Psalm 136:23

Psalm 136 is a hymn of thanks that walks through God’s works one by one. It opens with his greatness and his work in creation (Psalm 136:1–9), then tells of the Exodus from Egypt (Psalm 136:10–15), of God leading his people through the wilderness (Psalm 136:16), and of the kings he struck down as Israel came into the land (Psalm 136:17–22). In verse 23 the words become “us” and “our”. The great events of the nation’s history give way to God’s care for the people who are singing, and his vast power is shown to rest on a personal concern for them in their weakest hours. Verse 25 then widens the view to every living thing, and verse 26 gathers it all into one call to give thanks.

The psalm is often called the Great Hallel, the great song of praise, a name kept distinct from the group of Psalms 113–118. It was most likely sung in the temple, with a leader declaring each of God’s deeds and the whole congregation answering with the refrain, perhaps at the great feasts of Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles. Sung that way, the psalm gave every worshipper a part in remembering what God had done.

The refrain is the heart of the psalm. The word “for” makes it a reason: God remembered, redeemed and feeds because his mercy endures for ever. Creation, the Exodus, the wilderness, the conquest, God’s care in a low estate and the food on every table are all traced back to the same cause, which is who God is. His mercy rests on his own unchanging character, and so it is given freely, apart from any merit of ours.

The word for mercy, cheçed, means kindness and favour, and it is the word for love that stays loyal. “Steadfast love”, “loyal kindness” and “lovingkindness” all try to catch it in English. It is the love of someone bound in a relationship who keeps his commitments and acts for the good of the other, and when it is used of God it is his faithful love toward the people of his covenant. It begins in his grace, and it can be depended on to continue.

“For ever” translates ʻôwlâm, a word that properly means what is concealed, the vanishing point, and so time out of mind, whether past or future. God’s mercy reaches back further than anyone can see and forward further than anyone can see. Another psalm says that “the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting” (Psalm 103:17), and another, “For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations” (Psalm 100:5). Lamentations holds to the same truth: “It is of the LORD’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22–23).

The repetition does its own work. Said after every line, the refrain lets the whole congregation join in, it fixes the truth of God’s faithful love in the memory of each generation, and it binds the many acts of the psalm into one story with one thread running through it. By the last verse, everyone singing knows why God has done all these things.

The verb zâkar means to remember, and in one of its forms to mention or bring to remembrance. When Scripture says that God remembers his people, it means that he turns to them and acts for them. Exodus shows this at the very start of Israel’s rescue: “God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto them” (Exodus 2:24–25). God knows all things, and Scripture speaks of his remembering in human terms so that we can understand it. His remembering is his faithfulness to his promises put into action.

“Low estate” translates shephel, a humble rank or low place, from the verb shâphêl, to be brought low. It can describe being brought down in body, in standing or in spirit, through oppression, humiliation or distress. The psalm leaves the occasion open. It fits the bondage in Egypt, and it fits the exile in Babylon or any other time when Israel was oppressed and humbled. The same words fit one person brought low by poverty, sickness, despair or their own sin. In every case the people are weak and helpless, and that is when God’s remembering shows most clearly. He stoops to the helpless, and his mercy is the reason he does.

To redeem, pâraq, first means to break off or tear away, and from that it comes to mean to deliver. The word gives a picture of God pulling his people out of the grip of those who held them. Israel’s history was full of such enemies, from the Egyptians to the Canaanites, the Philistines and the empires that tried to rule them, and each deliverance from them was God’s work. The greatest was the Exodus, when God brought his people out of slavery as he had promised to redeem them (Exodus 6:6). “Hath redeemed” speaks of God’s lasting role as the Redeemer and Protector of his people, the one who has set them free before and does so again.

“Enemies” translates tsar. It comes from a root meaning to cramp, and it can mean narrow, a tight place, distress or an adversary. In Scripture it most often means an adversary, and that is its sense here.

