Psalm 44:1-8 – Deliverance Comes from God Alone

Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ The Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS, 24 May 2020

Introduction

• Today, as we face the threats of being decimated by a killer virus and impoverished by an economic collapse, the watershed question is, will we look for salvation from human leaders – from the government, or will we look to God to deliver us from these threats? This is the thought-provoking question raised by the priestly sons of Korah in Psalm 44.

• This Psalm is about the history of nations. In the history of our nation, the providences of God became so obvious during the independence movement that even the self-proclaimed agnostic, Benjamin Franklin went on record saying, “At the beginning of the war… we prayed for divine protection. Our prayers were answered. I have lived a long time. The longer I live, the more I see that ‘God governs in the affairs of man’. A sparrow cannot fall without His notice. Can an empire rise without His aid? … The Book of Psalms assures us that, ‘Unless the Lord builds the house, they labour in vain who build it.’ We can build our house in America only with His help.”¹

• What were these answers to prayer that convinced a hardened agnostic to publicly acknowledge God’s governance in human affairs? Peter Marshall & David Manuel chronicled this history in their book, The Light and the Glory. They noted

  • God’s providences in the survival of the New England Puritan colonies

  • the religious revival under the preaching of George Whitfield and others in the mid 1700s which moved America toward being a spiritually-unified nation,

  • and the many times God stopped the armies of the British and Germans from wiping out the American colonies when they could have,

    • from the British General Howe’s failures to advance when he had the advantage at Bunker Hill and Boston and Brooklyn,

    • to the snow and wind and fog that brought advantages to George Washington’s army at Dorchester Heights MS, Manhattan NY, and Trenton NJ.

• Psalm 44 opens up with a review of Israel’s independence movement back around 1500 B.C.

v.1 O God, we’ve heard with our own ears²; our fathers recounted for us the accomplishment You accomplished in their days – in the early days.

• What was that singular accomplishment which God wrought in the days of old which was written down and recounted from father to son in the nation of Israel? I suggest it was the establishment of the Jewish nation.

  • Moses began the record of it in the Pentateuch, and every spring, at the Passover feast, fathers would tell the story of Israel’s great escape from Egypt.

  • The same phrase “days of old/early days” shows up in Isaiah 51:9 where the Exodus is recounted poetically, portraying Egypt as a dragon named Rahab: “Awake! Awake, arm of Yahweh! Put on strength! Awake like the days of old - the generations long-ago. Were you not the one that cut Rahab to pieces, piercing the dragon? ¹⁰ Were you not the one that dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep – the one that set a way (in the) depths of the sea for the redeemed ones to pass over?” (NAW)

  • Joshua continued the written record of the newborn nation of Israel as it got established in the Promised Land, and that part of the nation’s early history is referenced in the next few verses of Psalm 44.³

• Telling the deeds of God in history to our children is a sacred duty for all Christian fathers and mothers. (Deut. 6, Psalm 9:1)

  • We have an annual national holiday which bears some similarity to the function of the Passover, and that is our Independence Day. On this day, we should do more than merely have a cookout and set off fireworks, we should recount God’s acts in bringing colonists who trusted in Him out of the oppression of tyrants into the blessing of religious freedom.

  • Here is one story: When the British army conquered Boston, they showed purposeful disrespect to God. They turned the church building into a horse barn and set up a liquor store in the balcony. The American Continental Congress, on the other hand, called for a day of prayer and fasting. General Washington was called upon to retake Boston, and despite all the obstacles, he said, “The Almighty will make a way.” And God did. Knox unexpectedly showed up with 50 canons from Ft. Ticonderoga loaded on sleds, a new defensive tactic was discovered in the use of French chandaliers, and then, when it was time to set up these new offensive and defensive works, God provided a mist and a wind and a storm to hide and protect the Americans when their positions were most vulnerable. After the daylight revealed the American forces well-entrenched above Boston on Dorchester Heights, the British retreated, and Boston was returned without the loss of a single American soldier.⁴ “The Almighty [made] a way!”

  • Over the course of 30 years of ministry in which my wife and I have had to live financially off of whatever was donated to us each month, we have a set of stories about times when we thought God would not provide for us – when we thought we would have to provide for ourselves, so we spent precious funds on something, only to be donated that very item a little while later. The items on that list include snow shovels, a puzzle with a map of the USA, a trampoline, and even underwear (I mean, who donates underwear? We thought for sure we were on our own to buy for that need!). Each time, God provided donated duplicates of the very things we bought, just after we bought them. Some of you who came to my house last year must have noticed how long we went with our old, ripped-up trampoline sitting unusable in our back yard. It was at least half a year, certainly long enough to decide that God wasn’t going to provide. Yeah, well... It’s kind-of a game I think God plays with us to remind us that we’re not on our own. So we tell our children these stories to teach our children to trust God to take care of us, and we give the glory to God.

v.2 It was You – Your hand – that disinherited nations. Instead You planted them. You caused calamity to the peoples but them you released.

