The Book of Psalms

Word Study

"Shepherd of Israel," Hebrew ro'eh Yisrael (רֹעֵה יִשְׂרָאֵל). The psalm cries to God under the same title the Lord Jesus would one day claim for Himself: "I am the good shepherd" (John 10:11) -- the Shepherd of Israel and the Good Shepherd are not two, but one.

"leadest Joseph like a flock," noheg katzon Yosef (נֹהֵג כַּצֹּאן יוֹסֵף). The title is filled out at once by an action: God does not merely own the flock, He moves it along the road. His people are pictured as sheep on a journey, and every stage of it is His leading, not their own wandering.

"dwellest between the cherubims," yoshev hakkeruvim (יֹשֵׁב הַכְּרֻבִים). This names the exact spot above the ark of the covenant, between the two golden cherubim, where God met with Moses and spoke (Exodus 25:22) -- the psalmist appeals to God enthroned in the very place He promised to be found.

"shine forth," hofi'ah (הוֹפִיעָה). The plea to the God enthroned above the ark is that He would break out into view: "thou that dwellest between the cherubims, shine forth." What is asked for is not a gift sent from God but God Himself made visible.

"turn us again," hashivenu (הֲשִׁיבֵנוּ), restore us, cause us to return. The word carries both senses together: bring us back to Yourself, and so bring us back to what we were. Restoration begins with God turning His people, not with the people managing to turn themselves.

"cause thy face to shine," ha'er panekha (הָאֵר פָּנֶיךָ). The refrain echoes the priestly blessing itself, "The LORD make his face shine upon thee" (Numbers 6:25) -- the psalmist begs for nothing new, only for the blessing already promised to be made real again. "Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved."

Explanation

Two things in this refrain repay close attention, and they are the heart of the whole psalm. First, notice what is asked: "Turn us again, O God." The prayer is not primarily "turn our circumstances again," or "change our fortunes," but "turn us." Restoration, the psalm knows, begins not with a change in situation but with a change in the people, and even that change is God's work to do, "turn us", we cannot turn ourselves. This is the true nature of revival: not that God fixes our troubles while we stay as we are, but that God turns our hearts back to Himself, and salvation follows. We are so bent on wandering that we cannot even return without God turning us. Second, notice the cure the refrain names: "cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved." This is the language of the ancient priestly blessing, "the LORD make his face shine upon thee" (Numbers 6:25). When God's face shines on His people, when His favour and presence are turned toward them, that is salvation itself; a dark, hidden face means trouble, a shining face means rescue. And there is one more thing worth seeing across the psalm: the refrain grows. In verse 3 it is "O God"; in verse 7, "O God of hosts"; in verse 19, "O LORD God of hosts." As the prayer deepens, the name of God swells, faith laying hold of more and more of who He is. The whole remedy for a people in trouble is here: not a better situation, but God turning us again, and the light of His face shining upon us.

Gospel Focus

"Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved", this prayer is answered fully in Jesus Christ, in whom God has turned to His people and made His face to shine. The turning we cannot do for ourselves God works in us, "turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the LORD my God" (Jeremiah 31:18), and it is His grace that draws us, "no man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him" (John 6:44). And the shining face of God, the light of His favour, has dawned on the world in Christ, for "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 4:6). To see the shining face of God is to behold Christ, "the light of the world" (John 8:12), and in Him "we all... beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image" (2 Corinthians 3:18). He is also the "Shepherd of Israel," the Good Shepherd who leads His flock and lays down His life for the sheep. So when your heart is far off and cold, pray this prayer: "Turn me again, O God," and look to the face of Christ, in whom God's favour shines. He turns the wandering, shines on the dark, and saves all who behold Him.

Word Study

"a vine," Hebrew gefen (גֶּפֶן). The psalm pictures Israel as a vine God tended. A vine is not a wild plant; it exists only because someone planted it, and it bears only because someone keeps it. The whole image puts Israel at God's mercy from the first.

"out of Egypt," mimmitzrayim (מִמִּצְרַיִם). "Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt." The vine did not walk out of slavery; it was carried out. Israel's history as a nation starts with a transplanting God alone performed.

"cast out the heathen," tegaresh goyim (תְּגָרֵשׁ גּוֹיִם). Before the vine could go into the ground the ground had to be cleared: "thou hast cast out the heathen." God prepared the ground Himself, driving out what stood in the place He meant His vine to occupy.

"planted it," vattitta'eha (וַתִּטָּעֶהָ). "Thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. Thou preparedst room before it." Every verb here is God's doing; the vine is wholly passive, set in the soil by another's hand.

"take deep root," vattashresh shorasheha (וַתַּשְׁרֵשׁ שָׁרָשֶׁיהָ). God gave it deep roots, and even that is credited to Him: "thou... didst cause it to take deep root." What looks like the plant's own vigour is traced back to the gardener.

"filled the land," vattemale-aretz (וַתְּמַלֵּא־אָרֶץ). Then it flourished, filling the land, its boughs like great cedars, its branches reaching to the sea. From a single transplanted vine came a growth that covered the hills and ran to the river.