Singing this line together, the people kept their history of rescue in common memory, as another psalm sets out to remember God’s deeds (Psalm 77:11). God’s past mercies were the ground for trusting him in the present and hoping in him for the future. His power is always used together with his love, which is why he is a Deliverer his people can rely on, and the same compassion is praised in Psalm 103:8–11 and Micah 7:18–19.

Verse 25 moves from Israel to the whole living world. The verb nâthan is the common word for to give, used with the widest range of meanings, such as to put, to set and to make. “Giveth” speaks of something God goes on doing, day after day. The food, lechem, is food for man or beast, especially bread or the grain it is made from. “Flesh”, bâsâr, means flesh, and by extension the body or the person, so “all flesh” takes in every creature that lives.

For a people who lived from the land, this was daily life. Their food depended on rain in its season and on fruitful fields, and they remembered the manna God had given in the wilderness (Exodus 16). Each harvest came from his hand. Jesus points to the same care when he speaks of God feeding the birds of the air (Matthew 6:26), and Paul assures believers that God will supply all their need (Philippians 4:19). Every creature depends on him for its most basic needs, and every meal is a gift of his mercy.

The psalm ends with a command. The verb yâdâh is traced to a root about the hand held out, and in this form it means to praise, give thanks or confess. Giving thanks to God is an outward act, often done together with others, and it acknowledges openly who God is and what he has done. The “O” makes the command a warm appeal.

“The God of heaven” is ʼêl shâmayim. The word ʼêl means God, the mighty one, the Almighty, and shâmayim is the sky or the heavens, from a root meaning to be lofty. The title sets God above every earthly power and every god of the nations. The God who acted for one small people is the ruler of all creation, and the mercy he showed them flows from the Lord of everything. The title “God of heaven” became prominent after the exile, as in Ezra’s account of the decree of Cyrus (Ezra 1) and in Nehemiah’s prayer (Nehemiah 1), when Israel lived under foreign rule and needed to know that their God ruled over the kings who ruled them.

Thanks is the fitting answer to everything the psalm has told. The same call to thanks, with the same reason, sounds in other songs of praise (Psalm 107:1, 1 Chronicles 16:34). The gratitude of this verse rests on who God is, the God of heaven whose loyal love lasts for ever, and so it holds through good seasons and hard ones alike.

These verses find their fullest meaning in Jesus Christ. Our deepest low estate is our sin and our separation from God, and there God remembered us by sending his Son. Christ emptied himself, took the nature of a servant, was made in human likeness, and humbled himself even to death on a cross (Philippians 2:7–8). He shared our weakness, sorrows and temptations, yet he was without sin (Hebrews 4:15). God showed his love in that Christ died for us while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8), and Christ now intercedes for his people (Hebrews 7:25), so that they are remembered for ever.

The enemies we most needed rescuing from were sin, death and the devil (Hebrews 2:14–15), and Christ broke their hold by his death on the cross and sealed the victory by his resurrection. He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29), through him we have redemption (Colossians 1:13–14), and he brings us into a new and better covenant of grace (Hebrews 8:6).

The God who feeds all flesh came among us in the one who said, “I am the bread of life” (John 6:35), and who satisfies a hunger that bread cannot reach. He fed the multitudes (Matthew 14:13–21), and all things were created through him and hold together in him (Colossians 1:16–17), so the daily provision this psalm praises is his work too. God sent his Son into the world to save it, so that everyone who believes in him has eternal life (John 3:16–17), and in this his love was made known to us (1 John 4:9–10). Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and for ever (Hebrews 13:8). When we thank the God of heaven for his enduring mercy, we thank him for the mercy we have received in its fullest measure in Christ.

These four verses show us a God who sees his people when they are at their lowest, who acts to set them free, who feeds every creature from day to day, and who reigns over all from heaven. Each of those works comes from the same mercy, and that mercy lasts for ever. The psalm gives us words for remembering what God has done, in the history of his people and in our own lives, and it sets each memory beside the refrain that explains it.

Peter’s words rest on the same truth as verse 23: “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7). God’s generosity to all flesh also shows the kind of giving he delights in, and those who have received from him have something to share with others in need. The psalm’s last word is thanks, offered to the God of heaven because his mercy endureth for ever.