Psalm 76

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. A Psalm of Asaph. A Song. 

1 In Judah God is known; his name is great in Israel.

2 His abode has been established in Salem, his dwelling place in Zion.

3 There he broke the flashing arrows, the shield, the sword, and the weapons of war. Selah

Psalm 75 begins with the declaration that God’s name was “near”, and Psalm 76 begins in a similar way proclaiming that his name is great and his home is established in the midst of Judah. This psalm is likely dated to the time following the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians in 701 BC. In that encounter, it seemed all but certain that Jerusalem would fall to the vastly superior and ruthless Assyrian army, but miraculously, 185,000 Assyrian soldiers died in the night. The army limped away the next morning and its general was promptly assassinated. This is a victory song, making it clear that God is with his people and that His power and will is the sole reason for their victory. He established his home in the middle of his people and he defended that house against overwhelming odds, breaking flaming arrows that were launched, the shield that protected the invaders, the sword that would have been used in hand to hand combat and the siege engines that were being used to compromise the city gates. Just like that the threat was annihilated. The placement of this victory psalm in Book 3 is interesting because these psalms were likely collected for use in the exile -- Psalms 74 and 79 specifically referencing the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians in 586 BC. In this case the psalm is completely ironic because God did not save his city. He abandoned his home. He didn’t break any arrows, shields, swords, or weapons of war. He was notably absent from the fight. So why sing this victory song? Wouldn’t it simply make you more embittered? Doesn't it just deepen the wound?

4 Glorious are you, more majestic than the mountains full of prey.

5 The stouthearted were stripped of their spoil; they sank into sleep; all the men of war were unable to use their hands.

6 At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both rider and horse lay stunned.

The glory of God was on display in this stunning military victory. The stouthearted fell asleep and were disarmed. Men of war were unable to use their hands. Both horse and rider were stunned. At God’s command, war ceased (“He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth, he shatters the bow and the spear and burns the shields with fire” - Psalm 46:9). Psalm 46 may also have been composed for the same occasion. The psalmist compares God’s glory to that of a mountain filled with prey, a hunter’s dream, food for all. This is the dream of anyone who is at war -- peace and prosperity for all. While in exile in Babylon, the psalmist recalls this glorious moment that he never saw, probably something that occurred 100 years before he was born, and yet it invigorates his faith in this moment. He believes that the same thing could happen again, that he will wake up one morning in Babylon and everything bad will be undone and he can go home. This is a great example of the power of remembering, of recalling an event and a truth that forcefully becomes front and center in your life, changing the way you see things and the way that you live. The psalmist can envision, as I can, exactly what happened that morning in 701 BC, and he believes that God will “do it again”. (Indeed, Babylon will eventually fall in one night, about as dramatic a military loss as the deliverance of Jerusalem from the Assyrians was a military victory). What impossible thing are you believing today? God has done the impossible over and over again in history, not just in the Bible, but in the church. Let the past animate your present. If God has done it once, surely he will do it again. He certainly has the ability to. 

7 But you, you are to be feared! Who can stand before you when once your anger is roused?

8 From the heavens you uttered judgment; the earth feared and was still,

9 when God arose to establish judgment, to save all the humble of the earth. Selah

The psalmist looks back fondly on that day when God treated the Assyrians as they deserved. They had terrorized the neighborhood for long enough, so God humbled them real good, hitting them at their greatest strength -- the power of their military might, their reputation of fearlessness. They learned God is the one to be feared. He’s the one who utters judgment and the earth fears and stands still. When God gets up to judge, it’s over for the powerful. It is the day that the humble are saved. The psalmist must be anticipating the same type of judgment in his day, believing that once more God will turn things upside down, exalting the humble and bringing down the proud. I must share this same hope today or else give up. The powerful ones in our culture today have all the megaphones and are firmly in charge of all the institutions. As they remake reality in their image, they are going to run into problems. The world just doesn’t work the way they imagine it. God will utter judgment and the earth will be stilled. The humble will be saved; they will be made whole in spite of the cultural brokenness. The language here again is similar to that of Psalm 46 -- “Be still and know that I am God”. Here the earth is still, awaiting the judgment of God. I don’t know if God’s judgment will come in some cataclysmic world-wide event (like maybe a pandemic?), but it will cause things to shift. We may be in the midst of that even now without realizing it. The plague that killed 185,000 Assyrians in a night caused Assyrian culture to come to a stop and they were eventually assimilated into other cultures. How will the pandemic reshape the world? History will tell, but it literally stilled the world for a season. God’s judgment comes to all of us in various ways and it stops us in our tracks, stilling us and redirecting us. His ways are higher than ours and we can’t presume to know his mind. Remain humble before him and in due time you will be exalted and the proud will be brought down. 

