Sing psalms unto Jehovah, ye saints of his, and give thanks in remembrance of his holiness.
The psalm moves from one man's rescue to a call to everyone else who belongs to God. The reason given for the singing is striking — not the deliverance itself, but the holiness of the God who gave it. The commentators quote an older wording: "give thanks at the remembrance of His holiness." The ESV reads, "give thanks to His holy name."
The call grows out of what David had just been through. He turns his own lesson outward.
David was prosperous and sure it would last. Then God hid His face from him, and he learned how dependent he really was. At once he was troubled. Then, crying to God with death in view, he proved the Lord's deliverance. God turned his mourning into dancing. God took off His servant's sackcloth and clothed him with gladness. What David proved then, others may prove too.
The call goes to God's saints, His own people, and not to everyone. Commentators point out that the reason for the song lies beyond the reach of anyone else.
There is a special reason for giving thanks — the remembrance that He is supremely holy, loving what is good and hating evil. The ungodly cannot appreciate this. They "despise those who are good," and they love to do evil. But being born again changes this completely. Holiness then becomes a most precious jewel, one to thank God for sincerely.
Of everything God is, holiness is the trait people are least drawn to. That is what makes this call remarkable.
Holiness has first place in this cluster of glories. We may say it is one of the essential attributes of God. Without it, who could worship Him, or even respect Him? Yet it is the very trait of His nature that people most dislike, and most easily overlook. So He has reminded us over and over in His Word that He is holy… Yes, God's perfect holiness is a very unpopular truth. Yet it is the very thing that the Spirit of Christ in David calls His saints to give thanks for.
Such thanks rests on a cleansed conscience. One writer traces it back to the cross.
The blood of the Lamb cleanses the conscience from every speck and stain of sin. It sets that conscience in perfect freedom before a holiness that cannot tolerate sin. In the cross, all the claims of God's holiness were fully answered… The higher our estimate of holiness, the higher our estimate of the work of the cross… This is a precious fruit of a perfect redemption. Before a sinner can ever give thanks at the remembrance of God's holiness, he must look at it by faith from the resurrection side of the cross.
It is grace that makes such thanks possible.
How wonderful is the grace that enables redeemed sinners to "rejoice in Jehovah, and give thanks" — not merely at the remembrance of His grace, but of His holiness!
Commentators differ on how far the psalm looks ahead. Some read it of Israel's future deliverance. On that reading, the thanks covers the very dealing of God that first brought them low.
They are urged to sing psalms to Jehovah, and give thanks at the remembrance of His holiness. Holiness had to bring them low to raise them up. They can now rejoice, and call others to rejoice, in that very dealing of God with them. It might seem severe, but it worked: it brought them to repentance, and so to God. He had only acted in keeping with Himself; and this is always necessary for anyone to be blessed.
The sense of God's holiness does the opposite of what we might expect.
The soul that has found rest in God's presence is filled with the sense of His absolute holiness. Instead of this being a cause for distance or fear, it is bound up with overflowing joy. This by itself would prove a perfectly clear conscience — one freed from the burden of its sins. God has blotted those sins out wholly and entirely, in a way suited to the nature of a holy and righteous God. God alone could have worked such a deliverance. The delivered soul knows Him as its Saviour and finds in Him the source of all its joy. So it can celebrate His perfect holiness as part of that joy.
- Rescued — the song starts with one man saved from the edge of death. What he proved, others may prove too.
- Called — the song is for God's saints. Only those born again can treasure holiness instead of resenting it.
- Holiness — people dislike and overlook this trait most, yet it stands first among God's glories.
- Cross — such thanks is a fruit of redemption. A sinner must look at God's holiness by faith from the resurrection side of the cross.
- Joy — holiness no longer means distance and fear. It becomes part of the delivered soul's gladness.
For a moment [is passed] in his anger, a life in his favour; at even weeping cometh for the night, and at morn there is rejoicing.
David wrote this psalm after God lifted him out of a deep distress. Verse 5 is the lesson he drew from it: God's anger set against His favour, and one night set against the morning that follows.
The verse does not deny God's anger. It measures it, and sets it against something far larger.
Holiness must have anger against sin. But God's own gracious heart limits that anger. Set side by side, the anger lasts only "for a moment," while His favour (or grace) "is for a lifetime" — with no limit at all. Precious, eternal favour!
One writer answers someone who used this verse to argue about the punishment of the wicked. His reply looks at who the psalm is speaking to.
He also appeals to Psalm 30:5: "His anger is but for a moment, and His favor is for a lifetime." But those words are part of a call to the Lord's saints to sing to Him. The deliverance the psalmist received from his enemies is what illustrates them. They apply to the discipline of the righteous, and not to the punishment of the wicked.
The psalm has a backstory: the singer had been comfortable, and comfort had done him harm.
As a psalm of experience this one is of high value. It is full of sayings a tested believer can put straight to use. It is the speech of a heart that God had taught deeply in the real secret of faith. The psalmist had tasted prosperity, and it had made him confident in himself. When someone takes the Lord's favour and uses it to prop up his own strength, he is sure to misuse it, and he never really understands it. The believer has to learn resurrection as a preparation for the right use even of the present life.
That reframes what the deliverance is worth. It is not simply the return of the good days.
The great truth of Psalm 30 is a very practical one. The joy that flows from the deliverance the Lord gives is greater and deeper than the blessing of prosperity. That holds true even when we admit the prosperity came from God.
The order in the verse is not random. God set evening before morning, and the writer treats that order as a rule rather than a one-off.
Now the cloud had passed and the anger was gone. It really had lasted only a moment. In the favour that followed came "life," in the fullest sense. This holds as a principle for everyone who turns to Him in the same way. Weeping may stay with us at evening, and a night of darkness and distress follows. But God's order is evening first, then the morning. And for the morning He has prepared a song of joy instead of sorrow.
Commentators read the night on more than one scale. One is the believer's experience now. Another is a night still to come for Israel.
Just as God's anger is but for a moment, so "weeping may tarry for the night." The Lord is absent from the earth now, and God's people still have to pass through that night. It tests their faith and may cause weeping. The night of the great tribulation will do far more: it will bring unspeakable sorrow and weeping to the godly in Israel.
Each night has its matching daybreak, and the same writer names both.
"But joy comes with the morning." This will be gloriously true for Israel, when "the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings" (Malachi 4:2). The dark night will give way to the bright coming of Israel's Messiah, who will bless His people with the light of the perfect day. For believers today the night is Christ's absence. His return to take His own to Himself will bring in the joy of a new day.
Christ's own darkest hours — the garden of Gethsemane and then the cross at Calvary — ended the same way.
After sorrow comes rejoicing. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning. The noonday darkness of Calvary went deeper than the midnight darkness of Gethsemane. Still, beyond them both was a morning with no cloud and no pain — the morning of resurrection and heavenly glory. Here darkness and tears; there no night, no tears, no sorrow and no sighing.
- Moment. God's anger against His own is real but measured. Holiness calls for it; grace limits it. The verse speaks of the discipline of the righteous, not the punishment of the wicked.
- Lifetime. Set against that moment is favour with no limit, and in that favour is life itself.
- Night. The dark stretch has a purpose. Good times had bred self-confidence. The believer has to learn resurrection before he can use even this present life well.
- Morning. God's order is evening first, then morning. That holds for everyone who turns to Him, and a song of joy waits on the far side.
- Song. The joy that comes from deliverance runs deeper than the prosperity that was lost. Christ shows the same pattern: His darkness at Calvary gave way to the morning of resurrection.