Explanation

This is one of Scripture's most beautiful pictures of God's care for His people: a vine He Himself brought, cleared ground for, and planted. Look at how completely the flourishing is God's work; every verb belongs to Him: "Thou hast brought... Thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. Thou preparedst room before it, and didst cause it to take deep root." The vine did not plant itself, did not clear its own field, did not give itself roots; God did it all, and the result was a vine that filled the land, spread its shade over the hills, and stretched its branches from sea to river. This is a portrait of grace: a people brought out of bondage, planted by God's own hand, and made to flourish by His care alone. But then, in the verses that follow, comes the anguished question, "Why hast thou then broken down her hedges, so that all they which pass by the way do pluck her?" (v12). The vine that God so tenderly planted now stands with its protecting hedges down, ravaged by the boar and the wild beast. And notice, the psalm lays even this at God's door, "why hast thou broken down her hedges?" The same hand that planted and protected has, for a season, removed the protection. This is the mystery the psalm wrestles with, and the ground of its prayer: the God who planted the vine is the only one who can restore it. So it cries, "Return, we beseech thee... look down from heaven, and behold, and visit this vine" (v14). The people appeal to the Gardener's own investment: You planted us; will You now let us be destroyed? Come and tend Your vine again.

Gospel Focus

"Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt... and planted it", the vine of Israel, so tenderly planted yet so ravaged, points beyond itself to the true Vine, the Lord Jesus Christ. Israel was God's vine but proved fruitless and had to be judged (Isaiah 5:1-7); so the Son came as the Vine that Israel failed to be, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman... I am the vine, ye are the branches" (John 15:1, 5). All the fruitfulness the old vine lacked is found in Him, and His people, grafted into Him, bear the fruit at last, "he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit" (John 15:5). Where the vine of Psalm 80 had its hedges broken down and was ravaged, Christ the true Vine was Himself cut down and crushed, "he was bruised for our iniquities" (Isaiah 53:5), and yet He rose, the ever-living Vine from whom His branches draw eternal life. And the prayer of the psalm, "visit this vine... and the branch that thou madest strong for thyself" (vv14-15), is answered in the Son whom God made strong, through whom the whole vine is restored. So if you would be fruitful, do not strive as a vine on your own; be grafted into Christ the true Vine, abide in Him, and draw your life from Him, and the God who planted the vine will tend and keep you, and make you bring forth much fruit.

Word Study

"the man of thy right hand," Hebrew ish yeminekha (אִישׁ יְמִינֶךָ). The psalm's hope narrows from a whole nation to a single person: "Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand." The right hand is the place of favour and of strength, and this man stands in it.

"the son of man," ben-adam (בֶּן־אָדָם). The same person is named again in the second line, "upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself." He is no angel and no abstraction but one of our own race, a man among men.

"madest strong for thyself," immatzta lakh (אִמַּצְתָּ לָּךְ). His strength is not his own achievement; God made him strong, and made him strong for God's own purpose. Upon this man the people's whole restoration depends.

"go back from thee," lo nasog mimmekka (לֹא־נָסוֹג מִמֶּךָּ). "So will not we go back from thee." Their faithfulness is made to hang on what God does for this man; give us Him, they say, and we will not turn away again.

"quicken us," techayyenu (תְּחַיֵּנוּ), give us life, revive us. The people know they need more than rescue from enemies; they need to be made alive. So they plead, "quicken us, and we will call upon thy name."

Explanation

Notice how the psalm's long prayer for a whole nation suddenly focuses down to a single figure: "the man of thy right hand... the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself." After crying for the flock and grieving over the vine, the hope of the people comes to rest on one Man, standing at God's right hand, whom God has "made strong" for His own purposes. In the psalm's first setting this may reach toward the king; but the language, "the man of thy right hand," "the son of man" strong for God's own sake, is too large to stay there. It gropes forward toward a Deliverer through whom the whole people would be restored, the hope that the salvation of the many hangs on the strengthening of one Man. And notice what the people ask along with Him: "quicken us, and we will call upon thy name." The order is important. They do not say, "we will call, and then You will revive us"; they say, "quicken us" first, give us life, "and we will call upon thy name." They confess that they cannot even truly pray until God first breathes life into them; revival must precede response. Dead hearts do not call on God; God must quicken them, and then they call. And having asked for the Man and for life, the psalm returns one last time to its refrain, now with the fullest name of all, "Turn us again, O LORD God of hosts, cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved." The whole hope of a ravaged people rests on two things: the Man of God's right hand, and God turning His face to shine upon them again.

Gospel Focus

"Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand, upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself", these words find their fulfilment in Jesus Christ, the Son of Man at the right hand of God. He is "the man of thy right hand," for God "raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 1:20), and He is the "Son of man" whom Daniel saw coming to the Ancient of Days to receive an everlasting kingdom (Daniel 7:13-14), the title the Lord Jesus most often used of Himself. Upon this Man, made strong by God for the very purpose of saving His people, the restoration of all God's people truly hangs, for there is no salvation in any other. Stephen, dying, "saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55), the very Man of God's right hand. And the plea "quicken us, and we will call upon thy name" is answered in the gospel, for it is God who first makes us alive, "you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins" (Ephesians 2:1), and the quickened then call, "whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:13). So the hope of Psalm 80 is a Person, the Son of Man at God's right hand, the Lord Jesus Christ. Look to Him for the turning of your heart, the life of your soul, and the shining of God's face, and you shall be saved.