Part 1: The Call | Part 2: The Commitment | Part 3: Delight in God’s Care | Part 4: Delight in God’s Instruction

The fifth stanza of Psalm 16 (vv 9-11) speaks of the confidence that David has in God and the consequent joyous expectation he has regarding the future.

9 Therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will dwell securely.

We think of the heart as metaphorically the seat of emotions. The Bible has a much larger picture of it. The Bible doesn’t contain a “psychological map” of the human; it speaks rather of a body and a non-body, which survives the death of the body. It uses many different words for that immaterial part: soul, spirit, heart, mind, conscience, will. It’s fruitless to try to tease out detailed distinctives among those terms. Here the “heart” is distinguished from the “flesh,” or body, and that’s David’s point.

“My glory,” I think, is a reference to the image of God that imbues all of us. We have a special relationship with God, and for believers that relationship is just icing on the cake; we have a joy that outlives death, and even our corpse will be secure, awaiting the day of resurrection.

10 For You will not abandon my soul to Sheol; Nor will You allow Your Holy One to undergo decay.

This is a controversial passage, but I think its meaning is unambiguous.

To begin with, we know that David is prophesying here; his words apply not so much to himself as to his Greater Son, the Christ. At Pentecost, Peter cites this passage (Ac 2.25-31), as does Paul in his sermon at Pisidian Antioch on his first missionary journey (Ac 13.35), with a later allusion in 1Co 15.4). In every case these authoritative interpreters (Jn 16.13) see these words as messianic. It is the crucified and buried Jesus who is not abandoned to sheol. At Pentecost Peter even says specifically that this prophecy cannot apply to David, because his body has decayed in the grave (Ac 2.29).

Now, these words have occasioned some dramatic interpretations, especially based on the wording of the KJV, “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell.” There a vigorous discussion about whether Jesus’ soul went to hell while his body was in the tomb, and for what purpose. I think all that discussion is a complete misunderstanding of this text. I’ve written at more length about that earlier.

Here I’ll just say that the operative word, sheol, has a broad range of meaning. It can and often does refer to the place of departed spirits, but I don’t think the context allows that meaning here. The next line speaks of “undergo[ing] decay,” and that does not happen in hell; there “the worm dieth not” (Mk 9.48). But our word sheol can also mean a pit (Ps 30.3), or more specifically, a grave (Ps 88.4).

Similarly, the word soul also has a broad range of meaning. It is used once elsewhere of a corpse (Hag 2.13)—which we would call a body without a soul. Such is the breadth of the Hebrew word.

Now, these two nuances juxtapose to give use a clear passage. “You will not abandon my corpse to the grave; my body will not see decay.” This is a clear statement that the body of Jesus would not be in the tomb long enough for putrefaction to set in.

You may recall that just before the resurrection of Lazarus, his sister Martha indelicately observed that after four days his body would smell bad (Jn 11.39). Jesus’ body, on the other hand, was revivified early Sunday morning, just about 36 hours after his death at 3pm Friday.

(That’s not a typo. While 36 hours is just 1.5 days, not 3, by our reckoning, in the Jewish mind these 36 hours included Friday afternoon, Saturday, and part of Sunday morning, which they would reckon as “three days and three nights,” as odd as that feels to us.)

11 You will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever.

Warren Wiersbe took this verse as his life verse. Was that a mistake? Since this is a messianic prophecy, was it inappropriate to take God’s promise to Christ as applying to him too?

I don’t think so. Many of the Son’s joys belong as well to those who are in him.

In his Tyndale Series commentary, Derek Kidner writes, “The refugee of verse 1 finds himself an heir, and his inheritance beyond all imagining and all exploring.”

While David doesn’t know what will happen in the short term, his confidence in the long term is airtight. He knows God; he knows that he is God’s child; and he knows how God works. He is filled with joyous anticipation.

Me too.

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Part 1: The Call | Part 2: The Commitment | Part 3: Delight in God’s Care

The fourth stanza of Psalm 16 (vv 7-8) speaks of the instruction that David receives from God, both directly (v 7) and through the protection he demonstrates (v 8).

