Psalms Lesson 19

Psalm 116:1-4

This is the last declarative praise Psalm we’ll be covering and next week we’ll begin a new category of Psalms, the descriptive praise Psalms. This is the declarative praise; there’s a difference, the declarative you’re praising God for specific historic deliverance. Descriptive praise Psalms mean that you’re just praising God for the many acts that He has done in history. So this will be the last Psalm in this category, and I would at the same time like to put out an assignment for those of you who are interested in testing your knowledge of declarative praise Psalms, for you to work up a form analysis and an outline, and a theological analysis of Psalm 138; like some of you did with Psalm 142. Those of you who worked on Psalm 142 did an excellent job. And Psalm 138 if you’ll analyze the parts of the form, then come up with an outline, and remember the outline if you’ll summarize in sentence, in full sentences, the thoughts of the major sections of the Psalm, and analyze the Psalm from the form experience that you’ve had. And then finally if you would come up with some application to the Christian life of Psalm 138. I think this will give you some experience in working this out for yourself and then we’ll talk about in 3 weeks. It’s just an exercise in application.

Now in Psalm 116 we come to a Psalm that is important because it’s going to teach you a little bit about dying grace and this is important because though as individuals you may not encounter death too often, I know as pastor I encounter death all the time and many weeks, many times I go to the hospital and that’s the last time a person is alive and so I know how important it is to have some orientation in the face of death. And I also know from my experience in working with people who are dying and working with the families of those who are dying that few people have the stability that they should have had they been paying attention to the Word of God. But as usual what happens is that they have heard and heard and heard and not taken in and then when the catastrophe hits they’re unprepared in handling it. It’s amazing how well people do who have made it a habit of ignoring the Word all their life and then comes the crisis of death and they do manage to get through and why they get through is because of dying grace which is one of the themes of this Psalm.

Now again we are dealing with a declarative praise Psalm and we are looking for certain parts: the proclamation, the introductory summary, and the main section consisting of a looking back, a report of deliverance and the vow of praise. Now seeing these parts let’s go through Psalm 116 and see if we can find these parts. Psalm 116 has a little complicated structure and it’s quite a difficult Psalm and I kind of saved it for the last because it is difficult and Psalm 138 that I gave you is easy. So if you can pay attention and watch how we work with Psalm 116 then you will have an easy time on your own doing Psalm 138.

Let’s look at Psalm 116 and see if someone can pick out the proclamation; how far down the proclamation go. First of all, is there a proclamation, secondly, if there is then how far into the Psalm does the proclamation proceed? [someone says something] Verses 1-2, anybody have any other suggestions. 1a, okay, any other suggestions. Zero. Obviously there is a divided opinion about this and there’s a reason for it; there’s something screwy at the beginning of this Psalm and I think maybe we can get at it if we ask ourselves another question; where is the introductory summary. Remember the introductory summary is not the same as the reported deliverance. The reported deliverance will be details, the introductory summary will be very brief and very general. Where is the introductory summary. [someone says something] Verses 1 and 2. 1b and 2. This is a hard Psalm, don’t be apologetic about it, this is difficult. Different scholars whose business it is to specialize in Old Testament have trouble with this Psalm. The point is that even though we can’t arrive at airtight compartments, that isn’t the important thing. The important thing, like I have said over and over, is that you get used to looking at the Psalm structure so that you can read these Psalms and get something out of them. There’s an argument to the Psalm; it’s not just sweet thoughts.

Can anybody suggest how we might get through this; there is a problem with these first few verses here. Look at verses 1-2 for a moment and ask yourself, remember the sign of the proclamation is there will be some sort of “I will praise God” type thing, or its equivalent… or its equivalent. And the introductory summary will be very brief, it won’t go into any detail, it’ll just say I had a problem and God delivered. Now what do you think is happening here in Psalm 116? [someone says something] Okay, verse 3, so you would agree with 3, that’s getting a lot of votes. [someone says something] all the way down to verse 5 is the proclamation? Just verse 5, and the introductory summary is 6. Okay.

All right, let’s see if we can go on, what is the main section; the main section has three sub sections, looking back, an analysis of what was the situation. Then a report of deliverance, a detailed summary of what God did in that situation. All right, looking back, where would you see some verses on looking back? [someone says something] 4-6 looking back, okay; anybody else, [someone says something] 3-4. 4 and 6, okay. A report of deliverance, you’re looking for something where it’s probably what God did. Remember the looking back isn’t saying anything what God did; the looking back is just discovering what it was before God did, now the reported deliverance is what did God do? [someone says something] 8, all right, anybody else, 5-8; anyone else? 6-8. Okay, now the vow of praise, [someone says something] 12-19, anybody else.

