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Psalms:16

Michtam of David (2 A. M. 2962. B.C. 1042)

(page last updated: Oct 28th 2019)

Today's Text:

Today's Audio Commentary: "Thine Holy One"

Today's Commentary Outline:

1. Psalm 16 - A Michtam (Engraving) of David:
• The first question I have today = Who? Who will 'êl ale (el-aw-lay = Almighty One) dict:strongs H410 show the path of life to?


• Is this Psalm primarily about you and me? (think about the awesomeness of the many processes of life, the splendor, the miracle, the beauties and complexities, conception/birth/adolescence/maturity/procreation/aging/death) (think of the colors, the smells, the shapes, the tastes, the tough of another's hands, the emotions, the joy/laughter, the fears/hopes/tears) (think of the mountains, the oceans, the sky, the moon, the sun, the planets, the stars, the universe) (think about the human soul, your human soul, in the hands of God, for eternity). Wouldn't you like to be shown "the path" of life from beginning to end? "Thou wilt shew me the path of life"


• Is this Psalm primarily about someone else? (there is an indication who this someone might be 1 verse before :11 "neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption"). (Do you see it there?) "Thou wilt shew me the path of life" 15:10




• I would like to paint an amazing picture for you today from 16: of someone we should all probably get to know a little bit better: thine Holy One


• B.C. 1042 an echo goes out from the very center of the spiritual universe from the Holy One outward to the receiving ear of the poet/king David of Israel. The message in engraved into song form (a Michtam). This Michtam is sung by the chosen people of God engraved in their hearts hopefully for the ages ever after.


• The Holy One is requesting of the Almighty One to protect Him "Preserve me, O God" for an upcoming journey : "for in thee do I put my trust".


• The Holy One acknowledges to the Almighty One that this upcoming journey will be most difficult and cost the Holy One everything (I mean EVERYTHING) that He has got. He sings "For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption".


• Why would the Holy One take such a dangerous and costly journey? "Thou art my Lord: my goodness extendeth not to thee; But to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom is all my delight". David in the reflection of a few initial chord changes ponders what this goodness extended to man might possibly be.


• The Holy One sings of the surety that He has in all of this in His mind: "The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot. The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage".


• And in the end when it is all said and done when the Holy One returns to the Almighty One from His journey He will have been shown "the Path of life" beginning to end in all of it's fullness, He will have experienced it, He will have extended His goodness to the saints that are in the earth, and in the process He will have become a Mighty Savior. As it was before going so it will be upon His return to His Almighty One "in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore"


• The year is B.C. 1042


• United Israel is near the apex of it's brilliance upon the world stage. It's many enemies are nearly defeated. It's possession of the Promised land nearly complete. God has made good on HIS promise to Jacob's children, they are living in the double blessing of their obedience to the conditional Mosiac covenant. The valiant son of Jesse is on the throne, a man after God's heart.


• All is not well underneath in the united kingdom. It won't be long before 10 of the 12 tribes leaves outright never to fully return. There will be civil war. There will be false gods. There will be collusion and foreign alliances. They will soon be lead by wicked kings and false prophets and be forced into captivity. Except for a small remnant God keeps for Himself, they will have all rebelled against their God. They will be living the double curse of frequent disobedience to the same exact conditional Mosiac covenant. Their enemies will be used by God as a razor to shave them into shame and dishonor.


• And yet in B.C. 1042, before all of this, the echoes of a beautiful Michtam went forth from the center of the spiritual universe. At least one person at the time had musical ears left to hear it.


• Is Psalm:16 a Michtam about either you or I or us?


• I suppose it is in a round about sense.


• In an unwritten way it is a song that will awaken the saints on earth that will perk up their ears to respond in chorus along with it.


• In an unwritten way it is a song that if we were to follow along with the storyline of the path of life that was shown to the Holy One, well we would see a path somewhere therein for us to be shown by the Almighty One as well.


• Would you like to for me to paint for you more of the picture?






2. "Thou wilt shew me the path of life": 16:11
• Early on this course of this human life took a drastic turn for all the sons of Adam. The Holy One called out to Adam from former path He and Adam once walked together daily "Adam, Adam where are you"?


• The Holy One of course knew where he was and what had happened but, He had to hear Adam admit to it. (we need to hear Adam admit to it as well otherwise we'd just think that God had played a trick on father Adam. What had actually happened had to be made clear to the jury of forever more)


• The Almighty One did not need to show the Holy One what the path of life had become. No, the Almighty One needed HIS Holy One to go in and fully experience it so as to be able to defeat what had happened and put it back on it's proper course once again.


• Even with the fall of Adam and his generations, this human life was a most beautiful thing despite the pains and the toils and the hardships and the steep gravitational pull of mortality.


• You and I both know of this beauty. It's hard to imagine any other form of life other than it. It's not the course of life that we are meant to be on though. (I think that we know that as well don't we)?


• The Almighty One did not need to show the Holy One of this either. No, the Almighty One needed HIS Holy One to go in and fully experience it so as to be able to defeat what had happened and put it back on it's proper course once again.


• But certainly on this altered path, for all the beauty in this life we have come to know and cherish so, there is also the unbearable pain of wars and killing, of smoke stacks of human ashes warming the winter skies, of irreversible afflictions rape/brutality/oppression/abandonment/enslavement, of and of things we choose not to imagine for our own sanities sake.


