There is a river the streams whereof make glad the city of God, the sanctuary of the habitations of the Most High.
The psalm has just pictured the earth giving way and the sea roaring, and now the scene changes to still water. A river appears, along with a city, a holy place, and God's title "Most High" — so where does this river run, and when will its streams appear?
The psalm sets two kinds of water against each other. One writer describes each:
In contrast to the heaving, roaring seas, "there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High" (v. 4). The seas stand for the commotion and trouble of the whole world. Their water is not even fit to drink. Their waves batter against each other, with no rest, no calmness of peace. But the river comes from above, flowing in one direction, with its fresh, pure water to refresh a weary land.
Hebrew has more than one word for flowing water. A reference work notes which one this verse uses:
God will make His people drink of the river of His pleasures, Ps. 36:8; here the word is nachal. In Ps. 46:4 it is nahar. "There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God." It will never run dry.
One writer points to Ezekiel and takes the river as more than a picture:
Blessing must flow from God's presence, and so we have the "river." It will have a literal as well as a spiritual fulfilment in the coming day (Ezek. 47:1).
Another writer reads Zechariah alongside Ezekiel and gives the direction of each branch:
Ezekiel did not mention the place to which the second arm of the double river will empty itself. In Zechariah we read in which direction it will flow. The river will flow right through Jerusalem. (Ezekiel shows us that the temple will stand apart from the city itself.) Half of it will go to the sea in the east, the Dead Sea. The other half will go to the sea in the west, the Mediterranean.
The verse does not say "the Lord" or "the God of Israel." One writer ties the title "Most High" to the crisis the psalm describes:
So Most High occurs in Ps. 46; for His supremacy is before the heart at that fearful time when "God" is the sole refuge, no matter what the desolations, no matter how the nations rage.
One writer takes the river as a picture of what God is doing through every upheaval:
Through all time, with its changes, upheavals, and conflicts, there flows the river of God's pleasure. No power of the enemy, no violence and corruption of men, no failure of the saints, can thwart God in carrying out His deep eternal counsels. Dispensations come and go: empires rise and fall; every testimony that God commits to the responsibility of men breaks down in their hands. But, over all, and through all, God is carrying out His purpose for the glory of Christ and the blessing of His people, earthly and heavenly.
The psalmist was not describing the Jerusalem in front of him. He was seeing something further on:
The Psalmist looks beyond the ruins of the Jerusalem of his own day. Looking by faith into the future, he sees the city as God has purposed it. There rises before his vision a city of gladness, a "holy place", a city that "shall not be moved", with God dwelling "in the midst of her". In the same way, in the middle of all the turmoil and confusion in the world around us, and the corruptions of the Christian world, the believer walks in the light of the heavenly city.
Trace the word "river" through Scripture and it stops at one place — a throne. One writer follows it to the end:
Finally, we have the river of God, presented to us in the last chapter of Revelation. "Then he showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb." "There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High." This is the last place in which we find river. Nothing can ever touch its source again, and nothing can ever interrupt its channel. "The throne of God" speaks of eternal stability. The presence of the Lamb marks that throne as resting directly on the ground of redemption already accomplished.
- Source — The river "comes from above," unlike the world's seas that batter each other with "no rest, no calmness of peace."
- Supply — The psalm's word is nahar, not the nachal of Psalm 36:8, and this river "will never run dry."
- Spread — The fulfilment is literal as well as spiritual: at Jerusalem the river divides toward the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean.
- Sovereign — The title "Most High" belongs to the moment when God alone is the refuge and the nations rage.
- Stability — The river's last appearance is at the throne of God and of the Lamb, where nothing can touch its source or interrupt its channel again.
God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved God shall help her at the dawn of the morning.
The psalm opens with the earth giving way and mountains falling into the sea, and then turns to a city that stays firm. Verse 5 gives the reason — not walls or armies, but God Himself inside her — and sets her rescue at daybreak.
The psalm sets two things side by side: things that shake and one place that does not. One writer draws out the contrast in the same breath as the promise of help.
