The Book of Psalms

Word Study

"the mighty God, even the LORD," Hebrew El Elohim YHWH (אֵל אֱלֹהִים יְהוָה), a stacking of three names of God for solemn emphasis. The psalm opens like the sounding of a great trumpet before a trial. Three names of God are stacked -- El, Elohim, YHWH -- and the one who bears them summons the whole earth "from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof" to His court.

"hath spoken," dibber (דִּבֶּר). The first act of the court is God's own speech. Before any charge is laid, the psalm establishes that the Judge of all the earth has opened His mouth.

"perfection of beauty," miklal yofi (מִכְלַל יֹפִי). Zion is named as the place from which He appears -- the perfection of beauty. The court convenes not in a wilderness but in the city where God has set His dwelling.

"hath shined," hofia (הוֹפִיעַ), shone forth, blazed out. "Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined." He does not merely arrive; He blazes out, as light breaking over the assembled earth.

"shall not keep silence," al-yecherash (אַל־יֶחֱרַשׁ). "Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence." The long silence in which men had assumed God did not see is over. The Judge of all the earth is taking His seat.

Explanation

Feel the courtroom being assembled in these three verses. God does not merely appear; He "calls the earth" as a judge calls a court to order, summoning witnesses "from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof", the whole world, east to west, is subpoenaed. He calls "to the heavens from above, and to the earth" (v4) to serve as the jury. And the accused, astonishingly, turns out to be His own covenant people: "that he may judge his people... Gather my saints together unto me" (vv4-5). Notice the pointed phrase, "our God shall come, and shall not keep silence." There had been a long silence; God had watched His people go through the motions of worship and said nothing (as v21 will admit, "these things hast thou done, and I kept silence"). Men mistook that silence for approval, or for absence. The psalm announces that the silence is ending. The God who seemed to say nothing is about to speak, and when He does, "a fire shall devour before him." This is the sobering truth behind every season when God appears quiet: His silence is not consent, and it is not permanent. The mighty God will speak.

Gospel Focus

"Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence", these words reach their fulfilment in the two comings of the Lord Jesus Christ. At His first coming, God did indeed come and shine forth, "the dayspring from on high hath visited us" (Luke 1:78), "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts... in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 4:6); the "perfection of beauty" came near in mercy, not to judge the world but to save it (John 3:17). But the psalm's fuller picture, the fire and the tempest, the summons of all the earth to judgment, points to His second coming, when "the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire" (2 Thessalonians 1:7-8). He who came the first time in silence, "as a sheep before her shearers is dumb" (Isaiah 53:7), will come the second time and "shall not keep silence," to "judge the quick and the dead" (2 Timothy 4:1). And the God who comes is one, "the mighty God, even the LORD," who is Jesus, "the mighty God" of Isaiah 9:6, God manifest in flesh. The long silence in which men presume upon His patience is not for ever; the Judge is coming. Blessed are those gathered as His saints, hidden in Christ, who will meet Him as their Saviour and not their terror.

Word Study

"offer," Hebrew zevach (זְבַח), sacrifice. After exposing the emptiness of mere ritual (God owns "the cattle upon a thousand hills," v10; He is not fed by sacrifices, vv12-13), He does not abolish sacrifice but redefines it. There is still something to be offered.

"thanksgiving," todah (תּוֹדָה), the thank-offering, praise. "Offer unto God thanksgiving." This is the sacrifice He truly desires: the offering God wants is a grateful heart.

"pay thy vows," shallem nedarekha (שַׁלֵּם נְדָרֶיךָ). With gratitude goes faithfulness: what was promised to God in the day of need is to be made good. Thanksgiving that never pays what it vowed is not thanksgiving.

"most High," Elyon (עֶלְיוֹן). The vows are owed to the Most High -- the same God who has just declared that He needs nothing from the herds of His worshippers.

"call upon me," qera'eni (קְרָאֵנִי). The thank-offering is joined to trust: "call upon me in the day of trouble." God is honoured not by animals He does not need, but by a people who thank Him and cry to Him.

"day of trouble," yom tzarah (יוֹם צָרָה). The invitation is set precisely where men are most tempted to look elsewhere -- the day when trouble closes in.

"deliver," achaltzekha (אֲחַלֶּצְךָ), rescue. And the promise attached is unconditional in its plainness: "I will deliver thee." The God who will accept no bribe of cattle gives rescue freely to those who call.