Now let’s tighten up these categories, let’s make sure we understand what we’re looking for. The vow of praise, let’s look at this first. By the way, the method that I have just used in the last five minutes is what you should use when you come to Psalm 138; the first time through you’re not going to find out, the second time through you’re not going to find out all these things, they just don’t fit together; you’ve got to work with it a while. But it’s the act of working with it that forces your mind to interact with the Word of God and that is what is important. Even if you finally can’t even come up with a solution. By trying to force questions against the Word you precipitate mental activity that’s very important for the Holy Spirit to use as He illuminates your heart. But you’ve got to give the Holy Spirit an opportunity and the way you do it is force the Word, rattle it around your brain so that the Holy Spirit has something to work with.

Now, in the vow of praise we’re simply looking for what the Psalmist does after he gets through reporting the deliverance and so on. It will either be instructive or vow; just looking from verses 12 on through the end of the Psalm what kind of praise is mentioned; is the emphasis on what he is going to do or is the emphasis on instruction like the other declarative praise Psalms. The emphasis in verses 12 and following is on the vow, on his volition, whereas the other declarative praise Psalms the emphasis was on content, on thought, but here it is his vow, his response to what God is doing or has done.

Now let’s go back up a bit and see if we can tighten up some of these categories. Let’s look at the main section. Some of you are still hazy on the difference between introductory summaries and the main section. The way to work in practice with these Psalms is if you’re hazy about where that introductory summary is, just drop it and go on and identify the main section; forget the introductory summary; let the introductory summary yield itself to your analysis of the main section. Do the main section first, get that down and then go back and find the introductory summary.

Now on the main section the difference between looking back, let me sharpen this up for you; the difference between looking back and the report of the deliverance is that in the looking back, I look back toward my problem, not toward what God is going to do with it. Looking back, I just look back to the situation, maybe what I did, but certainly nothing of what God does. So if you want to tighten up the difference here between these two, looking back is more “I” and the report of deliverance is more on God, the emphasis on God.

Now with that in mind let’s look at this Psalm again. Under the report of deliverance there’s something else; remember when I first defined the declarative praise section the Hebrew concept of deliverance included not just the act of being freed but also the loosening of the lips, what he was going to do as a result. It almost runs completely under the vow of praise. So the report of deliverance, most of you cut off at verse 8 because you read verse 9 and you see where it says in verse 9, “I will walk before the LORD in the land of the living. [10] I believed, therefore have I spoken. I was greatly afflicted; [11] I said in my haste, All men are liars.” Now verse 10-11 are very, very difficult, VERY difficult, and you probably, as you read through the Psalms you’ll want to kind of let them flap in the breeze for a little while. But I think no matter how difficult the Hebrew may be in verses 10-11, can some of you see what’s happening, it’s very difficult, the tenses of the verb in verse 10 are bad here, and they’ll mislead you.

But can any of you give the big idea of what’s happening in verses 10-11, let’s see if we can get those verse tightened up here. What is the psalmist doing, just summarize it. [someone says something] Okay, how does the New ASV put it: “I believed when I said, I am greatly afflicted. [11] I said in my alarm, All men are liars.” Okay, he’s looking back here, there’s a looking back in verses 10-11, isn’t there. Just look at it again, is there anything about God in verses 10-11, or is it about what the guy’s problem is. Isn’t it more what the guy’s problem is? So there it looks like we have a looking back; see, some of you got faked out because you tend to think of this mechanically, that one section is automatically going to follow the next one. This is art, literary art and the artist is free to mix the order of his elements, that’s what gives creativity to his art. So the form analysis will give you what to look for but it won’t necessarily give you the order. All right, so 10-11, at least we can say they’re looking back.

Where else do we have this theme of looking back? Don’t we have some before this, a looking back, a description of his situation, in detail? All right, I will argue that looking back includes 3 and 10 and 11. The report of deliverance, verse 4, “Then I called upon the name of the LORD; O LORD, I beseech Thee, deliver my soul.” You could also include that, perhaps as part of the looking back depending on whether you wanted to include the petition with the looking back or with the reported deliverance. And then verse 6b, you see verse 5 and 6a stuck in there, what is that? [someone says something] Okay, it’s descriptive praise, it’s a generalization about God from historical revelation. “Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful. [6] The LORD preserves the simple.” And then immediately he goes back, “I was brought low, and He helped me.” That’s a report of deliverance, “I was brought low, and He helped me. [7] Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the LORD has dealt bountifully with thee.” This is his relaxing in what God has done, so it continues the work of deliverance. The deliverance to the Hebrew mind is not finished until I enjoy it all. And here’s the command, he turns to his soul and says soul enjoy the deliverance that God has given you.

