Psalm 33:14

Psalm 33 calls the righteous to praise the LORD with instruments and a new song, because his word is right and his works are done in truth (Psalm 33:1–5). He is the Creator: “By the word of the LORD were the heavens made” (Psalm 33:6), and his word alone brought everything into being (Psalm 33:6–9). He also rules history. He brings the counsel of the heathen to nought (Psalm 33:10), while “The counsel of the LORD standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations” (Psalm 33:11).

These eight verses follow from that. The nation blessed in verse 12 is the people who have this God as their own. He can overturn the plans of nations because he sees every person and understands every heart. The things kings relied on fail them, and the safety of God’s people lies in his watchful eye and his mercy. The psalm then closes with his people waiting for the LORD as “our help and our shield” (Psalm 33:20).

“Blessed” is ʼesher, a word for happiness and blessedness that is used as an exclamation: “how happy!” or “how fortunate!” It describes people who are fortunate because God has blessed them. The word comes straight after the LORD has brought the counsel of the nations to nothing, so the contrast is plain. The nations that plan without him fail, and the nation that has him for its God is happy.

The word for nation, goy, can mean any people, and it is the same word translated “heathen” in verse 10. What sets this one apart is its God. “The LORD” stands for Yᵉhôvâh, God’s own personal and covenant name, which speaks of him as the self-existent, eternal One who keeps faith with his people. To have the LORD as your God means worshipping him alone, obeying him and leaning on him. Another psalm puts it this way: “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7).

The second line names how such a nation comes to be: it is “the people whom he hath chosen”. The choice is the LORD’s. Moses told Israel that God chose them to be a holy and special people to himself (Deuteronomy 7:6), and that he set his love on them out of his own grace and love, though they had neither size nor strength nor merit to commend them (Deuteronomy 7:6–8). Their covenant with him reached back to Abraham and was sealed at Mount Sinai, where God called them “a peculiar treasure unto me above all people” (Exodus 19:5).

“Inheritance” is nachălâh, something inherited, an allotted portion. The land of Canaan was Israel’s inheritance from God, and here the people are God’s inheritance, his own portion among all peoples. Moses said the same: “For the LORD’S portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance” (Deuteronomy 32:9). A portion like that is valued and kept, and the word carries God’s commitment to protect and preserve what is his.

“The LORD looketh from heaven; he beholdeth all the sons of men.” Both verbs are ordinary words for sight. Nâbaṭ means to look or gaze, and in some places to regard or consider, and râʼâh is the usual word for seeing. Hebrew poetry often sets the two side by side, as it does here, and together they say that the LORD who looks from heaven sees everyone. “The sons of men” (b’nei adam) means all mankind, every person of every nation and generation. Another psalm uses the same picture: “The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God” (Psalm 14:2).

In verse 14 his dwelling and ours share one word. “The place of his habitation” joins mâkôwn, a fixed place or settled abode, from a root meaning to be firm, with yâshab, to sit down and so to dwell. Solomon used the same two words when he asked God to hear “in heaven thy dwelling place” (1 Kings 8:39). Then yâshab comes again in “all the inhabitants of the earth”, those who dwell below. The One who dwells in heaven watches all who dwell on the earth, as the LORD says through Isaiah, “The heaven is my throne” (Isaiah 66:1).

The verb in verse 14 is shâgach, a rare word meaning to peer or look closely. It appears only here and in two other places: the beloved who “looketh forth at the windows” (Song of Solomon 2:9), and the people who “shall narrowly look upon thee” in Isaiah (Isaiah 14:16). In both, the eyes rest closely on someone, and that same close look is turned on the whole earth.

Scripture says this in many places. “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, beholding the evil and the good” (Proverbs 15:3). David asks where he could go from God’s presence and finds that the darkness and the light are both alike to him (Psalm 139:7–12). Hebrews says, “Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:13).

“He fashioneth their hearts alike; he considereth all their works.” Yâtsar, “fashioneth”, means to mould or form, as a potter shapes clay. It is the word Genesis uses when “the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground” (Genesis 2:7). Here what God forms is the heart, lêb, which in Hebrew is the whole inner person: the mind and its thoughts, the will and its choices, the feelings and desires, and the moral character. Every person’s inner life is God’s own work.

“Alike” is yachad, which means “together”, “both” or “alike”. He fashions the hearts of them all, and every human heart is his making. So all people share one Maker and one human nature, made in his image (Genesis 1:27), and so all have the same dignity and all answer to him.

“Considereth” is bîyn, to understand or discern, to tell things apart in the mind. God understands what we do and why we do it. He made the heart, so he knows what comes out of it, as another psalm asks: “he that formed the eye, shall he not see?” (Psalm 94:9). “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts” (Proverbs 21:2). Through Jeremiah he says, “I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings” (Jeremiah 17:10). His understanding leads to judgment, and at the last “the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works” (Revelation 20:12).

“There is no king saved by the multitude of an host: a mighty man is not delivered by much strength.” In the psalmist’s day a kingdom’s strength was measured by its army and its champions, and kings spent heavily on soldiers, chariots and horses. The verse names the best of both. A king, melek, the ruler of a nation, has “the multitude of an host”, rôb chayil. Rôb means a multitude or abundance, and chayil is strength, ability, wealth or, as here, an army. A “mighty man”, gibbôwr, is a warrior or champion, and his kôach is his strength and power.

The verbs name what both of them lack. Yâshaʻ, “saved”, is the great Old Testament word for being rescued, set free and given victory, and nâtsal, “delivered”, means to be snatched out of danger. Whether it is a whole army or a single hero, human strength comes up short when life and kingdom are at stake, and rescue has to come from the LORD.