The mountains around them may be moved, but the city they are heading for "shall not be moved." They also see that morning is about to dawn, and God's city will come into view. The nations may rage, and their kingdoms be removed, but nothing can hinder the fulfillment of God's purpose. God only has to speak, and every enemy will melt away.
The security is not in the walls. It is in the One living inside.
The Most High lives in Jerusalem and never leaves. So she can never lack the grace that feeds her, the life-giving streams of His blessed Spirit. God in the midst of her is full security. She will not be moved. God will help her at daybreak.
Wherever God's people suffer, someone asks where their God has gone. Commentators note that this verse answers that question.
He has His city on the earth. The Most High lives there. And the river gladdens the places where He dwells — the river that stands for blessing everywhere in these descriptions... God is there — the sure and best of answers to the taunting demand, "Where is your God?" She will not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns.
The promise is not made about a city in good condition. Writers read the psalm as looking ahead to a time when nations pour in against Jerusalem and Antichrist defiles her. Faith, they say, still holds to what this verse states.
Faith sees what Jerusalem truly is, whatever her state at the moment. So faith stays fully confident that God is present in her midst. At the actual moment, when the nations assemble against her like a flood, she will be defiled by the oppressions of Antichrist... Still, she is the city of God, and faith lays hold of that fact, and expects God to show Himself in her midst for her deliverance.
Older versions read "and that right early," which sounds like speed. Commentators say a closer translation points to daybreak, not speed.
"Right early" means "when the morning appears," or "at the dawn of the morning" — that is the reading given in the note beside the text in older Bibles. Faith will not expect in vain. The cloudless morning will dawn when the King rides out in majesty... No true morning will rise upon earth's night until that morning appears.
That places the help at the end of the darkest stretch, not before it.
What a relief for the constantly besieged city of David! The Great Tribulation will be the darkest time of the night for Israel and the world. But the dawn will come quickly. "Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning" (Psalm 30:5). "The sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings" (Malachi 4:2). His coming to Israel in power and glory will be the answer to the sorrows they have long endured.
Commentators do not leave the verse in the future only. They hear the same words on Jesus' lips about His gathered people.
"God is in the midst of her" (v. 5). This is the same God who says, "For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them" (Matthew 18:20). So the Lord Jesus will have the same place of central importance in Israel as He does now in the church of God. No wonder "she shall not be moved," as she has been in many centuries past.
And the scale of the promise does not shrink when it reaches one life.
What God can do for a whole nation in such extreme times, He can do for one person in his small troubles. The God who is enough for the whole universe can care for a sparrow, and the God of Psalm 46 is enough for you and for me.
- Presence — the city stands because God lives inside her. Take that away, and nothing else in the verse holds.
- Stability — mountains can move and kingdoms fall; the city where God lives cannot. Faith rests on His purpose, not on conditions.
- Answer — "God is there" is the reply to every taunting "Where is your God?"
- Dawn — the help comes "when morning dawns," at the end of the night, when the King appears in majesty.
- Reach — the God who is in the midst of a city is in the midst of two or three gathered in His name, and is enough for one person too.
The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved; he uttered his voice, the earth melted.
Psalm 46 speaks out of an hour when everything solid is shaking and God's people have nothing left to lean on but Him. Verse 6 packs that whole crisis into one line. The nations roar, and God answers with a word.
Commentators place this psalm in a time still to come. Israel goes through its darkest trouble, and God brings the nation out of it.
It has in view the sufferings and deliverance of the remnant of Israel in the great tribulation. It is divided into three sections, the close of each marked by the word Selah.
That setting rules out a popular view of the psalm. Many expect peace to arrive slowly, through deals between governments and a better society.
People say that this hope of peace will come true not only through the spread of the gospel. They also look to peace societies and other alliances, set up to spread peaceful principles and to press peaceful advice and policies on the governments of the earth. But is this what the Word of God says? Look at this Psalm. It relates to a time of tremendous trouble.
The verse is short, and it moves in stages.
Verse 6 is a very brief, but most graphic, description of God's great victory and man's utter defeat. The little verse is like a drama in four acts.
The rage is not random. It has a target.