Verse 8, “For thou hast delivered my soul from death; mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling,” obviously the report of deliverance. The report of deliverance I will argue is verse 4 provisionally, unless you want to attach verse 4 with verse 3, but certainly 6b-9. And then the vow of praise picks up in verse 12.

Now what are you going to do with the introductory summary and proclamation. I think the best way to handle this is to put proclamation and introductory summary together in verses 1-2, they’re all mixed together here. The reason I say that is because in verse 1 and in verse 2, doesn’t it tell you what God did to the psalmist. It’s not just saying I am going to praise the Lord, but I’m going to praise the Lord “because He has head my voice and my supplications.” So it’s already saying something in a very general way about what God has done. So I place the introductory summary in verses 1 and 2.

Now let’s look at the theological problem of the Psalm. The author is unknown, notice there is no heading here. We have no right to conclude David wrote this, though he probably did; we’re not bound by Scripture to say that. [someone says something] Verses 1 and 2 I said are introductory summary. [she says something else] Descriptive praise? I’ll explain that when I go through it, it hinges on the tense of the verbs. Now the theological analysis, the author is unknown. In the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Old Testament, they guess and for some reason if you look at the end of the previous Psalm, you see the last phrase of Psalm 115, “Praise the LORD.” Look at the end of Psalm 116, how does it end? “Praise the LORD.” How does Psalm 117 end? “Praise the LORD.” Well, the Septuagint translators thought that those “Praise the Lord” were not the end of the previous Psalm but the beginning of the next one, so in the Septuagint Psalm 116 is entitled, “A Praise the LORD Psalm.” And Psalm 117 is entitled, “A Praise the LORD Psalm.” They’ve taken that clause and dropped it down into the heading. You say how can they do that? It’s simple, in the original manuscripts they don’t have Psalm 116, Psalm 117, it’s just a continuous thing. So they break the Psalm differently. I don’t think there’s justification for that, the Masoretic text, the Hebrew text doesn’t do that.

Let’s summarize the main theme of the Psalm now. The main theme of Psalm 116 is the believer’s response to grace. The emphasis over and over is on… here the believer is pictured as a female, in Proverbs the believer is pictured as the male, but here the believer is pictured as a female. You’d better get ready for Proverbs 5 on Sunday morning, it’s a ripper and I mean in the area of the male/female. If you didn’t get sex education you will after we get through Proverbs 5. All right; this Psalm, then, pictures the believer’s response to grace.

Now the outline. This is the way I have outlined it. Roman numeral number one I’ve taken to be the first two verses; the thought of the first two verses is that the psalmist announces his response to God’s deliverance. The psalmist announces his response to God’s deliverance, verses 1-2. Then Roman numeral two, verses 3-11 I have entitled: The psalmist recounts how Yahweh completely delivered him from the threat to his life by his enemies, verses 3-11. There are sub points under that which I won’t bother with at this moment. And then Roman numeral three, verses 12-19 which most of you clearly saw was one unit by itself, the Psalmist vows to praise Yahweh in response for what He has done (“He” being Yahweh), verses 12-19.

Now verses 1-2. The psalmist announces his response to God’s deliverance. In the Hebrew it’s very forceful. It’s one of the most forceful passages that we will see in the Psalms. And this Psalm shows a believer as the female responding to the love initiative of God. “I Love” and there is no object to the verb; in the Hebrew it reads ahav or “I love,” and that’s it, no object. And the reason why there is no object to the verb is because this verb demands an object and by leaving the object of the verb off you emphasize and heighten the sense of mystery. “I love” what? It forces the reader of the original text to say what do you love, psalmist? And so obviously it’s very clear in the context, he loves Jehovah. And so it’s a method, a literary technique that the Psalmist has of heightening the fact that he wants the reader to see the object of his love by completely removing the object of love from the sentence. “I love,” it’s just as simple as that, “I love.”

