Now these are the last words of David David the son of Jesse saith, And the man who was raised up on high, The anointed of the God of Jacob, And the sweet psalmist of Israel saith,
This verse opens the last words of David. Before he speaks, God names him four ways — son of Jesse, exalted man, anointed one, singer — and each name says something about the man God chose to speak through.
Chapter 22 and chapter 23 sit side by side on purpose, and the contrast between them is sharp. One writer traces it to what David had come out of in each case.
At the end of his trials, when he looked back at his enemies, he sings of joy and triumph — it is all exultation. After his experience of the blessing, it is, "Although my house be not so with God." The end of all the sorrow and trial with Saul is rejoicing, exultation, and strength… while in the second, the result of the place of honour, blessing and triumph, is deep and bitter sorrow — the confession, "My house is not so with God!"
The verse repeats one word before David gets a word in — "oracle" in the ESV, "says" in older translations. One writer draws out what that repeated word tells us about the speaker.
The first verse is not part of David's last words. It sets before us, with great solemnity, what marked the man who spoke these words. This is a matter of the greatest importance. The first point is that God inspired him to speak them. The twice repeated word "says" shows that David spoke in oracles. So God inspired him in all four ways this verse presents him. God inspired him as "the son of Jesse," in the humble character of his human descent. God inspired him as "the man who was raised up on high," in the character He gave him when He raised him up as a man. God inspired him as "the anointed of the God of Jacob," in his character as king of Israel, the people who had received the promises. And last of all, God inspired him as "the sweet psalmist of Israel," in his character as prophet bringing grace to his people.
David names his low birth first, then his high place. He gives God the credit for the move from one to the other.
David was just about to pass away from this world. His last words present the vision that was before him — what God enabled him to see of the coming kingdom of Christ. First David speaks of what he was by nature: "the son of Jesse," of very humble origin. Then he praises the grace of God that made him "the man who was raised up on high." The Lord Jesus came from the same line, as becoming Man. Yet "He emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant"; and because of this "God has highly exalted Him."
Samuel had anointed David with oil. But the title reaches past David to Someone he saw only in vision.
This once despised but now exalted One is likewise "the Anointed of the God of Jacob." He is the centre and the sum of all God's purposes for Israel and for the Gentiles — and of the heavenly counsels also. David was speaking of the things "touching the king"… Samuel had anointed him with the "horn of oil." But the Anointed of the God of Jacob passed in vision before David's soul. He too, with Abraham, looked on to the day of glory, and saw Him who was at once David's "Son" and David's "Lord."
One writer weighs this last title against the crown, and finds the crown the lesser thing.
All the sweetness and melody and divine character of this voice come out when David becomes simply a Voice, like John the Baptist, to speak of Another… He is the anointed of the God of Jacob, the One whose glory it is to bring out of the poorest material a vessel for His praise. As anointed in this way, he is Israel's "sweet psalmist" rather than her king. And our hearts certainly judge of him so: what is the king compared with the psalmist? And no wonder. Here David is only the channel through which God's own living water has flowed to the lips of the thirsty ever since.
Another writer says what the title meant in practice, and who it points to.
As the "sweet psalmist of Israel," David was the leader of the praises of Israel to Jehovah (1 Chronicles 25:6), just as the Lord Jesus leads the praises to the Father now, in the midst of the church (Hebrews 2:12).
David's place as type of the Messiah did not soften his view of himself. It sharpened it, and bright hope and deep self-judgment ran side by side to the end.
God put into his mouth the words that looked ahead to the Messiah. David himself knew that God had made him, in a striking way, the ancestor and type of the Messiah. This very fact made his own shortcomings, errors, and sins more keenly felt… So we find a double current in the heart of David. His faith was bright and undimmed in the joy that was coming with the true king who would surely sit on his throne. But meanwhile his was the softened spirit, the broken and contrite heart of a man who knew what moral humbling means… Is it not important to see this? The sense of our failure, and of what we are, is never meant to dim the brightness of our confidence in the Lord.
