Psalm 18:46-50
‘The Lord lives!… Let the God of my salvation be exalted!… He delivers me from my enemies!… You lift me up!… You have delivered me…. Great deliverance He gives to His king…and to His Seed for evermore!’ Psalm 18:46-50.
Calvin comments: “David declares…’God lives!’… He is endued with Sovereign Power. Further…, His works…manifest to us that He lives!… He is therefore said to ‘live’ — inasmuch as He shows, by evident proofs of His power, that it is He Who preserves and upholds the world….
“‘Jehovah lives!’ — and therefore, ‘blessed be my Strength!’… God does not simply live in Himself…, but displays His vital energy in the government of the whole world…. ‘My Strength’ is here to be understood…(as) ‘Him’ Who bestows strength!”
David, “if…not…preserved by the hand of God…, could not…have escaped in safety. ‘My Deliverer from my enemies…, You have lifted me up from those who had risen up against me!’… We are to understand the lifting up of which he speaks, in that he was wonderfully raised up above the power and malice of his enemies — so that he might not sink under their violence….
‘Therefore will I praise You, O Jehovah, (among the Heathen)!’ In this verse, he (David) teaches us that the blessings God had conferred upon him…, are worthy of being celebrated…so that the fame of them might reach even the Heathen!… The meaning therefore is: ‘O Lord, I will not only give You thanks in the assembly of Your people…, but Your praises shall extend to a greater distance…through the whole world!’…
“This passage contains a prophecy concerning the Kingdom of Christ…. Paul very properly and suitably proves from this text…the calling of the Gentiles…. Romans 15:9…. The ears of the Gentiles were opened…when God adopted them, and called them to Himself by the Gospel….
“David here does not so much recount by way of history the singular and varied instances of the grace of God which he personally had experienced — as predict the everlasting duration of His Kingdom…. By the word ‘Seed’ we are…to understand…that Successor of David of Whom God had spoke in Second Samuel 7:12, promising that He would be a Father to Him.
“His Kingdom would continue as long as the sun and the moon would shine…. The prophecy must necessarily be viewed as descending to Him Who was to be King not for a time, but for ever. David therefore commends his Seed to us…, which fully applies…to the Only-begotten Son of God…. We shall then only duly profit in the study of this Psalm, when we are led by the contemplation of the shadow and type — to Him Who is the Substance!”
Only in Christ the son of David, is there any lasting continuance. Christ alone is the ‘Seed.’ The praise of Jehovah the God of David — His Anointed One — is ultimately a praising of the Father of Jesus Christ through Whom the Lord lives and keeps on delivering me!
