Psalm 16:1 ¶ «Michtam of David.» Preserve me, O God: for in thee do I put my trust. 2 O my soul, thou hast said unto the LORD, Thou art my Lord: my goodness extendeth not to thee; 3 But to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom is all my delight. 4 Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god: their drink offerings of blood will I not offer, nor take up their names into my lips. 5 The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot. 6 The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage. 7 I will bless the LORD, who hath given me counsel: my reins also instruct me in the night seasons.
Michtam is an obscure reference for which we can get many explanations
from many commentators. Some say it means golden or profound and others say it
is only a musical reference. It is found again in Psalms 56 through 60.
David is said to be a man after God’s own heart.
1Samuel 13:14 But now thy
kingdom shall not continue: the LORD hath sought him a man after his own heart,
and the LORD hath commanded him to be captain over his people, because thou
hast not kept that which the LORD commanded thee.
And yet David was guilty of great sin. How could he be described
as such?
Acts 13:22 And when he had
removed him, he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he
gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine
own heart, which shall fulfil all my will.
David’s trust in God never wavered despite his own selfish
desires. That is the key to being a man after God’s own heart.
Saints in verse 3 is a very interesting word. It means sanctified ones,
those set apart by God for God. Regardless of the Roman Catholic mythology
God’s own who trust in Him are His saints. It is clear that by noting the
saints that are in the earth it is implied that there are saints in the
spiritual world.
Ephesians 3:14 ¶ For this
cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth
is named,
Hebrews 12:23 To the
general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and
to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect
In verse 4 David mentions drink offerings of blood. Apart
from the Roman Catholic heresy let’s look at what he was specifically referring
to. Drink offerings of wine were required under the Law given to Moses.
Numbers 28:7 And the drink
offering thereof shall be the fourth part of an hin for the one lamb: in the
holy place shalt thou cause the strong wine to be poured unto the LORD for a
drink offering.
Drink offerings were made to other gods by the
heathen and the idolatrous Israelites.
Jeremiah 7:18 The children
gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough,
to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto
other gods, that they may provoke me to anger.
In verse 5 David is celebrating his relationship with God. Portion
is used as inheritance in the following;
Genesis 31:14 And Rachel
and Leah answered and said unto him, Is there yet any portion or inheritance
for us in our father’s house?
Deuteronomy 32:9 For the
LORD’S portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance.
My cup is used elsewhere in Psalms to refer to God’s blessings, God’s
bounty, and God’s deliverance.
Psalm 23:5 Thou preparest a
table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with
oil; my cup runneth over.
In verse 6 David declares the beautiful and wonderful inheritance
he has received from the Lord with lines as in boundary lines. See goodly
heritage at the end.
The use of reins in verse 7 is very interesting. Reins are
internal organs, particularly the kidneys, and is used in a similar way that heart
is used in the Bible sometimes for gut feelings, thoughts, and intentions. Remember
back in Psalm, chapter 7.
Psalm 7:9 Oh let the
wickedness of the wicked come to an end; but establish the just: for the
righteous God trieth the hearts and reins.
So here David’s confidence in the Lord is confirmed even by his
feelings, his innermost being.
Prophetically, not only can we see in the pages of the Bible how
the Israelites failed God and followed after other gods, to their own
destruction, we can look at a clear distinction between the Christian and the
heathen. The distinction is in how we have confidence in God and how many of
the elite of the heathen resent even our right and duty to acknowledge and
worship God. The clear lines between us become greyer in areas where Christians
engage in heathenish activities. For instance, when Christians practice
cohabitation and live with a sex partner to whom they are not married, treating
the bond-for-life that God intended casually and irreverently they are following
the heathen philosophy.
The first large work of Satan when Christianity first grew was the
creation of a state church that denied the liberty that is found in the New
Testament and killed not only unbelievers but nonconforming Christians. It was
a Satanic religion that said that kings ruled in God’s place and were to be
followed and obeyed as if they were God. That started with early church leaders
like Cyprian insisting that to obey a Christian priest was to obey God. We
still have that today in Fundamentalism where to obey the charismatic pastor is
to obey God in some instances (i.e. Jack Hyles).
Paul had to warn Corinthian Christians about not engaging in pagan
worship practices even if they were doing it as a matter of convenience as any
clear reading of his letters to them will show.
I am bringing this all together to explain a greater truth. Today,
there are controversies in America regarding things like Critical Race Theory
and various sexual orientations and lifestyles. So-called Marxist Critical
Theory and sexual “liberation” movements are all connected to 1960s Marxists of
the Frankfort School like Herbert Marcuse and postmodernist philosophers like
Michel Foucault. Modern Civil Rights movements in America take their cues and
tactics from the Marxist playbook as do the arguments to impact young people’s
lives with Critical Race Theory. Critical Race Theory is not about the teaching
of history but of Marxist philosophy and class warfare disguised as racial
oppression.
When Christians defy traditional lines of morality like practicing
fornication or having sex with someone to whom they are not married or
practicing cohabitation (shacking up) they have been drawn into the Marxist
sphere of living and are more open to the tyranny of the collective. People are
weakened by their rejection of the stability of traditional morality or their
offspring will eventually become more and more dependent upon government and
the largesse of the collective playing right into Marxist aspirations for
control.
There is not a long distance from the state church at Rome and its
drink offerings of blood to a government that considers itself a messiah and
rests its authority on what Richard Ely, mentor to President Woodrow Wilson,
said was the “divine right of the state.” There is also not a long distance
between Christians shacking up and accepting homosexual couples in the
congregation.