- Oracle. The repeated word — "oracle" in the ESV, "says" in older translations — marks this verse as a formal declaration. God names David as inspired before his last words begin.
- Son. He starts with his humble descent from Jesse, so that everything after it reads as gift, not achievement.
- Raised. The lift from low place to high is God's doing. It points on to One who humbled Himself, and whom God highly exalted.
- Anointed. Samuel's oil made David king; the title looks past him to David's Son who is also David's Lord.
- Psalmist. The crown fades beside the song. As psalmist, David becomes a voice for Another, and God's living water still reaches thirsty lips.
The Spirit of Jehovah spoke by me, And his word was on my tongue.
David's last recorded words do not begin with his reign. They begin with his mouth. What he is about to say is not his own. Two questions follow: what happened to David while God spoke through him, and why he put this on record at the end of his life.
The verse stands at the head of David's parting words.
There is something deeply moving and comforting in the last words of "the sweet Psalmist of Israel." It is good and helpful to listen to the "last words" of any saint of God or servant of Christ... So "last words" carry weight and value. That is true above all when they come to us not just as the fruit of a matured judgment, but, as in David's case, by inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
David does not say the Spirit gave him ideas that he then put into his own words. He says the word itself was on his tongue.
Here we have solemn divine authority, and at the same time the clearest statement of what inspiration is. Inspiration uses man — all of man. To express itself, it uses every feature of this human instrument. If he says something, it is as an oracle; if he speaks, it is the Lord speaking by him. Man has mixed in nothing that is of himself: "His word was on my tongue." God uses what He wants of man to present His thoughts in the complete integrity of His Word.
This does not erase David. He is still the one who sings, in his own voice.
So he was used — he was the singer, but the Holy Spirit was the composer of the music. David's songs were "the songs of the Lord," and by them he prophesied according to the mind of the Spirit. His tongue was "the pen of a ready writer." The Lord, as the apostle says, was speaking in David (Hebrews 4:7).
David gives himself a small place in his own last words.
David becomes simply a Voice, like John the Baptist, speaking of Another. That is when all the sweetness, melody and divine character of this voice is found... Here David is only the channel through which God's own living water has flowed to the lips of the thirsty ever since.
Some treat inspiration as a general influence on a writer's thoughts. David's own words go further.
David was a saint of God. Was he under a delusion about this? He clearly would not have dismissed the thought of verbal inspiration as something no sensible person could accept. He believed in it. He was conscious of it. This was his recorded testimony at the close of a long life, near the end of his prophetic ministry.
The verse also keeps two things apart: what God made known to David, and how God brought it through his tongue.
What David said did not come from his own heart or mind. He was the vessel of the Spirit of the LORD. This is inspiration, and we read of it in 1 Corinthians 2:13... David was the speaker, but God's word was on his tongue. What he spoke under the guidance and control of the Spirit of God was what God had made known to him. This is revelation... The youngest child of God can rest with assurance on the truth of the Scriptures. They not only give us God's revelation; they have come to us inspired by the Holy Spirit, in words that He has chosen.
What follows in the passage shows what the Spirit was speaking about.
Again we have David's own acknowledgement that he was only the instrument of the Spirit... Here again the immediate context shows that He was speaking about Christ. All God's counsels centre in Him. I do not mean to limit the inspiration to these direct predictions; far from it. Every word, whether for the individual or the nation, is always perfect. But Christ is the centre of God's thoughts, and it is the great work of the Spirit to point to Him.
One objection says the Bible writers never claimed inspiration for their own writings. This verse answers it.
"It is very remarkable that nowhere do we find the inspired writers — Jewish or Christian — declaring their own writings inspired." This is a mistake. See 2 Samuel 23:2 and 1 Corinthians 14:37. And there is "Thus says the LORD" a thousand times over — "The LORD spoke to Moses," and so on.
- Source. David traces his words past himself. The Spirit spoke by him, so what he says carries divine authority, not a king's opinion.
- Instrument. Inspiration used the whole man — his history, his voice, his gift — yet he mixed nothing of his own into the message.
