This Psalm is founded on resurrection. He takes up the whole case of Israel.
16. He took me, he drew me out of many waters." Compare Moses (Ex. 2 I0).
23. I judge that the true sense of these words is " the iniquity which lay before me in this path in which I had to walk." Meavone (from my iniquity) is never, I think, what we call " indwelling sin," but sin before God, iniquity, a relative state to Him, guilt. " I kept myself from what would have put me in this relation." So Rosenmiiller takes it, after Vogel. Hence its application directly to Christ Himself even is very simple, as " By the words of thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer."
20-27. Show the Jewish character of the Psalm in grace. It is as the sermon on the mount in principle. This could only be said by Christ as a Jew, save that the character of God at the close of them, would have been destruction to all else.
43. The people Am, not Am'ka (thy people) though, then go-im (the heathen) and then Am a people again, showing the plural force of this word Am (people), the heathen brought into recognition and relationship under Messiah with the Jews in the earth and not till then—now it is only said, and therefore individual sons of the living God.
We have in this Psalm the historical glory in which death and resurrection, and the power of it in Christ, is associated with the Egyptian deliverance in the beginning, and the latter-day deliverance in the end—associated with them though Jehovah, but showing that the principle of interest in which He as a man, a Jew, was associated with them, was true in sympathy then—" in all their affliction he was afflicted, etc," verse 16. “He sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters” (compare Moses, Exodus 2: 10); and afterward in strength verses 38-42—as David, God girding him with strength. Nothing can be more beautiful, more perfect or complete than these three Psalms.
We have, at the close, His royal power and victories upon earth, so that Psa. 16; 17 and 18 give us the joy of Christ in going to His Father (compare John 14). His joy in His manifestation in glory in resurrection as the display of the image of God, and His expectation of royal earthly glory in which He shall be manifested. The reference to His death, and His association with Israel from the beginning remains untouched.
This Psalm, the occasion of which is marked by its being presented in 2 Sam. 20, is one of deep interest and large extent. It plainly reaches to Him who was greater than David, and is the prophetic glance at all that He has been interested in from the Jewish covenant; interest as their God (" In all their afflictions he was afflicted, and the Angel of his presence saved them: in his love and in his pity he redeemed them: and he bore them, and carried them all the days of old," see the end of the chapter) to the end of His and their deliverance. It was the application of His righteousness to them, for He bare them, to verse 23; and therefore it declares the Lord's deliverances all through, that the enemy was against Him, i.e., God's deliverance and preservation of Him from that, to the end, His final triumph, and therefore the deliverance of His people—His own sitting therefore on high, and becoming Head over all. It is the David, however, all through; in the last word, sitting in the anointed way through Him. But it is, withal, the place of the Beloved before God, Jehovah, even after all His deliverances, and therefore celebrates all His deliverances of Him.
The comparison of this Psalm with Matt. 25 raises the question as to the destruction of all the wicked when Christ comes. I think we must distinguish between the outward submission in the conquests of Messiah, as in Psa. 45, and divine sessional judgment. It is certain what is left of Israel will be all righteous—it is said so, and many passages show it; this is just judicial and not warlike triumph. As to the Gentiles, there are both, because He takes up Judah and makes him His goodly horse in the day of battle. Thus in the war there will be submission which may be feigned through fear. The judicial process when individuals are judged is another thing; then they are finally separated when brought under it. This last is clearly the character of Matt. 25.