He shall come down like rain on the mown grass, as showers that water the earth.
Psalm 72 leaves David's wars behind and describes a reign of peace. Verse 6 pictures the king coming like rain on a freshly cut field — so why rain, and why a field already mown?
Commentators read this psalm as reaching past Solomon to a coming reign of Christ on earth. No son of David has yet matched the scale of what it promises.
Psalm 72 does not show us David in suffering and conflict. It shows us the full reign of peace and royal blessing. It is the Son of David we have here, the source and securer of millennial blessings... This is the king to whom God gives His judgments. He is at the same time the king's Son, the Son of David, reigning in righteousness and peace.
Another writer measures the psalm's words against history:
Here is a remarkable prophecy of David's Son. Solomon fulfilled only a very small part of it. It is still to be fulfilled in the true Seed, the Second Man... In no sense does most of this language fit the Church. But take it as a literal fulfilment of the promises God gave to Abraham and David about the earth. Take it as a description of a kingdom brought in by judgment and bringing universal blessing. Then the picture is divinely perfect.
Older translations read this line as a promise — "He shall come down like rain on the mown grass" — while the ESV reads it as a prayer. The quotes below follow the older wording. Either way, the cut field is not decoration. It fixes the order of events.
The scythe of judgment will have mown the earth. The great ones and their glory will be nothing but withered grass, as Scripture said long ago. Judgment will have been carried out first. Then He will come down on the earth like gentle showers on thirsty ground, and so the righteous will flourish in His days.
Another writer tells us to look hard at the figure itself:
He will bring down heaven to earth for "He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass" (Ps. 72:6). But note well the figure. It is upon the mown grass that He comes down. The sickle will have done its work first.
A mown field is not a dead field. What is cut down comes up again.
Grass mowed down by judgment gives way to new grass: the remnant, a willing people. He descends like a refreshing rain on His humbled people. Then the shining of the sun of righteousness makes it sprout up with abundance of blessings.
One writer compares that reign with Solomon's — not only in length and splendour, but in how it begins:
His reign of righteousness will surpass Solomon's reign, so sadly cut short, in splendor and in length... And it will begin as Solomon's reign never began: "He shall come down like rain on the mown grass" (v. 6). He brings heavenly blessing to the very place where judgment has done its work and left nothing to harvest. Under His gentle influence a new harvest will spring up.
The second half of the verse widens the picture to showers that water the earth. The kind of water matters: rain feeds a field, it does not flatten it.
His rule of peace will be like the refreshing rain that waters the earth, to make it bring forth welcome fruit (v. 6). How different from a pounding flood that sweeps away everything in its path, as the rule of some tyrants has been! In Christ it is wonderful to see absolute power combined with the gentleness of tender compassion.
If judgment must clear the ground first, that is not because God enjoys the clearing. One writer draws the distinction from the way Scripture itself speaks about the two.
God's purpose is the blessing of men... but judgment must go before the blessing, because of what men are. It is the persistent rebellion of men against God that makes judgment a necessity. Yet judgment is God's strange work; He does not delight in it, He delights in mercy. This comes out in the very language that Scripture uses. When it is a question of judgment, we read that the Lord "will carry out his sentence upon the earth fully and without delay" (Romans 9:28). But when it is a question of mercy, He is "patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish" (2 Peter 3:9).
The second half of the verse widens the scene from one meadow to the ground everywhere. Writers connect that spread of moisture with the spread of the King's authority — showers that water the earth picture "a general diffusion of prosperity... on earth" as "the effect of His power, which exercises universal sway."
- Mown — the field is cut before the rain falls. Judgment does its work first, and the great ones and their glory are left as withered grass.
- Rain — what follows the cutting is not more force. It is gentle showers: absolute power joined to tender compassion.
- Regrowth — mown grass grows back. The humbled remnant becomes a willing people, sprouting under the shining of the Sun of righteousness.
- Reach — the showers water the whole earth. This is a kingdom brought in by judgment and bringing universal blessing.