10 Surely the wrath of man shall praise you; the remnant [extremity] of wrath you will put on like a belt.

This is one of the most difficult verses of this psalm to translate and to interpret. The first half is straightforward in Hebrew -- “surely the wrath of man [adam] shall praise you”. This refers to the fact that God is sovereign and his sovereignty is so great that even in granting mankind the ability to act as free moral agents, God still ends up getting the glory, even in human rebellion. This is fascinating because it feels counter-intuitive. In his sovereignty, God allowed the Assyrians to run roughshod over other nations for  several hundred years, using them as an instrument of his justice. Then when it was time for the Assyrians to be judged, God did so in such a dramatic way that it resulted in praise from those who had formerly been brutalized by them. Other examples of how God used the free will of man to cause pain in the short-term for long-term gain are the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart and the hardening of some of the Jewish hearts that led to the crucifixion of Jesus and the early persecution of the church. This “wrath of man” was used by God to bring salvation (Passover, crucifixion/resurrection, conversion of Saul and the growth of the church). God’s sovereignty is so great that even his enemies find themselves working for him. The second part is tricky because of the meaning of “remnant”. “Remnant” is by far the most common translation, but it could also be translated, “survivors” (given that the survivors of an event are the remainder of those involved in a conflict). However, I think the ESV literal translation here is more likely given the context. This psalm is about the wrath of God coming down on the Assyrians in 701 BC, and about the wrath of God in general being something that the faithful can trust in as an expression of God’s justice (even when it seems to work in convoluted ways). The text is saying that in addition to the wrath of man, which God uses to accomplish his just purposes, God himself puts on wrath like a belt. He wears additional wrath that also results in praise (look at the verse that follows, calling forth worship because of God’s wrath). God’s wrath is simply the natural consequences of disobedience. God has set up the world to work in such a way that humans are blessed. When we operate outside of his ways, we bring a curse upon ourselves. We call this wrath, but it is really the results of working out our free will. Romans 1 is the best source for this. Because men rejected the knowledge of God and actively worked to suppress the truth of God, God allowed them to continue down that path until they brought destruction on themselves. They got what they wanted -- life without God. A life without God is one in which a person experiences negative consequences, and then that same person often expresses anger to the God that he doesn’t acknowledge. Ultimately, God is praised because He is proven right and objective observers acknowledge this. 

11 Make your vows to the LORD your God and perform them; let all around him bring gifts to him who is to be feared,

12 who cuts off the spirit of princes, who is to be feared by the kings of the earth.

A fitting response to the One who judges the nations is to worship Him with more than empty words. Make promises to him for sure, but complete them (Heb. shalom them). Demonstrate your devotion by giving of what you have for his use (not that he needs anything as Psalm 50 reminds us; the giving is for us, not for him). In fact, let him be surrounded by gift-givers who fear him. He cuts off the spirit (breath) of princes and is to be feared by the kings of the earth. This was literally true in the case of Assyria as God’s hand was clearly seen in their downfall. This should serve as a warning to the rest of the world’s leaders. Don’t mess with YHWH. I don’t know if many princes fear YHWH these days. It doesn’t feel like many governments recognized the power of God to bless or bring wrath. Religion has been relegated to a personal matter these days and is encouraged only so far as it produces what the state considers good citizens. I don’t know the giving habits of American Christians, but I doubt that they are surrounding YHWH with gifts, they have too many other expenses to take care of first. How about you? Does your giving reflect a reverence for God, does your practice of religion reflect a trust in YHWH as sovereign over the nations? Your nation? Or do you trust in princes, in political leaders to make this world a better place? If so, you are putting your trust in the wrong people. Place your faith in God’s justice, his wrath will bring him praise.