Taken from the book, Psalms: The Pilgrims Ascent, by A. B. Saint
A Heart set on the Heavenly Country
I have always loved the Psalms, the book which is often referred to as the National Songbook of Israel. In thinking like this I know I am not on my own, I know there will be countless others today just like me, even as there have been countless others thinking exactly the same who have gone on before.
Well known names come before me such as that of John Wesley who thought that the book of Psalms was one of the choicest books of the Old Testament. He called this book the book which “brings us into the Sanctuary” and in so doing, “draws us away from converse with men and the philosophers or disputers of this world and directs us to communion with God.”
Charles Haddon Spurgeon, affectionately known as the ‘Prince of Preachers’ wrote, “The book of Psalms has been a real banquet to me and in feasting upon its contents I have seemed to eat angels food.” Martin Luther also expressed his delight in this book and referred to it as a ‘little bible’ or the ‘bible in miniature.’ In fact, in his opinion he said, “If you wish to see the Christian Church painted in the true colours of life and beauty, if you wish to possess it in miniature, take the Psalms and you will find in them a faithful mirror reflecting in perfect purity the image of Christianity.”
It was said that before he was cruelly executed by the Nazis, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote a book which was called ‘The Prayer Book of the Bible: An introduction to the Psalms,’ in which he wrote these words: “I am reading the Psalms daily as I have done for years. I know them and love them more than any other book in the Bible.”
Just recently I was reading a piece about Brian Keenan the Irish writer, who in 1986 was kidnapped and taken by the Islamic Jihadists and held hostage in Beirut in Lebanon. After two months in solitary confinement, he was taken by his captors and placed in a cell with John McCarthy the British journalist. Mr Keenan wrote that he was held for four years and only released in the summer of 1990.
During his imprisonment he suffered greatly having been subjected to only one meal a day which was pushed under the door of a small, dark unlit room. To add to his misery, he was also blindfolded. Quite naturally, after his release he spoke about his experiences and told how that in his devotional moments, he found great solace particularly in reading the Psalms. I suppose he realised how in his depth of despair that he was not the first to have been there, for many other prayers had gone up before his, many of them written in the book of Psalms.
Did not Calvin have it right when he said the Psalms vividly reveal the anatomy of all the parts of the human soul. I have a reading actually which is taken from his commentary on the introduction of the Psalms. It says, “What variant and resplendent riches are contained in this treasury it were difficult to describe….. I have been wanting to call this book not inappropriately an anatomy of all parts of the soul; for there is not an emotion of which any can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror.”
The Psalms were written by those who were living in Old Testament times and were still living under the Law, unlike us today who are now living in the dispensation of Grace. The Name of Christ is not found in its Songs and yet they speak of Him. That place called Golgotha is not mentioned by name and yet the shadow of the Cross falls upon its pages. Did not Christ Himself after His Resurrection appear to His disciples in Luke’s Gospel chapter 24 and verse 44, where Jesus said to them, “These are the words which I spoke unto you, while I was with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the Law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the PSALMS, concerning Me.”
I believe there is something for all in this book. It has been well said that throughout time these songs of Zion have been bringing comfort to those who sorrow, setting forth direction to those who will follow, initiating worship from which we can borrow and ushering in that glad hope of Tomorrow!
Psalm 17 is a prayer of David, and as we know, this Psalm is inter-linked in ways with the previous one. In Psalm 17 David cries out unto God in his need. He is innocent, he says, of any wrong doing himself, so can with clear conscience make his request known unto God. There is no question here as to whether the Psalmist was claiming sinless perfection or not, for none can claim this but Christ.
David’s desire; his cry is for protection from those who seek his downfall. Who these enemies were, in all honesty we know not. All we do know is that David himself says he had not done anything to bring on or aggravate this situation. With hand on heart, he informs his Maker that he is innocent of any such thing. In this Psalm we read of his Complaint before God, his Conduct before God and man, and his overall confidence in God. In verses 3, 4, and 5 he says, “Thou hast proved my heart; Thou hast visited me in the night; Thou hast tried me, and shalt find nothing; I am purposed that my mouth shall not transgress. Concerning the works of men, by the word of Thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer. Hold up my goings in Thy paths, that my footsteps slip not.”
In verse 6 of the Psalm he declares, “I have called upon Thee, for Thou wilt hear me, O God.” It is the easiest thing in the world is it not, for a man to repay evil with evil, to give as good as he gets; but David, aware of such possibilities, seeks the Lord that he does not fall into such ways and enters not into such temptations nor even entertains such thoughts. He is aware that only the LORD can keep him from such.