Now the next part of the sentence, “I love, because Yahweh,” and then Yahweh is the subject, “has heard my voice and my supplications.” And then verse 2 the same, “He has inclined His ear unto me, therefore will I call upon Him as long as I live.” Now there’s a problem with verb tenses and this goes back to the question as to why on verses 1-2 descriptive praise, aren’t they saying something that God does all the time. And here we have a problem, “I love,” that first “love” is perfect tense in the Hebrew; perfect tense point action, “I love,” and here it’s looking at a lot of things, it’s called a gnomic perfect which means that you take all the points, I habitually love the Lord all the time, and then you wrap all those points conceptually up in one and you say “I love.” We do that in various English sentences. So “I love” means repetitive action but looked upon as a general truth, a gnomic truth, “I love,” that’s my general character the psalmist is saying.

The parallel to this sentence is “I love” and then you see “because,” and then verse 2 is the opposite, it starts out with “because” something is true, then “I call.” So the verb “I call” and “I love” are parallel. Verses 1 and 2 are parallel structured verses. So “I love” is parallel to “I call upon,” and notice if you have a King James in the original text “him” isn’t there either. See it’s italicized, “I call” and there’s no object there either. And this is to heighten up the object; that’s what he’s doing.

Now can some of you think about what the connection is between the two verbs, “I love” and “I call.” They’re used synonymously. Now what do you think is running through the psalmist mind when he says “I love Jehovah?” What is running through his mind, “I love Jehovah.” He lets the cat out of the bag by the selection of the second verb. [someone says something] Okay, his love is expressed, there’s no such thing as unexpressed love in the psalmist, in the psalmist’s mentality. When the psalmist says “I love,” the next thing the reader is going to do, if he’s a Hebrew reader, he’s going to say what do you love and how do you love. Well, here’s how I love, “I call upon Him.” Now maybe some of you have thought that God gets tired of listening to you bug Him with your ten cent requests, but actually, coming to the Lord in prayer doesn’t bug Him because He takes it as an act of love. You can bug God twenty-five hours a day and He loves it because He knows its your response. And so “I call upon Him” is the natural equation with “I love.” This is an important little point here. And I want you to read to be more acute readers of the text so when you study these Psalms by yourself you can get these points out. They are there in the text and the average Christian is so far from ever learning these fine points, and you read over these expressions, “I call upon the LORD,” oh yea, ho hum, what does that mean? You’ve got to ask yourself, now just a minute, what is meant by “I call upon the LORD.” And we’ll see more of what is meant as we go into the Psalm but right now I want you to see the equation between the two verbs, “I love … I called upon the LORD.”

Now compressed between those two verbs are the two “because” clauses, because; two reasons. Notice the two reasons are parallel also, “because He heard my voice and my supplications,” and “Because He has inclined His ear unto me.” Now here’s where we have a problem and this goes back to her question. The verb in verse 1, “to hear” is imperfect in the Hebrew and the verb in verse 2, “incline” is perfect. But to get you the perspective, the verb “love” in the first verse is perfect, and the verb “call” is imperfect. So these two verbs are linked, “love” and “call.” The imperfect means repetitive action, the perfect of love means repetitive action but with that is a point; it’s just a variation from the perfect to the imperfect but the two verb tenses are used for pretty much the same thing.

Now, here is the last part of verse 1 and the first part of verse 2 saying something that is always true of God, and if it is, it is descriptive praise, or if it’s saying something that was true of God during the time of the man’s problem. Now this is a matter where the grammar, you can be an expert in the Hebrew and all the grammar is to do is give you the options but it won’t pick which option; you have got to use your spiritual sensitivity as you work through the Psalm and get used to the kind of Psalm to pick the interpretation. The language gives you the possible interpretation but it won’t decide for you. So here we’ve got to decide whether he’s saying this, “because He almost hears my voice and almost hears my supplications. Because He almost inclines His ear unto me,” or is he saying, “Because back then during the days of my problem, He kept hearing my voice and my supplication, and because He inclined His ear back when I had my problem.”

Now linguistically it can go either way. I will argue that on the basis of the form we expect to have an introductory summary somewhere at the beginning of the Psalm, and on that basis I will argue that it means He heard my voice, He kept hearing my voice back in the days of my problem. And I think I can show you that there is support further in the Psalm that his problem, whatever his problem was it isn’t spelled out, it’s something to do with death. But his problem took a long time. This was an aggravation that the Psalmist experienced many moons and during this time period he kept up this, so it doesn’t bother me that there’s a repetitiveness about the last part of verse 1 and the first part of verse 2. That to me does not argue that it has to be descriptive praise; I take these two verbs, “hear” and “inclined His ear” to mean that during the time of his problem, which was an extensive time interval he kept calling on the Lord, the Lord kept hearing his request.