• The first Hebrew verb has to do with literally “causing to possess/inherit” (It’s the Hiphil form of yarash.), and the object is Goyim/Gentile nations. You, “God” is the subject. “You caused to possess the nations.” What does that mean?

• Well, if you look at the structure of the poetry of this verse, there are two parallel sentences, both of which begin with a statement about the godless nations and end with a statement about Israel.

  • So first it says that God “dispossesed the nations,” but, at the same time, God “planted” the Israelite fathers.

  • In the second parallel statement, it says that God “caused evil/calamity/brokenness” to come upon the pagan “peoples,” but God “spread/freed/released/[literally] sent forth” the Israelite fathers. (The last verb shalakh is the same one found in the previous psalm translated “send forth” your truth.)

    • Now, this verse doesn’t actually say that it was the Israelite fathers that God “released” from Egypt and “planted” in the Promised Land; it literally only says, “You planted them… you released them.” (The historic Greek and Latin versions of the Bible interpreted the word “them” to mean that God cast out the gentile people groups, so the NIV added “our fathers” to make the meaning of the word “them” more clear. The Canaanites weren’t so much expelled into other parts of the world as they were slaughtered by Joshua and his successors. So in what way were the Israelite fathers “sent forth” by God?

    • If we look back through the Bible at how the Piel stem for this verb shalakh is used, we see that it is repeated over and over again in the book of Exodus in the phrase, “Let my people go.”

    • Then in the Law, it is used to describe changing the status of a slave to that of freeman.

    • It is also the verb used in the history books of Joshua and Judges to describe the “release” of the tribes of Israel to go into the Promised Land and conquer their allotted territories: Judges 2:6 “And when Joshua had dismissed [וַיְשַׁלַּח ] the people, the children of Israel went each to his own inheritance to possess the land.” (NKJV)

• But wait, if it was Joshua who shalakhed the Israelite fathers to go take over the Promised Land, why does Psalm 44 say that it was not Joshua, but rather God who released them to spread out into the land?

  • God alone is emphasized as the main character here. “You did it… you drove out the Canaanites, you planted” the nation of Israel in Canaan – You, You, You.

  • Psalm 80:8-11 says it the same way: “You have brought a vine out of Egypt; You have cast out the nations, and planted it. You prepared room for it, And caused it to take deep root, And it filled the land...” (NKJV)

  • Why doesn’t the Psalmist give credit to the astonishingly-talented Moses who singlehandedly conquered the world’s largest armies, wrote the world’s first real book, and formed the world’s first republican government? Moses doesn’t get the glory here, because God is ultimately the one in control of it all, and God is the one we ultimately should praise.

  • If the President of United States or our state governor pulls a rabbit out of the hat and saves our economy from crashing, and keeps everybody from starving, and heads off a viral pandemic, all our Secular Humanist friends will be obliged to praise the human heroes, but Christians, while we express appreciation for their acts of heroism, will also get on our knees and thank God for delivering us because we know that God is the much bigger actor on the stage who deserves to be recognized!

  • Amos Farensworth, corporal in the Massachusetts militia wrote in his journal after the battle of Bunker Hill, “Oh the goodness of God in preserving my life, although they fell on my right hand and on my left! O may this act of deliverance of thine, O God, lead me never to distrust thee...”⁵ Amos didn’t give the glory to Colonel Prescott, the one who said, “Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes!” No, before the battle, Reverend Langdon had prayed, “O Lord, we seek Your divine protection this day… We place ourselves in Your hands… Have mercy on us.” So, Corporal Farensworth knew who to give thanks to, after the battle was over and mercy was given.

v.3 So it was not by their own sword that they inherited the land, and their arm-strength is not what brought deliverance to them, for it was Your right hand and Your arm-strength and the light of Your face by which you favored them.

• Did the Israelites use their arms to swing swords in battle? Of course. Joshua 6:21 says that the Israelite army killed everybody in Jericho (except for Rahab’s household) “with swords.” But does the glory go to Joshua and his soldiers? No, the glory goes to God.

• Could an unbeliever look at the same events in history and give the glory to man instead of to God? Certainly.

  • Skeptics have explained away every miracle, from the plagues to the crossing of the Red Sea, to the pillar of fire and cloud, to the manna and water in the wilderness.

  • They’ve done the same to American history. Secular author David McCullough, in his book 1776, commended Washington’s leadership and attributed his success at evacuating 9,000 American troops from Brooklyn without loosing a soul to “good luck.” (p.193)

• The three verbs in this verse: יָרְשׁוּ/inherited/won/got possession of, הוֹשִׁיעָה/brought deliverance/victory/saved, and רְצִיתָ/favored/loved/pleased – are all words which are used in the New Testament to speak of the Christian experience.