Is it not the same with us? Only the Power of God can keep any of us from such when we too at times for various reasons are solely tried. His prayer is that he will maintain his present hold, his present stance, his present position and not be moved otherwise. Even though in the prayer the Psalmist does not name these evil men, he is quick to call his enemies deadly. He likens them to hungry lions ready to devour their prey. They are lying in wait and seeking his downfall.
Notice in verse 14 how he makes a comparison with their lot and his own. He calls them “men of the world,” secular men, men who are only interested in the things of this life. He refers to them as men whose bellies are filled with hidden treasure. In other words, they have much material wealth stored up not only for themselves but also their posterity to come. It would seem they have everything their hearts could wish for when it comes to material things, but their lives were not God-centered, and their thoughts were not directed by Him.
“Their portion,” he says, “is in this life,” whereas of course in the previous Psalm he could say that the LORD was the portion of his inheritance. How this reminds me of those lovely words which we sometimes sing, ‘Christ is my meat, Christ is my drink, my medicine and my health. My portion, mine inheritance, yea, all my boundless wealth.’ David’s focus was not so much upon earthly things as upon heavenly, and it is to the last verse of this Psalm that I particularly wish to draw your attention, for here the Psalmist moves from the here and now to the hereafter.
I think verse 15 of our Psalm today holds a special blessing for the reader. I cannot tell you the pleasure I get from reading it myself. For me it is the key verse. If it is ever quoted I remember instantly from where it has been taken. It reads like this: “As for me, I will behold Thy Face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness.”
The awakening which David refers to here is nothing to do with the natural early morning stirrings which follow a good night’s sleep. He is referring rather to the time when he will leave his mortal body and go to be with the Lord. It is not that a spirit of gloominess has suddenly descended upon him that he would utter this, but rather it is an exclamation of joy in the assurance that when life upon earth has ended, his soul will be reunited with the Lord. David believed in eternity and in his prayer he is looking forward in time to the day of his own resurrection from the dead when he will be given a glorified body and will see the face of his Maker.
We have to remember here that David was also amongst those who desired that ‘Heavenly Country’ spoken of in Hebrews chapter 11. He expected life beyond the grave. In the undulating pathways of life, he was living as an Old Testament believer, in the light of eternity. Of course, we today have a greater revelation of Heaven than did those earlier saints, but even so it is quite obvious that to David, the God who cared for him and satisfied him during this life would be with him and still satisfy him in the next.
It is always of great sadness to me when many people we speak to deny the possibility of life after death. Some choose to ‘bury their heads in the sand’ rather than face the issue. Others are dismissive because in thinking on these things they might have to reconsider their lifestyle. There are those who can accept Heaven but cannot accept Hell, yet the bible speaks of them both and without a doubt there are numerous folks who firmly believe the grave for them will be their ultimate end.
But what do the Scriptures say? From the pages of the Old Testament in Daniel chapter 12 verse 2 we read these words: “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” Our Lord seems to be referring to the same thing over in the New Testament in John’s Gospel chapter 5 verses 28 and 29, when he says, “Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and they shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”
Remember, after the death of Lazarus did not our Lord tell Martha, “I am the Resurrection and the Life, he that believeth in Me, though he were dead yet shall he live and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me, shall never die.”
Also, Paul the Apostle in Acts chapter 24 and verse 15 speaks of the resurrection of the dead, which he says consists of “both the just and the unjust.”
I love those few lines written by the Canadian evangelist A. Ramsey. He is no longer with us, but we do have his poem. This is what he wrote:
“I was only a worthless pebble upon the beach of time,
Yet He stooped and declared to heaven “I have made this pebble mine!”
And this is why I serve Him as I think of that crowded beach,
And shudder: that when He was passing I might have been out of reach,
And left like the other pebbles to never be touched by His hand
And tossed by the waves of life’s ocean and buried at last in the sand.”
Again, speaking on this very subject, I have a text once written down and thought to have been given by an old-time Baptist Minister who said, “Men will be sorted yonder. Gravitation will come into play undisturbed; and the pebbles will be arranged according to their weights on the great shore where the sea has cast them up, as they are upon Chesil Beach down there in the English Channel, and many other coasts beside; all the big ones together and sized off to the smaller ones, regularly and steadily laid out.”
PRAYER: LORD, to those of us like David who have this Eternal Hope within, we too can look beyond the trials and tribulations of this life and say: “As for me I will behold Thy face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake, with Thy likeness.”
We shall see His lovely face some bright golden morning,
When the clouds have rifted, and the shades have flown.
Sorrow will be turned to joy, heartaches gone forever.
No more night, only light, when we see His face.
Norman Clayton
Taken from the book, Psalms: The Pilgrims Ascent, by A. B. Saint
LIFE ON THE ALTAR 