Now notice one other feature about verse 2 while we’re here; notice that little phrase, “inclined His ear;” what is the technical expression that we have used for this, that you ought to know of, add to your vocabulary and sound halfway intelligent. What is this expression called, in the Bible, when you see something like this and it says “inclined His ear.” An anthropomorphism, that’s a nice term that you can show out to show that Christians can use multiple syllable words. See, anthropomorphism, that God appears in the form of a man in Scripture. Why is that unusual? Because God has made man in his image; it’s the reverse, God appears to us as a man, simply because we are made in His image in the first place. So what we call man is the image of God; God’s image is man, and of course God reveals Himself in anthropomorphisms.

Let me give you one other point about anthropomorphism; all the other ancient religions of the world were non-anthropomorphic, they were zoomorphic; all the religions of the ancient world were zoomorphic. That means animal form, their gods appeared as animals. In the Bible, in the thousands and thousands of verse in all of God’s Word, God never appears as an animal (except by way of comparison), that when He is pictured in His own being He never appears as an animal. And this is a very important difference and scholars, even of the liberal persuasion will acknowledge this, the Yahweh of the Old Testament appears as a man.

Do any of you know the only other civilization in the world that developed anthropomorphic deities? Do you know what the civilization was and do you know the date? [someone answers] Zoroastic did it, okay I wasn’t even thinking of that, but the Persians aren’t that well known for it; the Greeks are the ones that were the most well known. When the Greek, Mount Olympus, when you had the three deities they show up more like men. But here’s the interesting thing, though they argue from Persia or Greece, these zoomorphic deities, what are the dates of them. Say Persia, Persia the earliest you go back is 600 BC. What’s the date of Scripture? All right, let’s say Moses, 1400 BC. That’s 800 years, so who had the first anthropomorphic deity. The Hebrews, and that is a powerfully important fact. We would argue as Christians, Bible-believing Christians have all the reasons in the world that the Persians and the Greeks had anthropomorphic deities because they were borrowing and it’s perfectly logical on a chronological base.

Okay, so “He inclines His ear unto me, therefore I will call upon Him” now most of your translations have it, “as long as I live.” Literally it reads “in my days,” and that means that the psalmist is looking… here’s the time he accepted Christ under the Old Testament dispensation, phase one of his life, phase two, the distance between the time he accepted Christ until the time he dies, and then phase three, eternity. Now during phase 2, during the time between the time he became a believer and the time he days, that is “in my days.” And so what he is saying, that during his life on earth “I will call upon the Lord.” In other words, I make this the norm and standard of my Christian life. This will be habitual practice during “in my days.” This refers to the faith technique; it’s one expression of the faith technique.

Remember, in order to use the faith technique the four prerequisites. The first thing about the faith technique that you want to remember is that it has four prerequisites. First, you have to have a foundation for the faith, that is you have to have the creation, the universe has to be made the way the Bible says it is, you have to have a literal fall, etc. If you don’t believe in a literal Genesis 1-3 you can just chuck the Christian life because it’s not going to work logically. You can be shredded in two minutes by taking an allegorical interpretation of Genesis 1 and a literal interpretation in the New Testament. You take an allegorical interpretation of both or you don’t take an allegorical interpretation of either. So the first prerequisite for the faith technique, the first large thing we want to say about the faith technique is that it has four prerequisites. The first one is that you have to have a foundation.

The second one is that you have to have an observable historic revelation. You can’t exercise faith in nothing. You’ve got to have faith in something, there has to be an object for your faith; the object for your faith is something that God has done in history for you.

The third prerequisite for faith is that you have to have a piece of the mind of God. How are you going to believe something if you don’t know what’s on God’s mind, what He wants you to do. So the third prerequisite is you have to have some of the content from God down through revelation into your brain.

And the fourth thing that you have to have as a prerequisite is that you must personally investigate the evidence until you can honestly believe yourself. And I can’t do that for you, I can put out the evidences, you are going to have to be the one that beats them around. And I don’t expect you to believe it just because I say; I’m giving you the evidences and it’s your invitation to believe. This is why we don’t have trot down the aisle services here; when you hear a message for the first time and you haven’t thought about it, you’re in no shape to come down any aisle; you’re in no shape to decide then at all. You have to decide after you can personally examine the evidences. So those are the prerequisites for the faith technique.