"The nations raged." We see the nations worked up almost to frenzy. They are full of fury and threats and slaughter. The opening verses of Psalm 2 have told us why they are in this raging condition. Their real hostility is against God and His Christ. They want to snap the bonds that hold them and throw off His cords.
There is also something about the word "rage" itself. It describes behaviour that has stopped making sense.
When men "rage" they act against nature and common sense. Driven by Satan, the prince of this world, men act without reason. It was the same when the demons entered a herd of pigs. The animals went against every natural instinct and rushed to their own destruction.
The second phrase turns from the mood of the nations to their structures. Governments that looked permanent lose their footing.
"The kingdoms were moved." We now see the kingdoms of men in a state of flux and dissolution. Some kings are overthrown, as Daniel 7 shows, while "the beast" rises to his place of ruling power. All are in a condition of change and transition.
Against all that noise, God's method is plain. He gathers no army. He announces no plan.
"He uttered His voice." Quite a simple thing, this! None of the fuss, the scheming and the elaborate plans that mark men going out to war! The Lord Jesus appears in His glory, and "His Name is called the Word of God." Then, "From His mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations" (Rev. 19:11-15). He has only to speak, and His enemies are overthrown.
What He speaks, happens. And His speaking reaches His enemies and His people in opposite ways.
Long ago He spoke, and it was done... He has only to speak, and His enemies are thrown into confusion. He speaks, and His people are encouraged.
Commentators differ on what melts. One reading takes it of the world's whole order, dissolved so it can be reshaped.
"The earth melted." These graphic words describe the overthrow. They picture the whole earth melted down, ready for His mighty hand to reshape it for the millennial age He is about to bring in.
Another takes "earth" as the land, and the melting as hearts breaking in repentance.
"The earth melted," that is, the land melted. It refers especially to the remnant of Israel left in the land after two thirds have been cut off in death. Their hearts will be melted down in deep repentance, as Zechariah 12:10-14 tells us: "They will look on Me whom they pierced." What a reason for adding the word "Selah" — pause and consider!
The God who silences nations is not distant from ordinary people in trouble.
God was with Jacob, a man of faith despite many failures. He has also said to believers today, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." If He is with us, He is "our refuge," and the believer can say with confidence, "The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?" (Heb. 13:5, 6).
- Rage — the fury of the nations is aimed at God and His Christ, and it is reason abandoned, not reason applied.
- Ruin — kingdoms that looked solid come apart. No government stands untouched.
- Voice — God needs no army and no strategy; He speaks, and the opposition is over.
- Melting — the same voice melts down the old order so God can reshape it, and, some say, melts hard hearts into repentance.
- Refuge — peace comes by God's own act, not by human peace-making. And the God who acts says to each believer, "I will never leave you."
Jehovah of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our high fortress. Selah.
This verse names God twice, and the psalm shouts the same words again before it ends. One name gathers every army in heaven and earth; the other belongs to one wayward man.
These words are an answer, not a plea. One writer points to what happens in the verse just before:
Verse 6 gives in magnificent abruptness the great result. All is decided. Then they say, "The LORD of hosts is with us." The God of the whole people is the refuge of this feeble remnant.
This title first appears at a low point in Israel's story. It covers everything in heaven and earth that God commands:
We do not meet with this name until 1 Samuel 1:3. It came in with prophetic testimony, when faith laid hold of Jehovah's glory at a time when Israel had corrupted themselves and were weak and low. Scripture shows that there is a mighty heavenly host, with rulers and powers in the unseen world. God is the God of them all, as well as God of all the elements of nature, which He has often used to punish His enemies. "The stars in their courses fought against Sisera" (Judges 5:20)... Psalm 24:10 shows the Lord Jesus to be "Jehovah of hosts: he is the king of glory."
The second name brings that same God down to one man:
Twice in the psalm we read, "The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress." Countless hosts of angels acknowledge His supremacy and serve His will, sustained by His power. Yet, what unspeakable grace! He is also "the God of Jacob." He bends down to the individual, even to the most wayward and unreliable, to the fearful and the needy, to you and me. His strength is against every foe that would hurt His people; His grace is their support in trial and drives away their fears. He has said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." He said that to Jacob. Hebrews quotes those words and applies them to us, so that we can confidently say, "The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?" (Hebrews 13:5-6).
