1.
The king shall joy in thy strength, O LORD; and in thy salvation how greatly shall he rejoice!
2.
Thou hast given him his heart's desire, and hast not withholden the request of his lips. Selah.
3.
For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.
4.
He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever.
5.
His glory is great in thy salvation: honour and majesty hast thou laid upon him.
6.
For thou hast made him most blessed for ever: thou hast made him exceeding glad with thy countenance.
7.
For the king trusteth in the LORD, and through the mercy of the most High he shall not be moved.
8.
Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies: thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee.
9.
Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.
10.
Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.
11.
For they intended evil against thee: they imagined a mischievous device, which they are not able to perform.
12.
Therefore shalt thou make them turn their back, when thou shalt make ready thine arrows upon thy strings against the face of them.
13.
Be thou exalted, LORD, in thine own strength: so will we sing and praise thy power.
THANKSGIVING FOR VICTORY
‘Be Thou exalted, Lord, in Thine own strength; so will we sing and praise The power.’
Psalms 21:13
This psalm follows naturally on the preceding. In the former, prayer had been offered for the warrior king as he went forth to war, but now in the opening strains of this (1–7), the priests of the temple, and perhaps the people, celebrate his victory. Ah! tried and conflicting soul, as surely as thou hast uttered thy prayer for salvation thou shalt utter thy thanks for it. Was it asked that God should grant thee thy heart’s desire? (20:4). It shall be said ‘Thou hast given him’ ( Psalms 21:2).
I. How admirably do these sweet words describe, not only the case of the Church militant, but also that of the Church triumphant!—Think of those whom you have loved and lost awhile, and then say of them Psalms 21:2-6. Oh, when will that day come, when of us too those words so exuberant in their triumph will be true? Of how many of our sainted dead may we not say that, in answer to their faithful prayers, God hath made them most blessed for ever, making them glad with His countenance?
II. But as the fire which ripens fruit consumes straw, so the same love which deals so tenderly with the saints is stern to punish all who oppose themselves.—Beware, O hardened sinner, lest in a moment thou be plunged into irretrievable ruin! Be thou exalted, O blessed Christ! in all coming ages, for Thy reign means joy and song to Thy saints.
Illustrations
(1) ‘The Targum and the Talmud understand this psalm of the King Messiah. In this, as in the last, the people come before God with matters which concern the welfare of their king; in the former with their wishes and prayers, in the latter with their thanksgivings and hopes in the certainty of a victorious termination of the war.’
(2) ‘A noble coronation psalm. It was sung throughout England by the over-trustful Presbyterians at the Restoration of Charles II. They afterwards mildly characterised it as a day when “the bitter was mingled with the sweet.” ’
(3) ‘Given the Messianic interpretation, it seems an irresistible conclusion that the group, from the twenty-first to the twenty-fourth inclusive, forms a connected whole—the twenty-first a thanksgiving for the victory of the King.’