The second thing that you want to remember about the faith technique that he’s using “in my days” is that it is by definition the assurance of God’s eternal gracious plan; the life of a believer, remember the definition of faith, assurance of God’s eternal gracious plan in the life of a believer which allows his own rational submission to it in the present moment.

The third thing about the faith technique you want to know, it has two parts, a doing and a resting. And that has to be carefully separated; there are things that you must do as a creature functioning under the first, second, third and fourth and fifth divine institutions. And then you have to have the rest because that’s the only way you can respond to God’s grace.

The fourth thing about the faith technique is that it is THE modus operandi of God. God never operates in the Christian life on the basis of works; it’s always the faith technique. Even confession is a subset of all the uses of the faith technique.

Fifth, the faith technique expresses rebellion against Satan and allegiance to Christ because it vindicates God’s character. Every time you use the faith technique you are rebelling, it’s an act of rebellion against Satan’s lies because Satan says God is not interested, God cannot or will not provide for you. And when you use the faith technique you’re saying to Satan, I believe that Jesus Christ is sufficient, that God will provide, and God does provide. So you are defying Satan at the point of the use of the faith technique.

The sixth point about the faith technique is that it must be exercised by usage; it is one way you have of strengthening your human spirit. Your human spirit cannot be strengthened by doing pushups. It can only be strengthened by doing the faith technique, operating on the faith technique. Pushups are good for you but….

And the seventh thing about the faith technique, it must be used or you’re going to harden your heart. Failure…for you to go along in the Christian life during “in your days” and you encounter some problem here and you have heard enough of the Word of God to know better than to panic, and you have heard all the promises, Romans 8:28 etc, and you know all these promises, and you come up to a problem in your life and you say no, I am not going to use the faith technique—when you say that you are on negative volition and right there you’re beginning to harden your heart because you’re rejecting known truth and the horrible result is that you can reject truth that you have learned and you forget it. It’s just like you’ve never known it. All right, that’s the faith technique.

Now beginning in verse 3 we start the second section; the psalmist recounts how Yahweh completely delivered him from the threats to his life by his enemies. Now I want to give you the breakdown on the second section. The second section goes from verses 3-11, and it’s entitled: the psalmist recounts how Yahweh completely delivered him from the threats to his life by his enemies. Part A under that, verses 3-4, which is all we will finish tonight, is: the psalmist recounts how he was near death and called upon Yahweh. So there you have the thought of verses 3-4.

Let’s read verses 3-4 in the text: “The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell got hold upon me; I found trouble and sorrow. [4] Then called I upon the name of the LORD: O LORD, I beseech Thee, deliver my soul.”

Now the first two verbs are “ compassed about” and “got hold” to use the King James English. Both of these are verbs of constriction. That is, both of these verbs emphasize a particular aspect to the psalmists problem. Whatever his problem was, it was minus freedom. His freedom was being removed from him. And both of these verbs emphasize the restriction; they are verbs of constraint, binding together, this kind of thing. Even the nouns are kind of the same theme, “the sorrows of death,” and it’s not the sorrow’s of death, it’s “the bonds of death.” It’s not talking about the subjective feeling, it’s talking about an objective destruction of his freedom; “the bonds of death compassed me,” and the other, “the constraints of sheol,” or “the grave” literally. In the Old Testament the word “hell” does not mean what we mean when we use the word “hell.” Someone who rejects Christ is going to hell; now what we’re talking about is negative volition, a person goes to Hades until revelation chapter 20, at which time he gets thrown in the lake of fire. Now that is what most people mean, they have two words here, lake of fire and Hades, and both of those refer to the punishment of a person who rejects grace. But “hell” in the Old Testament means this but it can also has another branch meaning. And it means simply grave, and that is what is meant here, hell or the grave, “sheol” is the word; sheol, the constraint of death.

“The bonds of death compassed me, and the pains” or literally “the constraints of sheol got hold upon me,” this apparently indicates whatever his situation was that it involved the threat of death. Now it sounds like disease, except for the fact when you look down in verses 10-11 his complaint is about men not disease, and therefore this is why I summarize the thought: the psalmist recounts how Yahweh completely delivered him from threats to his life by his enemies. Not by disease, and to further substantiate this interpretation “the bonds of death” and the “pains of hell” are repeated in Psalm 18:5. Turn to Psalm 18:5 and we can check how this idiom is used.

