Heart of a Psalmist - Worshipping Christ Through The Psalms

be expressed in every believer’s life. The church all over the world is awakening in praise from the slum- ber of death to claim the nations of the earth as their inheritance in Christ. “…we can praise the Lord both now and forever! Praise the Lord!”

1 Spurgeon 2 Keil & Delitzsch

3 Spurgeon 4 Spurgeon 5 Scroggie 6 Kraus

PSALM 116: I LOVE THE LORD Life from Death

The last two psalms (114, 115) were nationalistic and were sung at the Passover Feast. This is a highly personal psalm that addresses an audience, God and the psalmists’ own soul. The writer has been delivered from personal danger that has threatened his life and will possibly return again. In spite of the closeness of danger, the psalmist resolves to celebrate the favor of God. It is quoted in the New Testament to teach us to be faithful in our speech towards God even when we are experiencing difficult trials. Death is at work in us because we have embraced the cross yet it produces incredible life as we resolve to praise him and walk with him. Some ‘adhere to the Old Hebrew tradition, which ascribed it to Hezekiah, and consider it to have been written on the occasion of his deliverance from death, as narrated in Isaiah 38 1 .’ The psalm does fit the circumstances of Hezekiah’s deliverance as he called on the Lord and many expressions found in the song are the same or similar to Hezekiah’s words as recounted by Isaiah. Most scholars place it as a Post-Exilic psalm, written after the Jews return from Babylon. As Spurgeon says: there are those who ‘see their Lord everywhere in scripture’; this psalm also parallels the Lord Jesus who was delivered from the snares of death by his resurrection, lifted up the cup of salvation for us at the ‘Last Supper’ and on the earthly side of his nature was the son of God’s handmaid, Mary. It divides into two sections that are outlined as: The literal meaning of the Hebrew in this first verse is: “I love, because he hears and answers my prayers.” Although God is implied, love is ‘absolute’ as there is no object to the action of loving. God loves even when there is no one accepting his affection and kindness. He loved us while we were sinners and transforms us in such a way that we too experience ‘absolute love’ freely and unconditionally towards those around us. The reason the psalmist loves is found in the bonds of prayer where he has discovered the reality of deep communion with God. Prayer is the heart of life where God listens, answers and breathes new courage into us. Four different times in this song, in verses 2, 4, 13 and 17, the psalmist calls on the Lord: “I will call on him as long as I live.” (2, NIV) “Death had its hands around my throat; the terrors of the grave overtook me. I saw only trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of the Lord: ‘Please Lord, save me!” How kind the Lord is! How good he is! So merciful, this God of ours! The Lord protects those of childlike faith; I was facing death, and then he saved me.” (3- 6) The subject of death permeates this psalm. If the author was Hezekiah it reflects the poem he wrote after he recovered from his fatal illness: “In the prime of my life, must I now enter the place of the dead?…for you have rescued me from death and have forgiven all my sins.” (Isa. 38:10, 17) The key to the author’s escape from death is: “I called on the name of the Lord:”(4) This psalm borrows freely from 292 I I WILL CALL ON HIM - 1-11 Delivered from Death Determined to Live Delivered from Death II I WILL KEEP MY PROMISES - 12-19 I I WILL CALL ON HIM - 1-11 “I love the Lord because he hears and answers my prayers. Because he bends down and listens, I will pray as long as I have breath!” (1, 2)