Directly

7 I will bless the Lord who has counseled me; Indeed, my mind instructs me in the night.

David doesn’t elaborate on what form this counsel takes. He speaks elsewhere of his admiration of and attention to God’s Word, which we know in his day would have consisted only of the Torah, Joshua, and perhaps Judges and Ruth. When he says that his “mind instructs me in the night,” it could well have been through his meditation on the Scripture that he had, as he describes in almost every verse of Psalm 119. Of course, that would be possible only with Scripture he had memorized.

But we also know that David was a prophet, receiving revelation directly from God, and that he realized that himself; he claims as much at the end of his life:

The Spirit of the LORD spoke by me, And His word was on my tongue (2Sa 23.2).

Did he understand that at the time he wrote Psalm 16? I think it’s reasonable to assume so. As he lies awake at night, perhaps he receives, believes, and understands God’s direct revelation. Perhaps that consists of the very Psalms he later wrote down as Scripture, or perhaps there were other direct revelations that are not recorded for us; we know that others in biblical times experienced that. Paul, for example, wrote letters, perhaps a good many, that are not in the Bible (1Co 5.9; cf 2Co 11.28), and since he was an apostle, all his teachings would have been authoritative (Jn 16.13). John notes that many of Jesus’ words and works, which are directly revelatory (Jn 1.14, 18), were not written down (Jn 20.30-31).

Now, we can’t view any of our original thoughts as God’s direct revelation; our situation differs significantly from David’s. But we can read, believe, and meditate on the same Scriptures that David had—and many more—and we can apply them to our decisions. The Lord can “counsel” us; and if we memorize the Scripture, hide it in our hearts (Ps 119.11), then we can be “instructed” by God “in the night.”

When we’re waiting to fall asleep at night, where do our thoughts turn? The very best place is the Scripture that we’ve memorized.

Through Protection

8 I have set the Lord continually before me; Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.

What does it mean that David has “set the Lord before” him? God is omnipresent, and he looks after his people. David writes about that himself in Psalm 23. So why does he “set the Lord before” him?

I think he’s continuing his thought from the previous verse; he’s meditating, placing his thoughts intentionally on the Lord’s presence. Yes, God is always there, and he always cares; but when we’re in a relationship, we choose to place our thoughts on it. That’s an evidence of the depth of the relationship, of the love we have for our friend.

David says that the Lord is “at [his] right hand.” What does that position imply?

Well, 85 or 90% of people are right-handed. That means that most people carrying a weapon are going to carry it for effective use with the right hand. In those days a bodyguard would carry a shield to cover his protectee; that would ordinarily go on his left arm, to leave his right hand free for using the weapon. That means the protectee would be on his left, where he could more easily cover him with the shield. And that means the bodyguard is ordinarily standing on the right side of the person he’s protecting (IVPBBC).

Of course God needs no weapons, and his physical position doesn’t matter at all. David is using the typical physical situation to say that God is his protector and that he’s perfectly effective.

Sometimes fear is a reasonable response. But it’s never a necessary one.

Next time: David’s conclusion

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Part 1: The Call | Part 2: The Commitment

In the third stanza of our psalm (Ps 16.5-6), David is contrasting the difficult life of those who follow false gods, which he’s just described, with the life that he has chosen along with the saints.

5 The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and my cup; You support my lot.

The word inheritance here is the same Hebrew word used of the allotment of land portions to the Israelite tribes in the conquered Canaan. The word carries implications of both loot–captured treasure–and inheritance from one’s father; and the tribal allotments in Canaan carry both senses, since they were both captured and distributed. Since David was of course born into the tribe of Judah, he had a family claim to a portion of Judah’s allotted inheritance. But here he is looking well beyond that little town of Bethlehem; the Lord, he says, is the portion that matters to him.

My wife and I own our house. Until recently, I hadn’t lived in a paid-for house since I was 10 years old, and it’s nice to know that this bit of land belongs to us. Land is solid and steady–unless you live on a fault line–and it’s a good feeling to say, “This is ours.”

But that’s not how David is thinking. He’s fully invested not in land, but in a person. God not only bestows David’s portion, but he “support[s his] lot”: he grasps it and keeps it safe. “Lot” here is not a piece of real estate; it’s the outcome of a throw of the dice, the portion that has fallen to him from the Lord.

