Probably this Psalm was uttered by David on the same occasion. But the Spirit who spoke through David, and in David’s circumstances, soon leaves David to utter the heart of Jesus only. (Psa. 40:6-86Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: burnt offering and sin offering hast thou not required. 7Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, 8I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart. (Psalm 40:6‑8); and Heb. 10:5-75Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me: 6In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. 7Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God. (Hebrews 10:5‑7).)
The opening verses give us the Lord’s anticipation of His resurrection or deliverance; He afterward rehearses His self-dedication, His ministry, His sorrows, and His cry. He tells us that He patiently waited for resurrection. He might, we know, have asserted His divine power; but He waited till He was raised “by the blood of the everlasting covenant” (Heb. 13). Thus was He, as He says in this Psalm, the poor and needy one—the one who depended on God for everything—the one who waited patiently in exercise of faith.
As in other Psalms, He confesses the sins which He had taken on Him. For such confession both vindicates God, and is a gracious adoption of that which had been laid upon Him, that we may have strong consolation in knowing the reality of the imputation of our sins to His account; as the high priest, under the law, confessed Israel’s sins on the head of the scape-goat.
The unnumbered multitude of God’s thoughts (see also Psa. 139) beautifully expresses the diligence and delight of God over Christ and His redeemed, as though this object were all His concern, and the center of all His counsels. Would that we knew how to enjoy this truth as we should! (See Psalm 70 in connection with the closing verses of this.)