Verse 17 adds the warhorse. The horse, çûwç, was the strongest weapon of the day, and nations prided themselves on their horses and chariots. Even so, “An horse is a vain thing for safety”. “Vain thing” is sheqer, a word for a lie or falsehood that also means something vain, a disappointment. A horse looks like safety and disappoints the hope placed in it. “Safety” is tᵉshûwʻâh: rescue, deliverance, help, safety, salvation or victory. In the second line, “his great strength” is once again rôb chayil, the same words as the king’s “multitude of an host” in verse 16. The horse’s power and the king’s army bear one name and share one end.

Israel had been warned. Their king was told to keep from multiplying horses (Deuteronomy 17:16), and Isaiah pronounced woe on those that “go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses” (Isaiah 31:1). Another psalm says, “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help” (Psalm 146:3). The same holds for anything we lean on for safety today, whether savings, position, health or a nation’s weapons. Nations fall despite their armies, and riches “make themselves wings” (Proverbs 23:5).

“Behold” (hinneh) calls attention to what follows. After so much that fails, the psalm points to the One who saves. The LORD’s eye, ʻayin, has already looked on all the sons of men in verses 13 and 14, and now it rests with favour on a particular people. Scripture often speaks of God’s eye this way: “For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him” (2 Chronicles 16:9). Peter writes, “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers” (1 Peter 3:12).

Those he watches are described in two ways. They “fear him”, and yârêʼ here is the adjective “fearing” or “reverent”, said of one who fears. They also “hope in his mercy”. Mercy is cheçed, God’s steadfast love, his loyal and lasting kindness to his people, which rests on his own character and his covenant. Fear and hope belong together in true faith, reverence for who God is joined to confident trust in his goodness. “The LORD taketh pleasure in them that fear him, in those that hope in his mercy” (Psalm 147:11).

Hope in his mercy is a confident expectation, grounded in God’s faithfulness to his promises. Lamentations says, “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 3:21–23).

“To deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine.” This is why the LORD’s eye is on them. Nâtsal, “to deliver”, is to snatch away, and here the one rescued is “their soul” and the danger is death, mâveth. “Soul” is nephesh, a breathing creature, life, self or person, so “their soul” means their very lives. Famine, râʻâb, is hunger and scarcity of food, and in that world it was a frequent and deadly threat. To be kept alive in famine is to be sustained when the ordinary means of life have run out.

Israel had seen this. God fed them with manna and quails in the wilderness (Exodus 16), and he provided for Elijah and the widow of Zarephath (1 Kings 17). Moses taught them that “man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live” (Deuteronomy 8:3). Another psalm promises, “in the days of famine they shall be satisfied” (Psalm 37:19), and another, “The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul” (Psalm 121:7–8). Paul writes, “my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). The life God keeps is the life he gave, when he breathed into man the breath of life (Genesis 2:7).

The LORD whom the blessed nation has for its God is made known in his Son, “the image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15). “All things were created by him, and for him” (Colossians 1:16), by him all things consist (Colossians 1:16–17), and in him all fulness dwells (Colossians 1:19). “All things were made by him” (John 1:3), and that includes the hearts the LORD fashions.

The gaze of verses 13 to 15 was seen on earth in Jesus, who “knew all men, and needed not that any should testify of man: for he knew what was in man” (John 2:24–25). He knew Nathanael before they met (John 1:47–48), told the Samaritan woman her past (John 4:17–18), perceived the thoughts of the scribes (Luke 5:22, Matthew 9:4) and told his disciples what was to come (Matthew 24:25). Now he is seated at God’s right hand (Ephesians 1:20), upholding all things (Hebrews 1:3) and making intercession for us (Romans 8:34). The Father “hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John 5:22), who is ordained to be the Judge of quick and dead (Acts 10:42), and when he comes he “will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts” (1 Corinthians 4:5). John saw him with eyes “as a flame of fire” (Revelation 1:14). The eye that sees all is also the eye of love, for “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son” (John 3:16).

Verses 16 and 17 find their answer in the King who saves without armies. Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36), and he came as “the Lamb of God” (John 1:29), laying down his life. At the cross he spoiled principalities and powers (Colossians 2:15), and God’s strength “is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). “Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the LORD of hosts” (Zechariah 4:6). He “hath delivered us from the power of darkness” (Colossians 1:13–14), and “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). He saved us “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy” (Titus 3:5), and we are to “be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might” (Ephesians 6:10).

Verses 18 and 19 are fulfilled in him as well. Jesus lived in perfect reverence toward the Father and “became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:8). In him “we have redemption through his blood” (Ephesians 1:7), and through him we “come boldly unto the throne of grace” (Hebrews 4:16). “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23), and Jesus is “the resurrection, and the life” (John 11:25–26), the one through whom death is swallowed up in victory (1 Corinthians 15:54–57). He is the bread of life, and “he that cometh to me shall never hunger” (John 6:35). His divine power has given us “all things that pertain unto life and godliness” (2 Peter 1:3).

The LORD sees every heart and every deed, so we can live the same way in private as in public, knowing that he understands our motives better than we do. That same sight is a comfort. Faithfulness that others overlook, prayers said in secret and wrongs still waiting to be put right are all before him.

Each of us has a horse of some kind: savings, health, a career, a nation’s defences. They are good gifts to use and to prepare with, and they make poor saviours. The psalm turns us to fear the LORD and hope in his mercy, “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7). It also gives us something to pray for our nation, that it would be a nation whose God is the LORD. And if you belong to Christ, you are among the people he has chosen for his own inheritance, and his eye is on you for good.