The verse also mentions David’s “cup.” That speaks of his needs that are being supplied. We humans need water even more than we need food–and in the arid Middle East, even moreso. The Lord supplies all that he needs. David will return to this metaphor in his most famous psalm: “My cup runneth over” (Ps 23.5). God not only supplies as much as we need, but he pours out his supply abundantly, lavishly, extravagantly.

Investing in God not only sets you up well, but it guarantees eternal profit.

In his commentary on this verse, John Calvin writes,

This doctrine … ought to draw us away not only from all the perverse inventions of superstition, but also from all the allurements of the flesh and of the world. Whenever, therefore, those things present themselves to us which would lead us away from resting in God alone, let us make use of this sentiment as an antidote against them, that we have sufficient cause for being contented, since he who has in himself an absolute fullness of all good has given himself to be enjoyed by us. In this way we will experience our condition to be always pleasant and comfortable; for he who has God as his portion is destitute of nothing which is requisite to constitute a happy life.

Do you find yourself completely satisfied in God? What else do you think will make you truly happy?

In the next verse he restates this idea differently:

6 The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places; Indeed, my heritage is beautiful to me.

The word lines here, as you might suspect, is a reference to boundary lines, or perhaps the surveying ropes that were used to lay out those lines. In context, he’s clearly referring not to his tribal allotment, except as an idea on which his much superior inheritance is based. The pleasantness and beauty of his life in God far surpasses anything that the Israelites saw in their tribal inheritance–and Canaan was a land “flowing with milk and honey’ (Ex 3.8), productive, bountiful, more than sufficient.

David’s insight was anticipated way back when the land was apportioned by Moses. Every tribe received a contiguous land assignment, except for Levi. His descendants were apportioned 48 cities throughout Canaan and the East Bank, where they could teach the Law to all the tribes of Israel. As Moses put it later,

Levi does not have a portion or inheritance with his brothers; the LORD is his inheritance, just as the LORD your God spoke to him (Dt 10.9).

And this connection in turn anticipates our status in eternity; we are all priests before God (Re 1.6; 5.10; 20.6).

In the next stanza, David will detail more specifically the benefits the Lord has graciously provided him.

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Part 1: The Call 

In the second stanza of Psalm 16, David expresses his commitment to God’s cause. He speaks of loyalty to God’s people, and then of his attitude toward those who worship other gods:

As for the saints who are in the earth, they are the majestic ones in whom is all my delight. The sorrows of those who have bartered for another god will be multiplied; I shall not pour out their drink offerings of blood, Nor will I take their names upon my lips.

David uses the common Hebrew word for “saints,” which literally means “holy ones.” We often think of “holiness” as simply piety or goodness—the holy person doesn’t do bad stuff—but that’s not usually what it means; rather, it speaks of being set apart, or special. “Saints,” then, are simply people who belong to God, who are his treasured possession—what both Paul and Peter call his “peculiar people” (Ti 2.14; 1P 2.9 KJV). (They got this language directly from the Mosaic Law [Ex 19.5; Dt 14.2; 26.18 KJV].)

So David says here that he views the people who belong to YHWH, the true God, as “majestic ones,” like kings or nobles or chieftains; the word is also used of the ocean (Ex 15.10), a ship (Is 33.21), and a tree (Ezk 17.23).

God’s people, he says, are the people I respect.

That’s a good reminder for us.

We tend to be tougher on people we’re more familiar with, because we know their foibles and weaknesses; familiarity does indeed breed contempt.

And I’m not denying their foiblitude. (Don’t look it up; it’s not in the dictionary.) Everybody’s that way. None of our fellow believers, including you and me, deserved to become children of God. But we are, and the fact that we’re in the same family should incline us to give one another a break, a measure of grace. Family matters. Not because we’re all really cool, but because we are chosen and set apart and loved by the God who made all things and whose Son has purchased us with his own blood.

That’s a good place to start.

David contrasts that with his view of those who have chosen false gods.

[Sidebar: there’s a translation issue here; does the Bebrew say they have “hastened after” (mahar I) or “bartered for” (mahar II) other gods? In this case, as in many others, the question has no impact on the essential meaning of the verse.]

