Let us read this evening the ninety-fourth Psalm, and may the Spirit of God instruct us while we read it!
Psalms 94:1. O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.
God is the God of justice, and when iniquity and oppression prevail, it is natural that his people should call upon him to come forth out of his hiding-places. Sometimes, when oppression and iniquity and error prevail, it seems as if God had hidden himself away. Hence the prayer of the psalmist, «O Jehovah, the God of recompenses (or revenges, as the margin has it), show thyself.»
Psalms 94:2. Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud.
As one who is about to strike a heavy blow lifts himself up, to increase the force of the stroke, so the psalmist prays to the Lord, «Lift up thyself, thou Judge of the earth. The proud are lifted up; lift up thyself. They boast, they glory, Lord, show them how great a God thou art in the defense of righteousness; lift up thyself, thou Judge of the earth.»
Psalms 94:3. LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?
That question, «how long?» uttered twice over, sounds a little like howling; and sometimes God's saints get so dispirited that they cry unto God, and weep and wail before him until their wailing becomes almost like howling:
«Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?»
Psalms 94:4-5. How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves? They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.
Their words are heavier than stones, and when they hurl them at the Lord's people with cruel intent, they do great mischief: «They utter and speak hard things. All the workers of iniquity boast themselves.» It seems to be the mark of the righteous that they are humble and lowly, and the mark of the wicked that they are boastful and proud. They have nothing of which they ought to boast, yet they do boast very loudly. Pride is ingrained in our evil nature; and the more there is of sin in us, the more there is of boasting by us.
Psalms 94:6. They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.
Do you wonder that the psalmist prayed, «O God of vengeance, show thyself»? Can you see the fatherless robbed, and the widow and the stranger oppressed, without feeling your indignation burn? He who is never indignant has no virtue in him. He who cannot burn like coals of juniper against evil does not truly love righteousness. The psalmist was not a man of that sort, he was righteously angry with the wicked, who slew the widow and the stranger, and murdered the fatherless.
Psalms 94:7. Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.
They were practically atheists, for, if they had a god nominally, they regarded him as a god who did not observe sins, a blind deity, a god who took no note of evil. Do you not think that this is the prevailing religion of today? Are there not many who say, «Jehovah shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it»? God is not in all their thoughts, he is to them a nonentity, not the Omniscient Jehovah, and hardly even a person, but a kind of secondary power or a feeble force, an unknown something or other not of much account: «Jehovah shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.»
Psalms 94:8. Understand, ye brutish among the people:
When a man turns away from God, he casts off his manhood; he ceases to be a man, and becomes like a brute, a boar, for so this expression might be read, «Ye boars among the people.»
Psalms 94:8-9. And ye fools, when will ye be wise? He that planted the ear, shall he not hear?
Did the Lord make men's ears, and put them near the brain in the very best place for hearing, and shall he not himself hear? The argument is overwhelming. God gave us ears, and made us hear; is he deaf himself?
Psalms 94:9. He that formed the eye, shall he not see?
God makes all eyes; is he without eyes himself? The supposition is an absurdity. It needs only to be mentioned to be held up to ridiculous: «He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? He that formed the eye, shall he not see?»
«Shall he who, with transcendent skill,
Fashion'd the eye and form'd the ear
Who model'd nature to his will,
Shall he not see? Shall he not hear?»
Psalms 94:10. He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct?
Whole nations were driven out of Canaan to make room for Israel. Many other nations have been crushed, doubled up, utterly destroyed, on account of their sin. Everybody who reads history knows that this has been the case, so the psalmist argues, «He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? «He that executeth judgment upon heathen nations, can he not deal with sinful man, and with single individuals? He that broke the power of Persia, and Assyria, and Greece, and Rome, will he not punish guilty men when they dare to set themselves up as oppressors of his people?
Psalms 94:10. He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?
Our translators finish the question by putting «Shall not he know?» but those words are not in the original, and they are not at all necessary to the argument. It is as if the psalmist broke off his utterances abruptly, as much as to say, «It is of no use arguing with you fellows,» or else as if he said, «Finish my sentence yourselves; I put the truth so clearly before you that there is no escaping from it.» «He that teacheth man knowledge:» if God has taught men all that they know, does not he himself know all that is to be known? The psalmist does not say so much as that in words; but he leaves us to draw that as the only inference from what he says.
Psalms 94:11. The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man,
God knows not only men's words and acts, but their thoughts also. God knows thoughtful men, the best sort of men, when they are at their best, when they are thinking; and what does God think of the thoughts of man?
Psalms 94:11. That they are vanity.
Yet people talk about the thoughtful men of the age, and want us to bow down and worship their thoughts. This boasting about man's thoughts is only like the cracking of rotten sticks: «The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.»
Psalms 94:12. Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O LORD, and teachest him out of thy law;
Here is the truly blessed man; not the boaster, not the infidel, not the proud thinker, but the divinely-chastened man. He is sore through the chastening of the Lord, his bones are full of pain, his heart is heavy, and his home, perhaps, as a place of torture to him; but still it is true that he is a blessed man: «Blessed is the man whom thou chasteness, O Lord, and teachest him out of thy law.»
