Psalm 88, comments

 

Psalm 88:1 ¶  «A Song or Psalm for the sons of Korah, to the chief Musician upon Mahalath Leannoth, Maschil of Heman the Ezrahite.» O LORD God of my salvation, I have cried day and night before thee: 2  Let my prayer come before thee: incline thine ear unto my cry; 3  For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh unto the grave. 4  I am counted with them that go down into the pit: I am as a man that hath no strength: 5  Free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, whom thou rememberest no more: and they are cut off from thy hand. 6  Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. 7  Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves. Selah. 8  Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far from me; thou hast made me an abomination unto them: I am shut up, and I cannot come forth. 9  Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction: LORD, I have called daily upon thee, I have stretched out my hands unto thee.

 

Here is a prayer of desperation. He speaks of the God of his salvation.

 

Psalm 18:46  The LORD liveth; and blessed be my rock; and let the God of my salvation be exalted.

 

Psalm 24:5  He shall receive the blessing from the LORD, and righteousness from the God of his salvation.

 

He cried day and night.

 

Psalm 6:6  I am weary with my groaning; all the night make I my bed to swim; I water my couch with my tears.

 

He pleads with God to let his prayer come before him, to hear his cry.

 

Psalm 141:1 ¶  «A Psalm of David.» LORD, I cry unto thee: make haste unto me; give ear unto my voice, when I cry unto thee. 2  Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.

 

Hebrews 4:16  Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.

 

His soul is full of troubles and he feels like he is going to die. See verse 5 again and then read verse 15 in the next passage. How many of us have felt these things in our own troubles of divorce, disease or accident, grief, or bankruptcy? He feels like one of those people going down into the pit. He has no strength left in him. In his lamentation he feels like when he is dead that God will remember him no more. But remember Job’s words.

 

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.

 

He feels as if God has laid him in the lowest pit, in the deeps.

 

Jonah 2:1 ¶  Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly, 2  And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. 3  For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. 4  Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. 5  The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head. 6  I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God.

7  When my soul fainted within me I remembered the LORD: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. 8  They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy. 9  But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.

 

Notice the similarity here with Job, in that Job’s friends, as we have discussed, regarded him as a secret sinner as that could be, to them, the only explanation of why he was suffering, which was, of course, incorrect. The Psalmist’s friends are far from him. He is an abomination to them.

 

There are types here with Christ as well, being alone and facing execution for the sins of the world of men and women, crying out to the Father. The Psalmist cries out daily, seeking the Lord’s mercy, pleading for help. Have you done that when diagnosed with cancer, or having lost a child to death, or seeing a loved one suffer and feeling helpless?

 

Psalm 88:10 ¶  Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise and praise thee? Selah. 11  Shall thy lovingkindness be declared in the grave? or thy faithfulness in destruction? 12  Shall thy wonders be known in the dark? and thy righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? 13  But unto thee have I cried, O LORD; and in the morning shall my prayer prevent thee. 14  LORD, why castest thou off my soul? why hidest thou thy face from me? 15  I am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up: while I suffer thy terrors I am distracted. 16  Thy fierce wrath goeth over me; thy terrors have cut me off. 17  They came round about me daily like water; they compassed me about together. 18  Lover and friend hast thou put far from me, and mine acquaintance into darkness.

 

The Psalmist continues his thought with some statements that we might make in our attempting to bargain with God when we are in any great and grave distress. What good am I to you dead, God? What value do I have to you in the grave. Will you be able to show me mercy there? Will I see and marvel at your great works? Why are you turning your face from me? These are legitimate questions that people might ask, having never been in that state and only knowing and desiring to live.

 

Hebrews 2:15  And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

 

But the Psalmist asking these questions doesn’t negate the statements made by men like Job in the earliest written book of the Bible.

 

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.

 

Or in Isaiah, a thousand years later.

 

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.

 

Or in Daniel, hundreds of years after that.

 

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.

 

Or the words of the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

John 3:16  For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

 

So take these words in this Psalm for what they are, words of frustration and fear and not doctrine for us. Remember this one in that regard as well;

 

Ecclesiastes 9:5  For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.

 

For we must always remember that our souls do not sleep with our bodies in the grave. They leave the body at death.

 

Genesis 35:18  And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died) that she called his name Benoni: but his father called him Benjamin.

 

2Corinthians 5:8  We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.

 

We will be in Heaven as will be the martyrs in the Tribulation to come.

 

Revelation 6:9  And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held:

 

In fact, we’re there already, in a manner of speaking, represented by our angels or appearances of us (Isaiah 63:9a) while we are on the earth living our lives.

 

Ephesians 2:6  And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:

 

Revelation 5:11  And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands;

 

Hebrews 12:22  But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, 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,

 

But this Psalmist is suffering and in his pain, knows only it. This is something for us all as we have been there. Just remember your lowest point and your greatest fear coming on you in your trouble. This is our comfort that we do not endure these things alone but we share them with the people of the Bible and the people living on the earth now. This is a very negative Psalm that shows us that we are not the first to feel so desperate and fearful.