- Heart — God takes no delight in the scythe. He delights in mercy, and blessing is where the whole psalm is heading.
In his days shall the righteous flourish, and abundance of peace till the moon be no more.
Psalm 72:7 sets two marks on a coming reign: righteous people who flourish, and peace in full supply. The question is whose "days" these are, and why the earth has never yet seen such a state.
The psalm is not a prayer for a good ruler in general. One writer sets it against the psalms of struggle that come before it.
Psalm 72 introduces us, not to David in suffering and conflict, but to the full reign of peace and royal blessing. It is the Son of David we have here, the source and securer of millennial blessings. I do not think this psalm needs much explanation, because it is so clear. It is the king to whom God gives His judgments. He is at the same time the king's Son, the Son of David, reigning in righteousness and peace, like Solomon or Melchizedek.
The verse ties the flourishing of the righteous to abundant peace. One writer shows what that peace waits on. (The writers quoted here use older translations of the psalm.)
Millennial peace depends for its realization on authority and power being placed in Christ, and so on righteousness being established in the earth. Psalm 72 begins with "Give the King Your judgments, O God … He shall judge Your people with righteousness," and it is "in His days" that there shall be "abundance of peace so long as the moon endures" (ver. 7).
The picture here comes from farming. The same writer traces the order: first the mowing, then the showers.
The scythe of judgment will have mown the earth, and the great ones and their glory will be only withered grass, as the Scripture had said long ago. After He has executed judgment, He will come down upon the earth like gentle showers on thirsty ground. So the righteous shall flourish in His days.
The psalm names those who flourish earlier as the poor and needy. One writer identifies them:
the "poor and needy" in view here are without a doubt the godly people whom the antichristian powers of the last days will persecute.
The world knows peace only in small measures. The word "abundance" marks the difference.
Peace is much desired among the nations, yet how often it escapes them. If they enjoy it at all, it is in very scanty measure. There has never yet been abundance of peace; but there will be in the glad day of the kingdom. When righteousness reigns, when the needy are delivered, when blessing fills the earth, then an abundant peace will be the happy result.
That peace will also have no borders, and something of it can be had already:
Psalm 72:7 looks on to the day, in the world to come, when the peace secured will be universal. It will not be limited to any particular country or region… What a triumph for the Man of Golgotha! He secured peace for all who trust in Him now and in the future. Peace of soul and conscience now come before the reign of peace to come (Rom. 5:1; Eph. 2:14, 17; Col. 1:20).
One writer met a claim that Christian principle would "mainly" free the world from war. He answered it from this verse.
This little word "mainly" sets aside the coming of the One who alone is called in Scripture the "Prince of Peace." For if peace is established "mainly" without Him, by the efforts of Christians, His presence is only a secondary matter, not of prime importance or necessity. If "peace" is the question, Scripture says and insists that He is the necessity. (Ps. 72:7.)
The closing phrase measures the reign by the moon. One writer takes the moon as a picture of Israel:
"In His days the righteous shall flourish" (v. 7), though they had long been oppressed while the wicked prospered… But "until the moon is no more" no doubt reminds us that the moon pictures the nation Israel. Israel reflects the light of the Sun, the Lord Jesus.
Another reads the same measure as a way of saying the rule never stops:
Next, the duration of the reign is stated to be "to the ages of ages," that is, throughout all time to come, as long as sun, moon, and earth endure (Ps. 72:5, 7, 17). The reign extends to eternity. It shall never cease.
- King first. The days belong to the Son of David, the King to whom God gives His judgments — not to any human era or program.
- Righteousness first. Peace is never built on its own. It comes when Christ holds authority and righteousness fills the earth.
- Rain first. Judgment mows the field. Then He comes down like showers, and the long-oppressed righteous flourish.
- Abundance, not scraps. The world has never known more than scanty peace; abundance of peace belongs to that kingdom, and it will be universal, not regional.
- Now, in part. Those who trust Him today already have peace of soul and conscience. It arrives ahead of the reign of peace — the same Person, the same peace, coming early.