  • We receive possesion of the Holy Spirit and of heaven:

    • Jesus said, "Blessed are the meek, because it is they who will inherit the earth." (Matt. 5:5, NAW)

    • “and everyone who left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or fields for the sake of my name, will receive a hundred times as many, and will inherit eternal life." (Matt. 19:29, NAW, cf. 25:34)

  • Furthermore, we are saved and given victory over sin, Satan, and death:

    • The angel told Joseph, “...you will call Him by the name Jesus, because He Himself will save His people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21, NAW)

    • Hebrews 7:22-27 “...Jesus has become a surety of a better covenant... because He continues forever, He has an unchangeable priesthood. Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them” (NAW) [after offering Himself on the cross as the ultimate sacrifice for our sin].

  • And thirdly, God takes delight in and shows favor to those to trust in Jesus because Jesus is Himself first and foremost God’s “delight” (Matt. 3:17; 12:18; 17:5):

    • 1 Corinthians 1:21b “...God was pleased to save those who believe though... what was preached.” (NAW)

    • Luke 12:32 "Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” (NKJV)

• Now, do we employ our will to believe in Jesus? Of course. Do we do good deeds that are a part of our salvation? Sure. But do we boast that we saved ourselves by our own strength and willpower? No way!

  • We give all the glory to Jesus, because, without Jesus trading His righteousness for our sinfulness, no amount of believing and doing good deeds could ever make us right with God.

  • Without Him we have no refuge from God’s wrath and no inheritance in the kingdom of God. (Ps. 2)

• So Jesus is also the fulfillment of Psalm 44:3 – Jesus is the “right hand” of God and the “arm” of the Lord that was “revealed in the sight of all the nations” to save them (look it up in Isaiah 52:10), and, the “light of the knowledge of the glory of God [is revealed] in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6, NKJV).

• So it is by means of Jesus’ arm, Jesus’ strength, and Jesus’ face that God is pleased to show favor to us and accept us and delight in us.

• So come to Jesus, and the Lord will be “pleased” to “rescue” you (Ps. 40:13), “For the LORD takes delight in His people; He will beautify the humble with salvation.” (Ps. 149:4 NKJV)⁶

• The focus remains on God, but we get a new title for Him in verse 4: “my king.”

v.4 You are the same one who is my King, O God. Command the deliverances of Jacob.

• As King, it is God’s role to issue the commands to His army and put down threats to His people from enemies. And as “my King” it is therefore God’s role to put down threats leveled at ME!

  • This is a privilege you have when you become a follower of Jesus as your King. Your enemies become His enemies, and it becomes His responsibility to protect you.

  • Luke 1:74 says that Jesus was sent to deliver us from the hand of our enemies.

• The word “deliverances/victories is the exact same word that the sons of Korah used in Psalm 42:5 “... I shall praise Him again before His face [for] salvations.” It is also the noun form of the verb in the previous verse in Psalm 44:3 translated “save/deliver/bring victory” - I think it’s all related. And “Jacob” is just a poetic word for the nation of “Israel.”⁷

• Salvation starts in our experience when a life-threatening circumstance – like loss of life due to sickness or armed enemies, or loss of assets due to an economic collapse – is headed off, but it goes deeper than that with God’s salvation because His salvation also heads off the much greater threat of burning in hell forever for our sins! So there is more than one salvation/victory in view.

  • Isaiah 49:6 brings this out: "Your being for me a servant to establish the tribes of Jacob and to restore the remnant of Israel is insubstantial, I will also give you to be a light for nations, to be my salvation unto the end of the earth.” (NAW)

  • Yes, deliver Israel physically from Egypt and from the Canaanites, and yes, “deliver me from every evil work and preserve me” (2 Tim. 4:18) “from unreasonable and wicked men” (2 Th. 3:2), but also spiritually “deliver us from the Evil One” (Mt. 6:13) and “from the wrath to come” (1 Th. 1:10) and ensure that “all Israel [including us Gentiles] is saved” (Rom. 11:26).

  • We can pray for God to issue commands for these deliverances because every one of them is already in His word!

• The next verse goes back to the plural “us” - the people of God from v.1

v.5 With You we will ram through our oppressors; in Your name we will step on those who rise up against us.

• The imagery here in v.5 perhaps comes from Moses’ blessings on the tribes of Israel, where he asks God to strike those who “rise up⁸ against” Levi (Deut. 33:11) and describes the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh as having “the horns of the wild ox... with which He shall push the peoples To the ends of the earth." In this case it is an expression of faith in God’s promises through Moses.