Explanation

Watch how God turns the whole logic of sacrifice around in these verses. His people assumed that worship flows one direction: we give Him something, bulls and goats, as if the Almighty were the needy party who must be fed and kept supplied. He has just demolished that idea, "If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof" (v12). God lacks nothing; you cannot enrich Him. So what could a creature possibly "offer" the God who owns everything? The answer is beautiful: "Offer unto God thanksgiving... and call upon me in the day of trouble." The two things God asks are the two things only a dependent creature can give, gratitude for what He has done, and a cry for help in what we cannot do. And look at verse 15 closely, for it is almost a small gospel in itself: God says "call upon me... I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me." Even the "sacrifice" He requests is one where He does the real work. You call; He delivers; and the deliverance itself becomes your next thanksgiving. The worship God wants is not us supplying His needs but us admitting ours, and letting Him be the Giver, the Rescuer, the God who is glorified precisely by being trusted.

Gospel Focus

"Offer unto God thanksgiving... and call upon me in the day of trouble", this is the worship of the gospel, and it is made possible by Jesus Christ, in whom the true sacrifice has been offered once for all. The blood of bulls and goats could never take away sin (Hebrews 10:4); they were shadows pointing to "the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (Hebrews 10:10). Now that the one true sacrifice is made, what remains for us is exactly what Psalm 50 named: "By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name" (Hebrews 13:15). The thank-offering, todah, becomes the believer's daily worship through Christ. And the invitation "call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee" is the very heart of the gospel, for "whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:13), and the name we call upon is Jesus, "the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him" (Romans 10:12). Come, then, not to feed God with what He does not need, but to thank Him for Christ and to call on Him in your trouble; He will deliver, and your rescue will become fresh praise, and thou shalt glorify Him.

Word Study

"offereth praise," Hebrew zoveach todah (זֹבֵחַ תּוֹדָה), sacrifices thanksgiving. The psalm closes by gathering its whole message into one verse, naming the two marks of the worship God accepts. First, a praising heart: "Whoso offereth praise." The same thank-offering commanded in verse 14 returns here as the mark of the true worshipper.

"glorifieth me," yechabbedanni (יְכַבְּדָנְנִי). "Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me." This is God's own verdict on what honours Him -- not the size of the offering, but the gratitude behind it.

"ordereth his conversation aright," sam derekh (שָׂם דֶּרֶךְ), sets, orders his way. Second, a rightly ordered life: the man who sets his way in order. Praise on the lips is joined to a life laid out straight.

"conversation," here meaning manner of life, conduct. The older English word does not mean speech but the whole manner of life -- how a man walks, not merely how he talks.

"salvation of God," yesha Elohim (יֵשַׁע אֱלֹהִים), the deliverance of God. To such a worshipper, praising and obedient, comes the great promise: "will I shew the salvation of God."

Explanation

The last verse is the whole psalm distilled, and it deliberately answers the two failures the psalm exposed. Israel's worship had gone wrong in two ways: their hearts were thankless, going through sacrifice without gratitude (vv8-14), and their lives were crooked, mouths full of covenant words while they ran with thieves and adulterers (vv16-20). So the closing verse names the two things that put both right: "Whoso offereth praise", the thankful heart the thankless lacked, "and to him that ordereth his conversation aright", the honest life the hypocrite lacked. Worship God accepts is these two together, a praising mouth and a straightened path; the lips and the walk must agree. And notice the promise held out to such a person: "will I shew the salvation of God." The Hebrew for "salvation" is yesha, the very word from which the name Jesus is formed. The psalm that began with God coming in fire ends with God offering to show His salvation, judgment is real, but the door to deliverance stands open. To the one who will simply come with a thankful heart and a surrendered life, God does not merely threaten; He promises to show him salvation itself.

Gospel Focus

"To him that ordereth his conversation aright will I shew the salvation of God", and "the salvation of God," yesha, has a name: Jesus, in whom the LORD saves. This closing promise is the gospel's own hope, for the salvation God offered to show is fully revealed in Christ. When the infant Saviour was held in the temple, aged Simeon said, "mine eyes have seen thy salvation" (Luke 2:30), the salvation of God shown at last in a Person. Psalm 50 asks for "praise" and a life "ordered aright," and these are not the price of salvation but the fruit of it, for we are saved by grace through faith, not of works (Ephesians 2:8-9), yet that grace teaches us to deny ungodliness and to live "soberly, righteously, and godly" (Titus 2:11-12), ordering our way aright out of gratitude. The thankful heart and the surrendered life are the marks of those to whom God has shown His salvation in Jesus. So the psalm that opened with the mighty God coming in judgment closes with an open hand: come with praise on your lips and your life laid before Him, and He will show you His salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is Himself the salvation of God.