Psalms 94:13. That thou mayest give him rest; from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked.
Christ has gone to prepare heaven for his people; it is a prepared place for a prepared people. So is it with the ungodly and their eternal inheritance, it is a prepared place, «prepared for the devil and his angels,» and when men make themselves like demons, and so are ripe for hell, then is the pit ready to receive them.
Psalms 94:14. For the Lord will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.
If any of you are deeply troubled, I counsel you to get a hold of this promise. Perhaps it seems to you as if two seas of sorrow had met around you and that you were in a whirlpool of trouble; then I say again, lay hold of this text, and grip it firmly: «Jehovah will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.»
Psalms 94:15-16. But judgment shall return unto righteousness: and all the upright in heart shall follow it. Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will rise up for me against the workers of iniquity?
Well, David, you may ask the question; but we cannot tell you who among your fellow men will stand up for you. It sometimes happens that God's people are left without an earthly friend; their case is so hard, their cause involves so much question, so much shame, perhaps, that nobody will stand up for them. If this be your trying condition just now, listen to the psalmist's testimony:
Psalms 94:17. Unless the LORD had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence.
If it had not been for God, he would not only have had no hand to help him, but not even a voice to speak for him. He might not have suffered quite in silence, because he would have himself spoken; but what he would have said would only have made the matter worse. What would he have said if he had broken the silence?
Psalms 94:18. When I said, My foot slippeth;
«It is going, it is gone; my foot is now slipping,» what then?
Psalms 94:18. Thy mercy, O LORD, held me up.
God is grand at holding up his people in slippery places, and not only in slippery places, but when their feet actually do slip. When they think that they are gone, they are not really gone. «Underneath are the everlasting arms.» «Thy mercy, O Lord, held me up.»
Psalms 94:19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me
«I cannot collect my thoughts, they will not be gathered into orderly array, they rush to and fro, there is a multitude, a mob of them.» It is good to have thoughts, but sometimes you may have too many of them; and they may come helter-skelter, blasphemous thoughts, perhaps, despairing, proud, unbelieving, all sorts of thoughts: «In the multitude of my thoughts within me»
Psalms 94:19. Thy comforts delight my soul.
«Comforts which thou dost bring me, comforts which arise from thoughts of thee, the comforts of the Comforter, the comforts of the God of all comfort, thy comforts delight my soul.» You must often have noticed that troubles seldom come alone; if you get one trial, you will probably have a whole covey of them. It very rarely happens, I think, to any one of us to have a lone sorrow. In another place the psalmist says, «Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts; all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me.» It is so with some of us at this time; we have a multitude of troubled thoughts within us. But have you also noticed that God's mercies do not come alone? They come in flocks; the psalmist says, «Thy comforts» not merely one comfort, but a great host of them, «Thy comforts delight my soul, they not merely sustain me, and keep me alive, but they delight my soul. God never does anything by halves; when he gives us comfort, he does it thoroughly. The Lord's flowers bloom double; he gives us not only comfort, but delight: «Thy comforts delight my soul.» Now the psalmist turns to God in prayer, and says:
Psalms 94:20. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law?
Oh, how strong are the wicked! They think they can have everything all their own way, that they can make what laws they like, and crush out anything that they despise. Yes, there are many thrones of iniquity, but God has no fellowship with them; and if God has no fellowship with a throne, that throne will tumble down, God will not uphold it. The day will come when he will no longer tolerate its iniquity, and then one blow of his mighty right hand shall shiver it to atoms.
Psalms 94:21. They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.
Agreed about nothing else, they all agree against Christ and against the holy seed: «the soul of the righteous.» They would blot out the righteous from under heaven if they could.
Psalms 94:22. But the LORD is my defence; and my God is the rock of my refuge.
I commend these expressions to all believers, let them treasure them up. «My God.» Ah, you must personally appropriate God to yourself if he is to bless you! Another man's God is nothing to you unless you can also say, «My God.» When you have said, «My God,» you have uttered the grandest words that human lips can frame. If God be yours, all things are yours, earth and heaven, time and eternity. «My God is the rock of my refuge.» You are on the rock; you are in the rock; you are behind the rock; you must be safe now.
Psalms 94:23. And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity,
That is the punishment of sin. It seems strange that it is so, but sin is the punishment of sin. When a man has once sinned, it is part of his punishment that he is inclined to sin again, and so on ad infinitum. «He shall bring upon them their own iniquity.»
Psalms 94:23. And shall cut them off in their own wickedness;
It needs no fire nor worm to torment the ungodly, their own wickedness itself is fire, and worm, and pit without a bottom, and the hell that endeth not.
Psalms 94:23. Yea, the LORD our God shall cut them off.
«Surrounded by his saints, the Lord
Shall arm'd with holy vengeance come;
To each his final lot award
And seal the sinner's fearful doom.»
God save us from being of that company! May we all be numbered with his people for ever and ever! Amen.