The psalm makes the same claim three times over, and it marks off two ways of handling danger. The writer below quotes an older translation, which reads "refuge" in this verse where the ESV has "fortress":
The Psalm opens by saying that "God is our refuge." In the middle it says again that "the God of Jacob is our refuge." It closes by repeating, a third time, that God "is our refuge." So this is the great truth the Psalm presses home. When men of the world look for refuge from dangers and difficulties, they rely completely on natural and human plans. Believers do not despise the ordinary means God provides, but they have in God a resource that never fails.
One story shows what "with us" means in practice. The horses and chariots stood there long before the servant could see them:
The first clause reminds us of Elisha's words to his terrified servant in Dothan. The Syrians had surrounded the city to capture him: "Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them." And Elisha prayed and said, "O LORD, please open his eyes that he may see." So the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha (2 Kings 6:16-17). God's guarding care is as true for us today as it was for the prophet then. He is always with His own and around them, so that the enemy may do them no harm.
This comfort belongs to a particular stretch of time — the hours before daylight:
In the deepening shadows of the night, until the morning dawns, we can say with the Psalmist that the LORD of hosts is with us and the God of Jacob is our fortress. When the day dawns we shall be with Christ in the glory of that day; in the meantime He is with us as we pass through the sorrows of the night.
- Power. "LORD of hosts" claims the angel armies, the unseen powers, and the forces of nature. Faith first reached for this name when God's people were at their weakest.
- Grace. "God of Jacob" bends that same power down to one wayward, fearful man. Hebrews quotes Jacob's promise back to believers: "I will never leave you nor forsake you."
- Presence. Power and grace meet in the words "with us." At Dothan, Elisha's servant finally saw the horses and chariots that had been there all along.
- Refuge. Because He is with His people, He is their shelter. The psalm says it three times, against a world that trusts human plans alone.
- Result. The shout comes once the outcome is already decided, and it carries His people through the night until morning.
Come, behold the works of Jehovah, what desolations he hath made in the earth
The last part of the psalm calls the reader to stop and look at what God has done. Commentators hear the voice of God's people here, after His hand has fallen on the nations. Why does faith stop to look at ruin, and how can such wreckage end in peace?
The verse is a call to inspect finished work. One writer places it after the judgments have finished:
Now that His judgments are complete, we are invited to look at the results.
Another notes that this is not a request for blind trust but for evidence:
He has intervened for them, and they appeal to the manifest proofs of it. (v. 8.)
Armies and accidents did not cause this ruin. The Lord Himself did. One translation reads: Jehovah "who has set desolations in the earth" (William Kelly). The same God who shelters His people acts against those who oppose Him:
If the LORD is with His people, He is against the wicked. When He judges the nations in righteousness, He will bring them to desolation.
Writers place this verse at one moment in history. It comes after a time of unequalled trouble for Israel, just as Christ's reign begins. One writer says the song belongs first to another people:
This psalm cannot be applied literally to ourselves. Like many other psalms, it gives us precious lessons of spiritual instruction. But it pictures a people on the earth who know that Jehovah has shaken the earth, made it desolate, and then brought a time of peace and blessing into it. These faithful ones are on the earth. They know that judgments brought in this peace and blessing, and they are sure that Jehovah of hosts is present with them. The people here are the faithful remnant of the Jews, brought through the time of Jacob's trouble and celebrating their glorious deliverance.
Read this way, the shocking scenes described belong to the return of Christ:
Verse 8 gives us the result of that intervention from man's standpoint. The coming of Christ at the end of the great tribulation will be the signal for the most awful happenings. The most terrible earthquakes will take place. Cities will fall to the ground.
The desolations are not the last word — they clear the ground. Faith reads God's purpose through the wreckage:
The godly keep the purpose of God before their souls. So they see that God is working through the desolations of the earth to fulfil His counsel, and that in due time He will make wars cease. If God makes desolation, He also makes peace.
The change reaches down to what people want. After the final crisis, appetite for weapons dies:
War has not ended yet, as the sorrowful events of our own day bear witness. But the last great crisis will come and go, with all its unequalled horrors and bloodshed. After it, men will delight in weapons of destruction no more.
