD his trust, and respects not the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies (trust placed in anything other than Jesus Christ and Him Crucified is trust placed in a lie [I Cor. 3:23]).

⁵Many, O LORD My God, are Your wonderful Works which You have done, and Your thoughts which are to usward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto You: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered (it is strange that much of the modern Church declares that modern man faces problems that are not addressed in the Bible; and yet the Psalmist says that the wonderful works of God are so many, and His thoughts [counsel and cure for our plight] are so numerous, addressing themselves to far more than we would ever need, or that mere mortals could ever begin to enumerate, that only the Messiah could both declare them and speak of them).

⁶Sacrifice and offering You did not desire; My ears have You opened: Burnt Offering and Sin Offering have You not required (the Divine displeasure with animal sacrifices and offerings is defined in Hebrews, Chapter 10 as displeasure with them as types and symbols; animal blood simply would not suffice [Heb. 10:4]; and yet this does not conflict with Gods infinite delight in the one great Sacrifice of Calvary; the contrast, on the contrary, heightens that delight).

⁷Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the Book it is written of Me (the words, Lo, I come, signal His Incarnation, and the word Book is the Bible; in that Book, it was engraved concerning Him that He was to be born as a Man and suffer as a Sacrifice; regrettably, the world attempts to manufacture another god, while the Church attempts to manufacture another sacrifice),

⁸I delight to do Your Will, O My God: yes, Your Law is within My heart (the Incarnation and Atonement were necessary as predicted of Him and prescribed to Him in the Scriptures, and the statement is made that He delighted to obey these prescriptions, for they were not only in the Book, but also in His heart).

⁹I have preached righteousness in the great congregation: lo, I have not refrained My lips, O LORD, You know.

¹⁰I have not hid Your Righteousness within My Heart; I have declared Your Faithfulness and Your Salvation: I have not concealed Your Lovingkindness and Your Truth from the great congregation (Christ was faithful to deliver the entirety of the Word of God).

¹¹Withhold not You Your tender Mercies from Me, O LORD: let Your Lovingkindness and Your Truth continually preserve Me (sadly, man would show the Messiah no mercy or lovingkindness; the only thing that preserved Him was Your Truth).

¹²For innumerable evils have compassed Me about: My iniquities have taken hold upon Me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of My head: therefore My heart fails Me (calamities and afflictions in the sense of evils and iniquities result from sin; however, these sorrows and troubles did not result from the Messiahs sins, for He had none, but from the sins of those whom He came to save; these griefs so bent Him down that He was not able to look up, and they enfeebled His physical powers so that His heart fainted; in fact, never was there sorrow in this world comparable to His! [Mk 14:34]).

¹³Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver Me: O LORD, make haste to help Me (man gave Him no help; even His Own Disciples would not associate themselves with His suffering or His dying; His Own kindred forsook Him; if these Passages do not proclaim the depravity of man, nothing does!).

¹⁴Let them be ashamed and confounded together who seek after My soul to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame who wish Me evil (the religious men of Jesus day desired that the only truly good Man Whoever lived lose His soul; let this ever be a lesson to mankind; the true Child of God must ever be wary of the world and doubly wary of organized religion).

¹⁵Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame who say unto Me, Aha, aha (these Verses are a prediction foretelling the doom of the haters of the Messiah, just as Verse 16 predicts the Salvation and felicity of those who love Him).

¹⁶Let all those who seek You rejoice and be glad in You: let such as love Your Salvation say continually, The LORD be magnified (the contrast is outstanding; those who reject Him will be driven backward; those who seek Him and accept Him will rejoice and be glad).

¹⁷But I am poor and needy; yet the LORD thinks upon Me: You are My Help and My Deliverer; make no tarrying, O My God. (Some are poor and some are needy, but only One was, in the fullest sense, poor and needy at the same time.

The words, make no tarrying, O My God, refer to the speedy conclusion of the Sacrifice that must be offered, not because of the pain of the poor and needy, but rather because of the hurried necessity of the Redemption of man.

As we have stated, every one of these Psalms speaks of Christ in some way, whether in His Atoning, Mediatorial, or Intercessory Work.)