In Psalm 18 we know this, it’s talking about human enemies. And notice the language in 18:5, same expression, “The bonds of sheol compassed me about; the snares of death prevented me [were round about me]. [6] In my distress I called upon the LORD,” now you look at the Psalm heading of Psalm 18 and that interprets it for you, “To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, the servant of the LORD, who spoke unto the LORD the words of this song in the day that the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul.” So that sets up how that idiom is used. Now knowing Psalm 18 we come back to Psalm 116 and that’s why we interpret verse 3, “The bonds of death and the constraints of sheol” as referring to enemies who apparently hindered his freedom to the point where he was going to be killed. There’s definitely the theme of death in this. Just what the connection is I do not know; the Psalm doesn’t give us the historical details, it just gives us the principles.

All right, keep this in mind because there’s going to be a fantastic truth revealed about a believer’s death in this Psalm but you have to appreciate the truth about death and dying and all of you ought to think ahead to the time you’re going to die because you might as well prepare for it today and learn from the Word of God how you are going to face death. And this Psalm will teach you how to face death. So verse 3 sets up the situation, it definitely is a death situation.

“…I found trouble and sorrow.” Now the verb “found” is in the imperfect and this is why I defend my interpretation that this was a long extended trial. “I kept on finding trouble and sorrow.” So this shows you there was a process of time involved in this thing. So that’s why going back up and checking… see, this is what you always do when you interpret God’s Word, you pass from one part to the other part, you interpret this to check it with this. So we’ve seen this new verb in verse 3, we see that the trial definitely takes over a time interval, now we come back and say did we make the right choice back in verses 1-2 when we interpreted that as a past trial and not descriptive praise. Yes, because it fits this verb in verse 3, “I kept on finding trouble and sorrow.” So this was an extended period of time threatening him with death. The principle could apply to a Christian suffering from a disease.

Verse 4, “Then I called” and the word “called” is imperfect, “I kept on calling,” “I kept on calling upon the name of the LORD:” and this is what he said, “O LORD, I keep on beseech” “beseech is imperfect again, “I keep on beseeching Thee, deliver my soul.” So we have the linearness or the durativeness of this trial expressed by these verb tenses.

Now there’s one final point about verses 3-4 that is vital to us in our spiritual lives. You see how the translators began verse 4, with the word “Then?” Now I don’t know about you but to me the English word t-h-e-n suggests time, more than contrast. To me, when I use the word “then” I mean I did something when that was happening. In other words, it’s a time anchor. Now in the Hebrew the point about time isn’t there at all, and yet every translation emphasizes time. The point in the Hebrew is just very simple: contrast. In the Hebrew there’s a simple contrast between verse 3, the last part, 3b and 4, and it obviously involves time because obviously when verse 3 was going on verse 4 was going on, that’s obvious. But the stress isn’t on the coterminousness, the contemporanity of verses 3-4, the fact that they both occur at the same time. The emphasis is on the difference between the last part of verse 3 and the first part of verse 4, because this is the way it looks in the Hebrew if you transliterated it. It would read: “trouble and sorrow I kept on finding,” see, that’s describing the situation. Now verse 4, it says literally, “On the name of Yahweh I kept on calling.” And there’s a contrast mark right there, on the “I”.

So what does the Hebrew try to communicate to us. Don’t you see how those sentences are set up. The emphasis is not on the verb but on the situation, “Trouble and sorrow I kept on finding,” the emphasis is not on what I am finding, but “trouble and sorrow I keep on finding.” That’s the way it would be said. That sets you off on one direction, and then he says but I’m a man of Yahweh, “I kept on calling,” now that’s the contrast, the powerful contrast in this believer’s life. The contrast, then, is between the name of Jehovah and the trouble.

Now what do we know and what have we seen in the Psalms when we see “name” of Jehovah? What doctrinal area is being stressed when you see the phrase “the name of Yahweh.” What does “name” mean in the Old Testament? The character, or the essence of God. So what is he emphasizing here? Divine essence, isn’t he? The essence of God. And he’s contrasting the essence of God with the trouble that he faces. And this shows you a tremendous thing about the mentality of these psalmists. These men were fantastic and it’s little phrases by paying attention carefully to things like this where you will capture the mentality of these men and their secrets of living the Christian life, which isn’t a secret to anybody with open eyes and an open mind and diligence to study the Word. There’s no secrets in the Christian life; it’s all there.