The works are God's. So the verse cuts against every human plan to build world peace by agreement. One writer puts it plainly:
The slow, gradual spread of peaceful principles does not put an end to the strife and wars that have laid the earth waste for so many ages. God's solemn intervention in judgment at the coming of the Lord does. That is what brings in the time of universal peace.
Another gives the reason such plans fail: there can be no peace unless it rests on righteousness (A. J. Pollock).
The psalm's scale is worldwide, yet writers turn it toward the single believer:
What can happen to a whole people in such unequalled circumstances can happen to one person in his small circumstances. The God who is enough for the whole universe can care for a sparrow, and the God of Psalm 46 is enough for you and for me.
- Come — the verse invites us to inspect finished work. God's judgments are complete, so faith looks at the results.
- Behold — the sight is ruin. That ruin is God's own righteous judgment on the nations, not a disaster He failed to stop.
- Desolations — writers place them at Christ's coming, after the time of unequalled trouble. Cities fall and the earth shakes.
- Peace — the same hand that makes desolation makes peace. God ends war by destroying its weapons, not by talking nations into agreement.
- Enough — the God who does all this on a world scale is the refuge of His people, and He is enough for one person's small troubles.
He hath made wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariots in the fire.
Psalm 46 has just described a world in chaos: roaring waters, raging nations, shaking kingdoms. Then the fighting stops everywhere, and this verse tells us who ended it and how.
Every act in the verse belongs to God: the stopping, the breaking, the burning. One writer draws a firm line between that and any human effort:
The end of wars does not come by the slow, gradual spread of peaceful principles. It comes when God steps in with judgment at the coming of the Lord. That is what ends the strife and wars which have laid the earth waste for so many ages, and brings in the period of universal peace. And what is the moral the Holy Spirit draws from all this? Is it, "Push yourselves — use all your energy — work with all your might to fill society with principles that will bring in the golden age of universal harmony and peace"? No, it is this: "Be still, and know that I am God." God works these wonders by His power, not by human energy; for His glory, not to lift up proud, boasting man.
Peace does not arrive by another road. It comes through God's judgment:
If peace is to come, it must come through judgment, and the Lord Jesus alone will have power to put an end to wars (v. 9). Today many people organize to demand that governments refuse war, but their methods are completely futile. It is like ordering the waves of the sea to cease their tumult! Only One could do this, as the Lord Jesus did in Mark 4:38-39. That is a picture of Him one day speaking peace to a world of tumult. All the tools of war, the bow, the spear, the chariot, He will render useless, whether by cutting or by fire.
Plans for world peace keep failing, and one writer names the flaw in them:
The righteous judgment of God will lead to universal peace among men. As the prophet says, "The effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever" (Isa. 32:17). Men talk of a new order, by which they hope to end war and bring about a universal peace. But the peace of which men dream ignores both the holiness of God and the wickedness of men. It is a peace without righteousness. All the efforts of men will be in vain. It is the LORD who "makes wars cease." His peace will be universal, for wars will cease "to the end of the earth."
If God alone can stop war, why has He not? One writer traces the delay to the world's treatment of Christ:
The world rejected the only One who could make wars cease (Ps. 46:9). That rejection drove the possibility of peace from the earth. Peace waits for the appointed time when He steps in with power. Then He will "scatter the peoples who delight in war" (Ps. 68:30), and bring in a reign of peace.
The change will go deeper than broken weapons. Men themselves will stop wanting them:
War is not yet at an end, as the sorrowful events of the present time bear witness. But the last great crisis will come and go, with all its unmatched horrors and bloodshed. After that, men will delight in instruments of destruction no more. Under the good reign of the great King "they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore" (Isa. 2:4). Happy time for this poor troubled scene!
One writer warns that this scene is not a picture of our own situation:
It is impossible to apply this psalm literally to ourselves. No doubt, like many other psalms, it gives us precious lessons of spiritual instruction. But it has in view a people on the earth who know that the LORD has shaken the earth, worked desolations in it, and brought a time of peace and blessing into it. He has made wars cease to the end of the earth, broken the bow and spear, and burned the chariot in the fire. The faithful here are on the earth. They know that judgments brought about this time of peace and blessing, and they are conscious that the LORD of hosts is present with them.
