A seed shall serve him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation.
The psalm opens with a cry of abandonment. It closes with a crowd of worshippers, and this verse is where that crowd begins. Where the ESV says "Posterity," older translations read "a seed," and the writers below work from that older wording. Two questions come up again and again: who is this seed, and what does it mean to be counted to the Lord as a generation?
Christ had no children during His life on earth, yet the psalm promises Him descendants. One writer traces that promise back to a question Isaiah asks about the suffering Servant:
This is the answer to the question of Isaiah 53:8, "and who will declare His generation?" During His life on earth He had no seed. But in resurrection, "He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, and the will of the Lord shall prosper in His hand" (Isa 53:10). Because of the value of His sacrifice, His children will be a great multitude.
"Seed" is first a title of Christ Himself, and only then a name for His people. The ESV renders the word "offspring":
Remember how Scripture predicted our Lord Himself as the "Seed" of the woman in Genesis 3, and again as the "Seed" of Abraham. About that promise the Apostle wrote, "It does not say, 'And to offsprings,' referring to many, but referring to one, 'And to your offspring,' who is Christ" (Gal. 3:16)... He, who above all is the "Seed," is to have a seed of His own order in His risen life.
Here "a generation" means a people God owns as His own. Being owned brings a task:
"A seed shall serve Him: it shall be counted to the Lord for a generation." Literally, "the generation" — the one, I take it, that truly is such: a people born of God. The full expression of that thought waits for the New Testament. But God counts them as His. He owns them as such, and it falls to them to keep the testimony of the grace they have received: "they shall come and shall declare His righteousness to a people that shall be born, because He has done this."
The same writer adds a warning. The work of Christ does not produce this seed on its own. Unless the Spirit works in sovereign power, "there will be no effect."
The verse marks an exchange. The generation that refused Christ gives way to a new people, in an age still to come.
The old Christ-rejecting generation is gone. But the returned remnant, after passing through judgment and being cut down, shall be a holy seed and a new stock. "They shall come, and shall declare His righteousness (now at last cured of any high opinion of themselves) to a people that shall be born, that He has done this." (Verses 29-31) This is not heaven or eternity, and not the present evil age. It is the bright and holy age to come.
Some take the seed to be the Church, seen apart from Israel, and hear an echo of the verse in Hebrews:
A seed shall serve Him (verse 30). This seems to mean the Church, seen apart from Israel. It shall be counted to the Lord for a generation. Compare the apostle's quotation in Heb. 2:13: "Behold, I and the children God has given me."
Another writer takes the seed to be Israel's believing remnant. He admits the verse is not easy:
I am not sure verses 30 and 31 apply to the same thing. Verse 30 seems clearly the remnant out of the Jewish congregation... "I will make of the remnant a strong nation." I take it that "they shall come" is the remnant of the latter day, which shall become a strong nation, and the great congregation.
One writer sees a company already answering to this description. He names them from the Lord's own prayer:
There is "a seed" who serve Him, as we saw at the end of Psalm 22, and they and their seed shall last. This will have its fulfilment in the millennial age, but it also has a fulfilment now. Right now we may identify these servants and their seed with "the people whom You gave me out of the world" and "those who will believe in me through their word" (John 17:6 and 20). We come in among those who have believed in Jesus through the Apostles' word.
- Cost. The seed comes out of His death. He had no children on earth, but in resurrection He sees His seed, and the value of His sacrifice makes them a great multitude.
- Kind. He is Himself the promised Seed, and what He gains is "a seed of His own order in His risen life" — people begotten of God.
- Claim. Counted to the Lord for a generation means He owns them as His own: a people born of God.
- Reach. The Christ-rejecting generation passes. Commentators differ over who the new seed is — Israel's remnant, the Church, or all who believe through the apostles' word today.
- Errand. Those He owns carry the testimony on. They declare His righteousness to a people not yet born: "He has done this."
They shall come, and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done [it].
Psalm 22 begins with a cry of abandonment. It ends here, with news going out to people who are not yet born. Two questions hang over its last words: who is the "He," and what is the "this" that He has done?
One writer notes what John's Gospel leaves out of the crucifixion, and what it keeps.
John does not mention the three hours of darkness, or the forsaking and the bitter cry it drew out, which the first verse of Psalm 22 had predicted. Those things did not especially show that Jesus is God, the truth the Spirit of God had led John to stress. What did show it was the triumphant cry that closed His life on earth. Psalm 22 ends with the words, "He has done," and the New Testament equivalent is, "It is finished." He came into the world knowing all that the Father had entrusted to Him. He was leaving it knowing that all had been fulfilled. Not one thing was lacking.
The link is not only in sense but in the vocabulary itself.
"It is finished!" was His triumphant shout. In Greek it is one word — "tetelestai." And our Psalm ends with a similar word — "He has done." The Hebrew word "ohsa" carries the same thought: it is finished.
The verse says nothing about who "He" is or what He has done. One writer notes the vagueness and answers it.
The final phrase, "that He has done this (it)" is suggestive. The words are general, and some might ask, Who has done it? and What has He done? But to every spiritual mind the reference is obvious. It is the unmatched act of propitiation that Christ carried out on the cross. There He was displayed as a mercy-seat, to declare the righteousness of God about sins (Rom. 3:23-26).
Propitiation is the act that satisfies God about sin. The mercy-seat was the lid of the ark in the tabernacle, where the priest sprinkled blood.
Does the weight fall on the deed or on the Doer? One writer answers without hesitation.
What our blessed Lord has done — His work — is one thing. But what He is in Himself — His Person — is far more, for the work is only the necessary result of who He is. Jesus Christ has done what He has done, because He is what He is. May grace be given us each day and hour to grasp more fully what the closing verse of Psalm 22 says: "That He has done it." It means not only that He has done it, but that HE has done it — the One whose divine and human perfection gives His work its value.
The second half of Psalm 22 moves outward in stages, and this verse is the furthest reach of that movement.
His sufferings from the hand of God for sin bring only blessing, the outflowing of grace alone... Next, the word goes out to all the ends of the world, to bring them into this blessed circle of praise... The seed that is spared then will serve Him, and then it will flow down to other generations. They will come and proclaim "to a people yet unborn" this great and wondrous work of redemption; that blessed, lowly, afflicted One "had done this." All is the fruit of redemption and victory. Judgment has been silenced.
The hearers described here do not yet exist. One writer, comparing a parallel psalm, argues that more than birth is meant.
The Psalmist is led to see that more will be needed than mercy shown to sinful men. He predicts that "a people yet to be created may praise the LORD." In Psalm 22:31 he says, "They shall come and proclaim His righteousness to a people yet unborn, that He has done it." Here it is not a people that shall be born, but that shall be created... God is going to create a new kind of person to enjoy the blessing... Not a physical but a spiritual creation is in view.
One writer counts today's readers into that same testimony.
A new generation is in mind — "Behold, I and the children God has given Me." "They shall … proclaim His righteousness to a people yet unborn, that He has done it" (Psalm 22:31). What wondrous grace that we should have our part in this precious testimony! The night of sorrow is over, and "joy comes with the morning."
- Done. The psalm opens with "why have you forsaken me" and closes with "He has done it." The Hebrew matches the Greek tetelestai — "It is finished."
- Righteous. The deed is propitiation at the cross, which declares God's righteousness in dealing with sins.
- He. The weight sits on the Person as much as the deed: the work has its value because of who did it.
- Born. The hearers do not yet exist. They are a people to be created, brought into being to enjoy the blessing and to praise.
- Told. Those sufferings came from God's hand for sin, so they bring only blessing. It flows out to the nations and on to generations unborn, and we have a share in carrying it.