Now let’s watch what’s happening here. Here’s God’s essence; God is sovereign, God is righteous, God is just, God is love, God is omniscient, God is omnipresent, omnipotent, immutable and eternal. That’s what God is like; that is the “name.” Now what the psalmist is saying, and the essence of his faith is this simple: all he’s saying in this Psalm is that no matter how big the sorrow, no matter how big the trial, my God is bigger. I don’t care what the trouble is that I have, no problem I ever will have in my life will be bigger than my God. And I say that dogmatically. And you stop and look at it, any time you and I get in trouble in the Christian life isn’t that what we’re doing. Aren’t we saying I am so fantastically important that my problem is bigger than the Lord. That’s ridiculous, obviously, when you trot it out and look at it for a minute. But in the panic situation when you don’t think isn’t that what you do? Doesn’t the problem appear bigger, oh, I’ve got this horrible problem in my business, the thing’s falling apart. God’s big enough isn’t he, do it His way and you won’t have to worry about it. Oh, I’ve got this problem in my life, or this problem with my husband, this problem with my girlfriend or something, and what am I going to do about it. God is bigger than your problem. No matter how large your harem is, God is bigger than any set of your problems.

Now let’s conclude by turning back to Romans 8:18 because Paul teaches us the same truth in Romans 8. In verses 18 and following I just want to show you the argument, the overall argument that begins in verse 18 where Paul says, “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed to us. [19] For the earnest expectation of the creature waits for the manifestation of the sons of God.” And then he goes on and enumerates what you have going for you, believer, in the middle of your trials. Now look down at verse 23, “Not only they, but ourselves also, who have the first fruits of the Holy Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves waiting for the adoption.” Now the Holy Spirit with its groaning within ourselves, verse 26, “Likewise, the Holy Spirit helps our infirmity;” it’s singular in the Greek, not plural, “infirmity” means the fact that you and I are fallen creatures, being redeemed yes, but still fallen creatures in a fallen world, and full of the flesh. And because we have infirmity, “the Spirit is constantly,” present tense, “helping our infirmity,” how, “because we know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us,” present tense, continuous action, twenty-four hours a day the Holy Spirit is making intercession for you. Now that is not talking about the Holy Spirit helping you to pray. The Holy Spirit does help believers to pray but you can’t get that out of verse 26.

Verse 26 is talking about the Holy Spirit seeing things that need to be done in order to sanctify you to get you into the position of conforming with Christ. And the “groanings which cannot be uttered,” the prayer requests of verse 26, are so powerful and the content of them so holy that you and I are not permitted to eavesdrop on this particular prayer group between the Holy Spirit and the Father. The Holy Spirit is making intercession for your with petitions that are so fantastic that we are not allowed to horn in. Why? Because the Holy Spirit knows, as perfect righteousness, what being conformed to Christ means and He knows and He sees you and He sees me, if we are Christians, He sees us as we are going to be conformed to the image of Christ. If you saw what you will ultimately be in phase three, you’d faint, like Isaiah fainted in Isaiah 6, because he saw the presence of God. And you would faint. Now down on the line, there you are in phase three conformed to Christ and the Holy Spirit sees that; that’s the plan, and He sees this mess where you are now and so He compares the two and makes petitions. If you’ve had trials recently do you realize that the Holy Spirit might have said Father, this believer is so stupid down here, they have heard the Word and heard the Word and heard the Word and they’re not doing anything about it so Father, I think it’s about time you kind of dropped a little bomb in their lap, get some interesting action going, and that may be the reason why some of you, all of a sudden, wham, where did this thing come from. Oh, the Holy Spirit dropped it in as a sweet gift, valentine’s present, I love you. Literally, I love you and so I’m not sending flowers, I’m sending you some trouble, and that way I know that this will knock you off center and get you going again in the Christian life.

And then finally one other verse to remember in this passage, there are gobs of verses we could remember but verse 34, I just want you to remember verse 26 and 34. Verse 26, the Holy Spirit praying; verse 34, Christ has died, has risen, both past tense, “who is,” present tense, “even at the right hand of God, who is now” present tense, “making intercession for us.” That means that Jesus Christ is constantly praying for you. And Jesus Christ is constantly applying His finished work to you, when you goof up and you drop the ball, you get in rebellion, mental attitude sins and so on, against God’s Word, you’re not going to lose your salvation, don’t get into that operation that every once in a while crops up around here. Oh, so and so, did you hear their sin, they can’t be a believer and do things like that, believers just don’t do things like that. Oh yes they do, all the time. So we have the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ, both praying for you, and that’s why you’ve got all the stuff going for you.

So conclusion: Romans 8:28, “All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”