- He — every verb in the verse has one subject. Ending war is God's act, not man's achievement.
- Judgment — desolation comes before disarming. Peace is the fruit of righteousness, and any peace that ignores God's holiness and man's wickedness is a dream.
- Rejected — the world turned away the one Person who could make wars cease. So peace waits until He comes in power.
- Total — bow broken, spear cut, chariot burned: not weapons stored away, but a world that will not want them again.
- Still — the response the psalm asks for is not campaigning but confidence: be still, and know that He is God.
Be still, and know that I am God I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.
The psalm has been describing roaring waters, shaking mountains and raging nations. Then God Himself speaks, and His command is not to fight but to stop, because He, not His people, will be exalted in all the earth.
The command carries weight because of who speaks it. One writer traces the titles this psalm uses for Him:
Who speaks like this? The Lord of Hosts is the answer. His title suggests power; and the God of Jacob reminds everyone that He can act in grace toward someone who does not deserve it. He has only to speak, and His enemies fall into confusion. He speaks, and His people are encouraged. This psalm shows God under different characters. He is God. He is the Lord. He is Most High. As God He is the strong One. As the Lord He is the self-existing One. As Most High He will be acknowledged when the whole earth comes under His rule.
The verse states the point of everything the psalm has described.
Now God speaks. "Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!" (v. 10). Here we have the object and result of all the discipline through which Israel and the world have passed. People know God by the works He has done, and no one can dispute His rule over all. Then these words will come true: "Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven" (Matt. 6:10).
Commentators tie the psalm to a future crisis for Israel and its outcome:
Psalm 46 describes the hour of Israel's trouble — the waters roaring, the mountains shaking, the nations raging, and the kingdoms in turmoil. Still they can say: "The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress."… Here the God of Jacob — a name tied to the nation — is with "us", that is, Israel. He brings the wars and turmoil of the nations to an end by devastating judgments, and He establishes peace on the earth.
Stillness sounds easy. It is not.
Only faith can enter into these truths. Our human nature can lean on human strength; but it can neither trust in God, nor "be still" and wait for God to act.
Our restlessness in trouble shows something about us:
How healthy the call — "Be still, and know that I am God." We are very prone to agitate and busy ourselves in times of trouble; but it achieves nothing. It only betrays our lack of faith and entangles and distracts us still more.
One writer finds the same test in the way the Lord dealt with Martha and Mary, when their brother Lazarus fell sick and Jesus stayed away two days before coming to them:
The Lord was indeed "a present help," though His help did not come at once. He waited until death closed all hope in human effort, and there was nothing left for the two sisters but to "be still" and learn that God is God… Martha said, "I know that he will rise again… on the last day." The Lord replied, "I am the resurrection."… Her faith believed the great things the Lord will do in a day to come, but her faith was not strong enough to "be still" and believe in the Lord as the great "I am" — the present help in trouble.
The second half of the verse explains the first. Since God has said He will be exalted, our restless effort often has a rival aim buried in it:
But where there is no duty to perform, our place is to "be still," and patiently wait for God to act in His own time and way, for His own glory and exaltation… How often the restless activity of our human nature springs from the desire to exalt self. Man is always active in seeking his own glory and exaltation. The believer is called to "be still" so that God may be exalted.
Stillness does not mean doing nothing at all. It means not taking on a job that was never given to us.
In view of all this the way of the saint is very simple. It is to stop making fruitless efforts to do what will only be done when the Lord Jesus appears in His glory. Our business is not to put the world right, but to be witnesses to our absent Lord. When He comes He will soon put the world right; and meanwhile the word to us is, "Be still, and know that I am God."
- Speaker — The command comes from the Lord of Hosts: God the strong One, the self-existing One, the Most High. The whole earth will one day acknowledge His rule.
- Stillness — Human nature can lean on human help. It can never trust God or wait quietly for Him. Only faith can.
- Struggle — Rushing about in trouble achieves nothing. It only exposes weak faith and tangles us further.
