Psalm 69:1–13
69 To the choirmaster: according to Lilies. Of David.
1. Jesus Suffers for the Sins of His People
1 Save me, O God!
For the waters have come up to my neck.
2 I sink in deep mire,
where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
and the flood sweeps over me.
3 I am weary with my crying out;
my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
with waiting for my God.
4 More in number than the hairs of my head
are those who hate me without cause;
mighty are those who would destroy me,
those who attack me with lies.
What I did not steal
must I now restore?
5 O God, you know my folly;
the wrongs I have done are not hidden from you.
Here in this Psalm as with others, our Lord’s extreme suffering is addressed. He was constantly enduring trials for the sake of the elect and constantly suffering for sin He did not commit.
God’s divine displeasure over sin is here seen as a tempest in with Christ is enduring. The sins of the world become like mire that the Messiah King is sinking in and being overtaken by. The storm of displeasure and the pounding tempest and the sinking into mire is a picture of God’s wrath being poured out on the Savior who is in the process of paying the debt for our sin.
All the waters of affliction are sweeping over our Lord’s head and are penetrating to His very vitals. He is dying for our sins.
1 Save me, O God!
For the waters have come up to my neck.
2 I sink in deep mire,
where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
and the flood sweeps over me.
In verse three, we see the effects of Jesus’ prayers. His throat is dry through loss of blood and His constant prayers to the Father.
Hebrews 5:7–10 (ESV)
7 In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 10 being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.
God heard and answered our Lord’s many prayers. Here, specifically we see even in His
being forsaken by the Father, Jesus’ complete confidence that God hears and answers prayer. As our Lord’s eyes grow dim and death is almost upon Him He closes His eyes in confidence that His Father is in complete control and will, in fact save Him from death. The resurrection is proof that God answered… 1 Save me, O God!
3 I am weary with my crying out;
my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
with waiting for my God.
Jesus was waiting and was completely confident to close His eyes in death waiting on God.
Genesis 50:24–26 (ESV)
24 And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” 25 Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.” 26 So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.
There is something that gives God great glory when His people go to the grave with confidence. Have you considered that someday you too will die? How will your death give God glory? I pray as our Church gets older that our children might see how it is that Christians can die well.
Jesus, here is that wonderful example of closing His eyes in death and waiting until God raises Him three days later.
Even though His Father has forsaken Him do to the sin He is carrying and dying for, Jesus still knows God is the only Being worthy of our trust even at death.
“Our God is the God from whom cometh salvation. God is the Lord by whom we escape death.”
-Martin Luther.
“I enjoy heaven already in my soul. My prayers are all converted into praises.”
-Augustus Toplady, author of the great hymn “Rock of Ages,” who died at age 38.
“I have pain—but I have peace, I have peace.”
-Richard Baxter, 17th Century Puritan Theologian.
John Knox uttered these piercing words and then died, “Live in Christ, die in Christ, and the flesh need not fear death.”
4 More in number than the hairs of my head
are those who hate me without cause;
mighty are those who would destroy me,
those who attack me with lies.
What I did not steal
must I now restore?
Jesus addresses this verse in John’s Gospel as He explains the Jews really hate God and also the Son of God. He claims these words as His own…
John 15:23–25 (ESV)
23 Whoever hates me hates my Father also. 24 If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. 25 But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’
One commentator from the 1700’s wrote this about verse 4…
Like a herd of evening wolves the enemies surround the Lamb of God! They thirst for His blood without cause or offense in this Sinless One.—George Horne
Saint Augustine comments…the first Adam stole all our righteousness, but the Last Adam restores what He did not steal.
Jesus, now becomes our representative Head and through His death as payment for sin imputes to us His righteousness. He restores what He did not steal. He gives us back true righteousness.
2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV)
21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The Martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer recognized Jesus here in this verse. It is the true man Jesus Christ who prays in this Psalm and who includes us in His prayer.
So, the only innocent person in the world suffered for all its guilt, making atonement for and restoring that which He did not steal.
In verse 5, Christ has so identified Himself with us the one who has not sinned is claiming that He is a sinner.
5 O God, you know my folly;
the wrongs I have done are not hidden from you.
The mire of our sin has so overtaken the King that He claims it as His own.
Again George Horne writes, Concerning the iniquities committed by us but laid on Him which Jesus claims to be His own.
2. Jesus Prays that His Shame Would Not Bring Shame to His Father or to Us (69:6-13)
6 Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me,
O Lord God of hosts;
let not those who seek you be brought to dishonor through me,
O God of Israel.
7 For it is for your sake that I have borne reproach,
that dishonor has covered my face.
8 I have become a stranger to my brothers,
an alien to my mother’s sons.
9 For zeal for your house has consumed me,
and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me.
10 When I wept and humbled my soul with fasting,
it became my reproach.
11 When I made sackcloth my clothing,
I became a byword to them.
12 I am the talk of those who sit in the gate,
and the drunkards make songs about me.
13 But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord.
At an acceptable time, O God,
in the abundance of your steadfast love answer me in your saving faithfulness.
Here Jesus prays that the scandal of the cross would not make His followers relinquish their trust in God because God the Father has forsaken His Son. What a wonderful Savior we have who is concerned for us and our faith.
6 Let not those who hope in you be put to shame through me,
O Lord God of hosts;
let not those who seek you be brought to dishonor through me,
O God of Israel.
He prays to the Father and His prayer is one we are privileged to listen in on and be educated as to why and what purpose He was shamed and was under reproach. Jesus answers why He carried the shame of the cross.
7 For it is for your sake that I have borne reproach,
that dishonor has covered my face.
8 I have become a stranger to my brothers,
an alien to my mother’s sons.
Because of the shame of carrying our sins and bearing such reproach for sin and being punished for sin Jesus was not recognizable to those who even knew Him well.
9 For zeal for your house has consumed me,
and the reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me.
Jesus was so concerned about God’s glory that He bore the reproach that was
a) falling on the Father due to the fact that He was passing over former sins.
b) He was bear our reproach which fell on us due to our sin’s consequences.
John 2:13–17 (ESV)
13 The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. 15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.” 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”
Romans 15:3 (ESV)
3 For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, “The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.”
Jesus has such zeal and passion for His Father’s honor that He was willing to go to the cross to bear our sin and so remove the shame given God’s name and the shame we as God’s people deserved. Through the work of Jesus God’s name and God’s people are made clean…
John 1:10–13 (ESV)
10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
The insults upon Jesus were to clear God’s name and to redeem God’s people it was all redemptive.
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