- Words. The claim reaches the tongue, not just the thought. The Spirit gave the very words, and David said so at the end of his life.
- Subject. As a channel, David became a voice for Another. The Spirit's great work is to point to Christ.
- Certainty. Because the words came this way, they still refresh the thirsty. The youngest believer can rest on Scripture.
The God of Israel said, The Rock of Israel spoke to me, The ruler among men shall be just, Ruling in the fear of God;
David's last words are not simply an old king's reflection on a long reign. They are a message given to him. In it God Himself names the two things He looks for in anyone who holds power over others.
The verse names its speaker twice: the God of Israel, the Rock of Israel. One writer takes it as the clearest possible account of how God's words reach us through a man.
Here we have solemn divine authority at the same time as clearest affirmation of what inspiration is. Inspiration uses man — all of man. To express itself, it uses every feature of this human instrument. If he says something, it is as an oracle; if he speaks, it is the Lord speaking by him. Man has mixed in nothing that is of himself: "His word was on my tongue." God uses what He wants of man to present His thoughts with the complete integrity of His Word. But if God speaks by David, He also speaks to David: "The Rock of Israel spoke to me."
Another writer notes what David then does with that word: he rests his whole faith on it.
This is now not merely the Spirit of God speaking through the experiences and the faith of an instrument God Himself has formed. It is a direct revelation: "the Rock of Israel spoke to me." On that divine revelation David rests in faith, whatever within him or around him seems set against it.
God asks two things of a ruler: justice, and the fear of God. The writers quote an older wording of the line — "He that rules over men must be just" — and hold the whole record of human government up against it.
This is God's standard. Nothing less will do. Where among human rulers shall we find one who comes up to it? We may go down the entire list of those who have sat on the thrones of this world, and not find so much as one who matches the great qualities set out in this verse.
For a ruler, the fear of God is not one quality among many. It decides whether he can rule at all. Israel's first king, Saul, once excused himself by saying he was afraid of the people. This verse weighs that excuse.
He pleads his fear of the people, which, if true, showed he was unfit to rule at all. For "he that rules over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God"; and the fear of man cannot live together with the fear of God. It sets a trap. Scripture is full of examples of this. It spoils the life of even many a child of God — a shrinking from the path of full surrender to Him, in the fear of what flesh can do or say.
The standard tests David first, and he falls short. One writer shows where it points instead.
"The ruler over men shall be just, ruling in the fear of God." In comparison with other rulers, this was in measure true of David. But there were many things in which he fell short of this, as we have seen in this book, and as he confesses in verse 5. In Christ, in His lowly humiliation, we find perfect righteousness and perfect truth. He proved His character in His experiences of sorrow and rejection. This same truth and justice will shine out in beauty and splendour when He takes His throne over all creation. As Man He will rule in the fear of God, in perfect consistency with the character of the God of Israel and of the universe.
Another writer names three things such a ruler must have, and the one Person who has them.
The one who is to rule for God's glory and man's good needs righteousness, obedience, and dependence. These are found only in that blessed One, who came not to do His own will, but the will of Him who sent Him.
This standard is a foundation. Everything David goes on to picture is built on it.
Here, David sets up the divine standard of character for one called to rule over men. "He must be just"; and on that base of justice rises a structure of cloudless light, richest blessing and abundant fruitfulness. All this will only happen when the Son of David, now hidden in heaven, takes the throne of his Father and stretches out His sceptre over a restored creation.
- Spoken, not deduced. David's closing words are a direct revelation — "the Rock of Israel spoke to me" — not the summary of a long career.
- Two requirements. God asks for justice and the fear of God in whoever holds power. Nothing less will do.
- One disqualifier. The fear of man cannot live alongside the fear of God. Whoever is held by it cannot rule others — and the same trap catches ordinary believers.
- One qualified Man. Only Christ holds righteousness, obedience and dependence in full. He came to do the will of the One who sent Him.
- One outcome. Justice is the foundation. The light and blessing built on it come when David's Son takes the throne.