But back to the passage, Their sorrows shall be multiplied that
hasten after another god is a very prophetic statement and an indictment of
America today.
Personally, we must reject any standard of living, any even hint
of our accepting of current society’s moral positions. We as Christians must
not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate anyone who does. We must not commit
fornication, avoid “shacking up” with a sex partner, drunkenness, illegal drug
use, and so many other things that are glorified in our culture. We must
refrain from immodest dress, sensual behavior, and sexualizing children at a
young age by permitting these things to come before their eyes.
In other words, we should be circumspect in our lives, careful in
our dealings, and always thinking of whether what we are doing glorifies God or
ourselves, or perhaps no one. The Communist mentality that has infiltrated our
culture tells us that a thing is okay to do simply because we want to do it and
that being happy is life’s highest good which of course are rubbish thinking. Remember
always in your mind, Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after
another god.
Psalm 16:8 ¶ I have set the
LORD always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be
moved. 9 Therefore my heart is glad, and
my glory rejoiceth: my flesh also shall rest in hope. 10 For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither
wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption. 11 Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy
presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures
for evermore.
David’s confidence in God requires David’s complete trust in God. He
is expressing the belief and faith of what God will do for him. It is clear he
is showing that David had a confidence in the resurrection. And by context
verse 11 would reveal a belief in eternal life on David’s part which is evident
throughout Bible history on the part of believers.
Job spoke of the resurrection nearly 2,000 years before Christ.
Job 14:13 O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave,
that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldest
appoint me a set time, and remember me! 14
If a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time
will I wait, till my change come. 15
Thou shalt call, and I will answer thee: thou wilt have a desire to the
work of thine hands.
Job 19:25 For
I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon
the earth: 26 And though after my skin
worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: 27 Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes
shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.
Isaiah spoke of a resurrection a thousand
years after Job.
Isaiah
26:19 Thy dead men shall live, together
with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for
thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.
And Daniel a few hundred years after Isaiah.
Daniel
12:2 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.
Ezekiel also spoke of a physical resurrection
although many insist this is metaphorical, simply about the restoration of
Israel. I believe it is, on its literal level, physical regarding flesh and
blood.
Ezekiel
37:1 ¶ The hand of the LORD was upon me,
and carried me out in the spirit of the LORD, and set me down in the midst of
the valley which was full of bones, 2
And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very
many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry. 3 And he said unto me, Son of man, can these
bones live? And I answered, O Lord GOD, thou knowest. 4 Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these
bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. 5 Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones;
Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live: 6 And I will lay sinews upon you, and will
bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye
shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD. 7 So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I
prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together,
bone to his bone. 8 And when I beheld,
lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them
above: but there was no breath in them. 9
Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and
say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Come from the four winds, O breath,
and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the
breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an
exceeding great army. 11 Then he said
unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they
say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.
12 Therefore prophesy and say unto them,
Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and
cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.
13 And ye shall know that I am the LORD,
when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your
graves, 14 And shall put my spirit in
you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye
know that I the LORD have spoken it, and performed it, saith the LORD.
In the record of Paul’s debate with the
religious leaders of his day when he was first arrested the proof of the belief
in the resurrection is evident.
Acts
23:6 But when Paul perceived that the
one part were Sadducees, and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council,
Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee: of the hope and
resurrection of the dead I am called in question…8 For the Sadducees say that there is no
resurrection, neither angel, nor spirit: but the Pharisees confess both.
Acts
24:15 And have hope toward God, which
they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead,
both of the just and unjust…21 Except it
be for this one voice, that I cried standing among them, Touching the
resurrection of the dead I am called in question by you this day.
The Resurrection is the primary doctrine of
Christianity, for without it, saying that Jesus Christ was God means nothing.
Without the Resurrection, belief in the judgment of sin in eternity is a stupid
and vain oppression of the spirit of man. If we die and cease to exist we have
nothing but self-righteousness in this life if we are religious.
Paul said it like this;
1Corinthians
15:12 ¶ Now if Christ be preached that
he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of
the dead? 13 But if there be no
resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: 14 And if Christ be not risen, then is our
preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. 15
Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified
of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead
rise not. 16 For if the dead rise not,
then is not Christ raised: 17 And if
Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. 18 Then they also which are fallen asleep in
Christ are perished. 19 If in this life
only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
Prophetically this passage is alluded to again in Acts as a
reference to Christ. An allusion is not a direct quote but uses the sentiment
of a passage. The Holy Spirit shows us what the intended meaning of a passage
is in this way.
Acts 2:25 For David
speaketh concerning him, I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is on
my right hand, that I should not be moved: 26
Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my
flesh shall rest in hope: 27 Because
thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to
see corruption. 28 Thou hast made known
to me the ways of life; thou shalt make me full of joy with thy countenance.
So, at Pentecost Peter is preaching to Jewish proselytes from many
nations who will become followers of Christ the Lord. Here the Holy Spirit
applies this passage in Psalms to the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophetic
interpretations are clear.
For us, personally, this again can be applied to the promise of
eternal life and our eternal life with the One who created us. It is a great
prayer if we think of the promises we have in Christ and how we view Christ
Himself, God in the flesh, who was here with us in the flesh, who is here
inside of us in His Spirit, and perhaps in book form, in the Bible as the word
of God.
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