He begins by saying that they have a difficult life ahead of them: their “sorrows … will be multipled.” That is what happens to people who live outside the umbrella of God’s protection. It’s the language God used to Eve as the consequence of the first sin (Ge 3.16).

Now, we should note that God is in fact kind even to those who reject him; he gives food (Ps 145.15) and sunshine and rain (Mt.5.45) even to those who are ungrateful and evil (Lk 6.35). It’s often said that he gives breath even to the people who use it to curse him. We call this generosity “common grace.”

It’s also true that the Christian life is not simply a matter of tiptoeing through the tulips. The consequences of living in a world broken by sin reach us as well, and we know the sorrows of sickness and death, of conflict and conflagration.

But God’s people have promises of his protection, wisdom, direction, and care that do not apply to those who reject him. In that sense, the choices of the godless result in a lifetime of sorrows.

Perhaps the clearest illustration of this principle is the child sacrifice practiced by the Canaanite religions. How can tossing a living infant into a raging furnace and hearing his dying cries not bring unimaginable sorrow—even if you think it will incline the god to send rain? Wouldn’t it also make you hate that god? David won’t even speak the name of such a god.

The contrast here beteween the false gods and the true God is stark. David’s decision is not difficult.

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I’ve found great benefit in memorizing a few of the Psalms. They bring comfort and calm, but also often challenge and courage. Psalm 2 is not Psalm 23. 

I preached recently on Psalm 16. I’d like to share some of those thoughts here. 

The folks at Logos have put together a nice interactive module on the Psalms, which, among other things, organizes them into seven genres: praise, thanksgiving, hymn, lament, wisdom, royal, and trust. Psalm 16 they categorize as a psalm of trust. This is the least populated genre, but it does also include, among others, Psalms 11, 23, and 91, which is a pretty good neighborhood. 

Its superscription calls it a “Mikhtam” of, or to, David. A few people think they know what a Mikhtam is. I’d suggest that they don’t; it’s an unknown term, like “Selah.” There are five other Mikhtams (technically, mikhtamim) in the Psalms, and oddly enough, they’re consecutive, in a separate section of the book: Psalms 56-60. 

I see five stanzas in the psalm, each two verses, except for the last, which is three. Maybe a post apiece. 

David begins by calling out to the Lord: 

Preserve me, O God, for I take refuge in You. I said to the LORD, “You are my Lord; I have no good besides You” (Ps 16.1-2 NASB). 

The first verse sounds like this is going to be a lament psalm (compare Ps 15.1 and Ps 17.1), but this is the last we hear about anything potentially threatening. There’s not even any more prayer of any kind in the rest of the psalm. 

He asks the Lord to “preserve” him—that is, to keep watch over, guard him. This is what God told Adam to do to the Garden (Ge 2.15); it’s what Cain asked if he was supposed to do for his now-slain brother (Ge 4.9); it’s what God promised to do for Jacob at Bethel (Ge 28.15). Commentator Charles Pfeiffer writes, “This prayer is not for deliverance from an enemy but for the continuance of the happiness he has already found.” 

And so begins the rejoicing that will constitute the rest of the psalm. 

Note that David uses two names for God in verse 2: “I said to YHWH [God’s personal name], You are my Master.” David begins by saying that God is both his covenant-keeping, loving ally and his lord/master. And he builds that on verse 1, which states that he is his refuge. 

Do we see God in that way? 

One more thought. The Hebrew of verse 2a is difficult; different English translations vary somewhat. I think the context of the psalm favors how the Good News Bible puts it: “All the good things I have come from you.” David will spend the rest of the psalm enumerating those that come to his mind. 

A member of my extended family, who is with Lord now, had a particular fondness for a restaurant up across the state line in North Carolina. Our two families would enjoy driving up the mountain to eat the brunch buffet there. It was out of the way, surrounded by scenery (not far from Connemara, the Carl Sandburg home). I recall clearly one such meal, all of us seated around the table, stuffed to the gills, and him with his cup of tea, looking out the surrounding picture windows at the greenery. 

“This is my happy place,” he said. 

And we sat, just soaking it all in. 

Well, I’m confident he has an even happier happy place now. But his words that day reflect, I think, the joy that David found in his God, the specifics of which he’s about to lay before us. 

RIP, Steve. 

Next time. 

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