And [he shall be] as the light or the morning, [like] the rising of the sun, A morning without clouds; [When] from the sunshine, after rain, The green grass springeth from the earth.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
Although my house be not so before God, Yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, Ordered in every way and sure; For [this is] all my salvation, and every desire, Although he make [it] not to grow.
David's last recorded words come at the end of a reign scarred by his own sin. They hold two things at once: an honest verdict on his own family, and unshaken confidence in what God had promised him.
Older translations read the verse as a statement, not a question: "Although my house be not so with God, yet He has made with me an everlasting covenant... for this is all my salvation and every desire, although He make it not to grow." The commentators below work from that wording. David is not talking about hard times in general. He names the wreckage in his family and traces it back to himself.
He admits that his house was not with God as it ought to have been — and this was the fruit of his own sin. He himself had brought a sword into it, and that sword stayed drawn until he handed the house over to another. He was convicted, and he took note of the judgments that had come on him. Yet he goes on trusting.
Everything turns on two small words. One admits the failure; the other answers it.
There is rare beauty and power in the link between the "although" and the "yet" here. The first leaves a wide margin for the words of a convicted and humbled heart. The second opens the floodgates and lets in the full tide of divine mercy and loving kindness. "Although" puts man in the dust as a failing one; "yet" brings in God in all the fullness of His pardoning love.
David's house was not ordered; the covenant was. Only one side signs this covenant, and that is why it holds.
God's covenant is eternal and secure. It is a new covenant. The old covenant was indeed ordered, but it was neither secure nor eternal, because it rested on man's responsibility. God sought the ground of the new covenant in Himself. Man does not enter this covenant as a party to a contract. This is why it can endure and never end.
The same look that humbled David also steadied him.
He had learnt to look away from himself and his house straight to God, and to His everlasting covenant of grace. His sense of his own nothingness, as a man and as a king, was deep and real. So was his sense of what grace had done for him. The view of what God was had humbled him; the view of what God was had lifted him up.
The verse ends by admitting that nothing had grown yet. Commentators point to a later King for the fulfilment.
This covenant did not rest on the faithfulness of David, but on God's purpose regarding Christ. God will fulfil everything He promised in Christ. All is sure, because everything spoken of here finds its answer in Christ risen from the dead. David found his salvation — all his salvation — in what God had promised about Christ. God's king, the Lord Jesus Christ, satisfies all his heart's desires too. David did not then see everything God promised, except in vision. God did not then make it grow. Solomon would not bring it about, though David was about to place him on the throne, and though Solomon's reign would picture Christ in the splendour and glory of the coming kingdom. These things could not come until the Lord Jesus had finished the great work of the cross, taken His place at the right hand of God, and returned from heaven to set up His kingdom.
Another writer traces the same promise into Isaiah and Acts.
He counted on the everlasting covenant that God had made with him, ordered in all things and sure. And he looked forward to that morning without clouds. The "sure mercies of David" will reach Israel through the risen Christ. Isaiah 55:3; compare Acts 13:34.
David sees his own sin clearly, and his confidence is not dented by it. Neither one cancels the other.
So we find a double current in the heart of David. His faith was bright and undimmed in the joy that was coming with the true king who would surely sit on his throne. But meanwhile he had a softened spirit, the broken and contrite heart of a man who knew what moral humiliation means about himself and all his house. Is it not important to see this? The sense of our failure, and of what we are, is never meant to dim the brightness of our confidence in the Lord. Conscience must work without hindrance, and so must faith.
- Although. David's dying verdict on his own family is honest and self-accusing; the ruin was the fruit of his own sin.
- Yet. One word turns the sentence: where "although" puts man in the dust, "yet" lets in the full tide of God's mercy.
- Ordered. His house was not ordered, but the covenant was. God found its ground in Himself, not in a partner who could fail.
- Sure. What David could not secure, the risen Christ secures. The "sure mercies of David" reach Israel through Him.
- Not yet grown. Nothing had grown yet in David's lifetime. So he rested on the covenant and looked ahead to the cloudless morning.