- Self — Restless activity often hides a wish to exalt self. God calls us to be still so that He may be exalted instead.
- Scope — God's aim reaches past our situation to the whole earth. Our task is not to fix the world but to witness to the Lord who will.
Jehovah of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our high fortress. Selah.
This verse repeats verse 7 word for word, but now it comes after God Himself has spoken. Why say it twice? And why name God twice over — once as the Lord of armies, once as the God of Jacob, a schemer rather than a hero of faith?
The psalm says one thing three times over. That repetition is the key to reading it.
The Psalm opens by saying that "God is our refuge." In the middle of the Psalm it says again, "The God of Jacob is our refuge." It closes by repeating a third time that God "is our refuge." So this is the great truth the Psalm presses on us. When people of the world look for a refuge from danger and difficulty, they rely completely on natural and human plans. Believers do not despise the means God provides, but in God they have a resource that never fails.
The ESV says "fortress" here. Older translations say "refuge," and that is the word these writers use.
The word "hosts" in this title covers more than one kind of army.
The same word translated "hosts" — as in Jehovah Tzebaoth, the Lord of hosts, in Psalm 46:7 and 11 — is also used of the hosts of the heavens in Psalm 33:6... It is used of armies, of angels, and of created things such as sun, moon and stars.
The two halves of the verse are not saying the same thing twice. One speaks of unlimited power; the other of God stooping to an individual.
Countless hosts of angels acknowledge that He is supreme and serve His will, kept going by His power. Yet — what indescribable grace! — He is also "the God of Jacob." He bends down to the individual, even to the most wayward and unreliable, to the fearful and the needy, to you and me. His strength is set against every enemy that would hurt His people. His grace supports them in trial and drives their fears away. He has said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." He said that to Jacob, and the words are quoted and applied to us (Hebrews 13:5-6).
The psalm could have named a greater man.
But why does the psalmist twice say "God of Jacob"? In Psalm 47:9 we read "God of Abraham." There is surely instruction in the difference. Abraham was the outstanding man of faith and obedience. He left himself and his affairs in God's hands in a way that still wins our admiration today, though he was not perfect. Jacob was just as truly a saint of God as Abraham was. But he was a poor, wayward schemer, and God had to take him through much painful discipline before his heart could find its all in Himself... Do we hesitate to put ourselves beside Abraham, because we see our own history reflected in Jacob instead? Well, so be it. He is the God of Jacob, and He will never give up even the weakest and most unbelieving of His people, though He may discipline them severely for their good and their blessing in the end.
One writer hears an echo of a scene from Israel's history.
The first clause reminds us of Elisha's words to his terrified servant in the city of Dothan, when the Syrian army surrounded it to take him prisoner: "Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them." Then Elisha prayed and said, "O LORD, please open his eyes that he may see." So the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha (2 Kings 6:16-17). This guardian care of God is as true for us today as for the prophet then: He is always with and about His own, that the enemy may do them no harm.
The verse is an answer. One writer names the voices in it.
God Himself speaks in verse 10. He calls on everyone to know, from the works He has done, that He is God. He declares that He will be exalted everywhere among the nations of the earth. In verse 11 the remnant [the faithful part of Israel] lift up their voices again in their chorus of praise.
Verse 10 and verse 11 belong together. The command comes first, the discovery follows.
When we are given grace to "be still," we find in our own experience that God "is with us" and is "our refuge." ... The Lord is "with us" in this world of conflict so that we may be with Him in the coming glory. That is the desire of His heart, in His own words: "Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am" (John 17:24).
- Refuge, three times. The psalm says it, repeats it, and ends with it. The world shelters in human plans. Believers have God Himself.
- Refuge in power. "Hosts" covers armies, angels, sun, moon and stars; the One who is with us commands them all.
- Refuge in grace. The psalm names Him the God of Jacob — the wayward schemer, not the model of faith. So the weakest believer can claim Him too.
- Refuge unseen. Elisha's servant saw nothing until God opened his eyes. The chariots of fire were there before he could see them.
- Refuge received by stillness. Be still first. Then you learn by experience that He is with you — and being with Him in glory is where it ends.