• The image of trampling/treading down/stepping on enemies occurs two more times in the Psalms, where it says, “Through our God we shall do valiantly; it is He who will tread down our enemies.” (Ps. 60:14; 108:14) This is God coming through with justice for the oppressed, but using the agency of His people empowered by Him to push through oppression and the insurgencies of those in rebellion against God!

  • This is violent imagery, but this is war. The lives of God’s people are being threatened, and it demands a violent response in defense. (cf. Psalm 47:3, 18:38)

• This is not just Old Testament. We see this kind of imagery in the New Covenant as well, referring to Christ and the church in a holy alliance against evil:

  • Malachi 4:3 "‘You [who fear my name] will tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day which I am preparing,’ says the LORD of hosts.”

  • Romans 16:20 “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet...”

  • Eph. 1:22 “And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church”(NKJV, cf. 1 Cor. 15:25)

• The converse is stated in the next verse:

v.6 For it is not in my bow that I will trust, and my sword isn’t going to deliver me.

• Modern-day equivalents to the “bow” and “sword” might be:

  • I don’t put my trust in a facemask, or believe that my salvation comes from a vaccine. I might use them, but I’ll use them with trust in Jesus, praying in the name of Jesus to be saved from the plague.

  • I will not trust my earning power or my investments to save me. I will work, and I will save money, but with trust in Jesus, using them for the glory of His name.

• We know where the Psalmists’ trust and confidence is:

  • Psalm 9:10 “Then those who know Your name will trust in You, for You did not forsake those who were seeking You, Yahweh!”

  • Psalm 21:7 “Because the king is trusting in Yahweh and in the lovingkindness of the Most High, he will in no way be overthrown.”

  • Psalm 22:4 “In You our fathers trusted. They trusted, and You delivered them.”

  • Psalm 31:14 “But as for me, it is in You that I trusted; I said, ‘You are my God, Yahweh’” (NAW)

• And we know that’s where salvation/deliverance comes from:

  • Psalm 18:2 “Yahweh is my rock-mountain, my stronghold, and my deliverer...”

  • Psalm 18:35 “You also give me the shield of Your salvation...”

  • Psalm 27:1 “Yahweh is my light and my salvation...”

  • Jonah 2:9 “... Salvation belongs to Yahweh!'" (NAW)

  • or as Peter put it: “Nor is there salvation in any other [than Jesus Christ of Nazareth], for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." (Acts 4:12, NKJV)

• John Calvin commented, "The best means, therefore, of cherishing in us habitually a spirit of gratitude towards God, is to expel from our minds this foolish opinion of our own ability." So it’s not the bow and the sword – the tools in our hands, it is our God that we will trust to get us through!

v.7 for You delivered us from our oppressors, and those who hated us You put to shame.

• The Psalmist stands between the past and the future, remembering how God delivered “us” (the nation of Israel) in the past and projecting that into the future for himself.⁹ When his forefathers trusted in God, they saw deliverance, so he’s going to trust in God and anticipate victory over the stressful circumstances that confront him in his day.

• Now I realize that modern American citizens can’t expect national deliverance to the same extent that an Old Testament Jew could, because God gave promises to the Jews that He didn’t give to everybody.

  • But there are still general promises which apply to us, such as Proverbs 14:34 “Righteousness exalts a nation, But sin is a reproach to any people” (NKJV),

  • and there are promises regarding the church which apply to the communities of God’s people in our nation¹⁰.

• We can still remember the ways Israel and the church throughout history have testified of God’s deliverances, and we who trust in Jesus can assert with confidence, as this Psalmist does, that “I too will praise God in the future when He brings deliverance to me!”

v.8 It is in God that we have boasted all the day, and it is Your name forever that we will praise!

• Solo Deo Gloria - The fifth of the Sola doctrinal statements of the Reformation naturally follows from the belief in the doctrines of grace that God is the one who initiates and secures the salvation of His people. In other words, if we didn’t save ourselves, but rather God saved us, then we can’t take any of the credit; it all goes to God.

• George Washington, after winning the war for American Independence, boasted in God during his inaugural address to Congress, saying, “I must express my gratitude to the Almighty... No people can acknowledge the invisible hand of God more than the people of the United States. Every step toward independence was protected by His hand...”¹¹

• Are you giving God the credit He deserves for saving your soul from hell – and also for getting you through whatever scrapes you were in just last week?

• What percentage of the day are you giving Him praise? What would it look like for you to boast “all day long” about God?

  • Verbally sharing the Gospel is the most obvious way of boasting in God,

  • but I’d suggest that a mindset of confidence in God’s care for you into the future – believing that “goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever” (Ps. 23) – is a way of “boasting all day long.” Conducting everyday life in the peace of Christ, instead of with anxiety over health threats and economic threats, proclaims something to the world even without spoken words.

Psalm 44:1-8 - Side-by side comparison of versions^A