Psalm 76

Psalm 76  •  2 min. read  •  grade level: 9
Listen from:
• BibleTruthPublishers.com
This Psalm is still in connection. For as Psalm 74 was the cry of the Remnant over the desolation of Zion, and as Psalm 75 presented Messiah challenging the enemy and taking the kingdom as in answer to that cry, so this Psalm shows Him seated in Zion, no longer therefore a desolation, but saluted as the throne and sanctuary of the Lord, made more excellent than all the mountains of prey, or the preceding kingdoms of the Gentiles. God’s name is “great in Israel” now, as it has previously been brought “near” by His works of judgment. (Psa. 75:1; 76:11<<To the chief Musician, Al-taschith, A Psalm or Song of Asaph.>> Unto thee, O God, do we give thanks, unto thee do we give thanks: for that thy name is near thy wondrous works declare. (Psalm 75:1)
1<<To the chief Musician on Neginoth, A Psalm or Song of Asaph.>> In Judah is God known: his name is great in Israel. (Psalm 76:1).)
Though the Spirit has larger thoughts in it, yet the occasion of this Psalm was, probably, the overthrow of Sennacherib’s army. For this signal deliverance was achieved eminently on behalf of Zion. (See 2 Kings 19:20-3520Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, That which thou hast prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria I have heard. 21This is the word that the Lord hath spoken concerning him; The virgin the daughter of Zion hath despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn; the daughter of Jerusalem hath shaken her head at thee. 22Whom hast thou reproached and blasphemed? and against whom hast thou exalted thy voice, and lifted up thine eyes on high? even against the Holy One of Israel. 23By thy messengers thou hast reproached the Lord, and hast said, With the multitude of my chariots I am come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon, and will cut down the tall cedar trees thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the lodgings of his borders, and into the forest of his Carmel. 24I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my feet have I dried up all the rivers of besieged places. 25Hast thou not heard long ago how I have done it, and of ancient times that I have formed it? now have I brought it to pass, that thou shouldest be to lay waste fenced cities into ruinous heaps. 26Therefore their inhabitants were of small power, they were dismayed and confounded; they were as the grass of the field, and as the green herb, as the grass on the housetops, and as corn blasted before it be grown up. 27But I know thy abode, and thy going out, and thy coming in, and thy rage against me. 28Because thy rage against me and thy tumult is come up into mine ears, therefore I will put my hook in thy nose, and my bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way by which thou camest. 29And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such things as grow of themselves, and in the second year that which springeth of the same; and in the third year sow ye, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat the fruits thereof. 30And the remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall yet again take root downward, and bear fruit upward. 31For out of Jerusalem shall go forth a remnant, and they that escape out of mount Zion: the zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this. 32Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it. 33By the way that he came, by the same shall he return, and shall not come into this city, saith the Lord. 34For I will defend this city, to save it, for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake. 35And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses. (2 Kings 19:20‑35).) So that it was said to the King of Assyria, “The virgin, the daughter of Zion, hath despised thee and laughed thee to scorn.” As here, the Psalmist says, that in Zion God broke the arrows of the bow, the shield, the sword, and the battle. Verse 7 may remind us of Psalm 2:1212Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. (Psalm 2:12).
In a fine strain the people publish this mighty achievement. And at the close, the Prophet of God, who had been anticipating all this, draws the moral, that the Lord acquires glory out of the violence and iniquity of man, (Ex 9:14,16,29); then overrules it all, and finally spreads around Himself a happy and a worshipping people, keeping the whole earth in godly subjection to His scepter as King of kings.
The Gentile kingdoms are fitly called “mountains of prey.” Daniel says, speaking of them, “these great beasts” (Dan. 7:1717These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth. (Daniel 7:17)). They were in God’s esteem the haunts of wild beasts.
We may more particularly observe, that Psalm 76:1010Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee: the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain. (Psalm 76:10) reveals a very glorious truth. It intimates that all things, even the most unpromising—such as “the wrath of man”—shall end in God’s praise; and all that cannot aid that happy result shall be cleared off the scene, forestalled, as it were, by the divine sovereign power. How truly should our souls triumph in this thought! Things may appear evil and confused, but there is not a circumstance in the “mighty maze” that shall not swell the hallelujah around the throne and in the presence of the Lord, and aid in giving them their harmony and power forever and ever.