• The Holy One was given the experience of birth and infancy, the soft warmth of a mother's breast. He experienced the play and schooling of childhood, of siblings, of family, of market places and bazaars and synagogue and temple, of feasts and festivals, of travel and foreign lands.


• The Holy One was given the wise words of a mother, the skills of a craftsman handed down from a father, the doctrines of learned scribes. He also knew the horrors of having threats against His life, of injustice, of Egyptian prejudice, of Roman oppression, defilement at the Temple gates, religious hypocrisy, the under tow of moral and political revolution.


• The Almighty One did not need to show the Holy One any of this either, it was already fully known. No, the Almighty One needed HIS Holy One to go in and fully experience it so as to be able to defeat what had happened and put it back on it's proper course once again.


• There were some things that the Holy One would not in this life taste of. For instance He never married, never had children of His own, He wasn't allowed to age after His prime. Though His dad may have died early, His mom and brethren survived Him by several years.


• Nor did He have the experience of committing sin. He was never burdened with sin guilt, never had to face the consequence as such. Not that He didn't have the opportunity to sin, He had just as many opportunities to sin as either you or I if not more given His eventual position. He kept Himself from sin, not by any of the divine powers within Him but by the purity of His human blood and His extreme will to do only as the Almighty One had commanded Him.


• Sin was not something the Almighty One had to show the Holy One in this way because the Holy One had been sent bodily into this world to defeat sin, not to participate in it.


• So through the Holy One's obedience to the Almighty One the Almighty One was able to perform great miracles and wonders through Him.


• What the Almighty One told Him to say, that is what He said. What the Almighty One told Him to do, that is what He did. If HE told Him to walk across the water He obeyed, not by His own power mind you (though He could) but in the Almighty One's confirmation of His obedience.


• The Almighty One to showed Him the paths of life lived in by the blind and the crippled, the diseased and the leprous, the demoniacally possessed and the dying. He experienced the Almighty One's confirmation of His obedience shown in healing these multitudes (everyone of them brought to Him in fact).


• The Almighty One to showed Him the paths of life lived in by the poor and the hungry, the orphan and the widow, the centurion and the prostitute. For them He lived their experience by means of empathy. He took their ills and ailments upon Him in His own flesh.


• The Almighty One to showed Him the paths of life lived in by 12 devoted but faulty men and those many that followed town to town after them. He experienced their experiences. He experienced along with them people being dropped down from the ceiling, desperate women fighting through the crowds just to touch the hem of His robe, sisters crying in the street "oh Lord if you had only be here sooner", clay barrels of water turned the finest of wedding wines, fish in their nets plenteous enough to break their nets. All this the Almighty One's confirmation of His obedience.




• For all of this goodness and divine confirmation what was to be the Holy One's human reward? Well He was shown the very ugliest part of the paths of this life.


• The religious elite quickly turned against Him, they sought to kill Him for a long time but were prevented from doing so by the Almighty One. In the mean time they sought to turn public perception against Him.


• The political elite came to fear His influence above and beyond their own. The revolutionaries wearied of Him because He refused to join in their rebellious cause. Even many of His followers turned back claiming that His "Kingdom of Heaven" teachings were too hard, that their expectations of Him mounting an army to fight the Roman's back and restore Israel were not developing.


• Then just prior to the Passover one of His own disciples plots with the elite for His capture and arrest. That same disciple returns to the Holy One's supper to mockingly dip his bread in the his master's sup.


• We all know what occurs from then on. What the Holy One is shown in us goes from ugly to absolutely criminal, from chains to false testimonies, from spit to calls of blaspheme, from cat of nines to crown of thorns, from no fault found in Him to His life bartered for a murderous thief, from palaces up to the Hill of Skulls with heavy cross on shoulder, from laid down on it to errect and hung by wrists and ankles by it, deserted by all that knew Him except for Mother and Magdalen and beloved one John.


• The Holy One was shown most everything that could be about this present path of life. But soon in this story will be shown Him the path of life to come!






3. "Because He is at My Right Hand, I Shall not be Moved": 16:8
• How was it that the Holy One was able to keep His strength during all of this?


• If there was ever anyone with the unbearable weight of the world on His shoulders, He would certainly be the one.


• With the information available we won't be able to conclude this for sure but, I suspect, at least in part, there was strength to be found in the trail of echoes that He had left for Himself over a millennium prior to His journey. Echoes like the one we are considering in our hands today kjv@Psalm:16.


• This Michtam penned by David had been engraved into the religious culture of that day (even though they did not understand it they carried it forward with them), engraved in the canonized scripture of that time, scripture that the Holy One would have been fully familiar with and with David's added melody could have sung to us in it's fully throated meaning.


• What then would this Michtam have reminded Him of to strengthen Him onward?



kjv@Psalms:16:1 @ Preserve me, O God: for in thee do I put my trust.



• The path of life is a path of trust. Who is to know what has been, what is to come, what will happen to us along the journey? All any of us really have is the ability to trust in God (Almighty One) just as "Thine Holy One" is singing here.



kjv@Psalms:16:5 @ The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.



• Jehovah is all that any of us really need. HE is everything inheritance and cup. Having given ourselves over to that fact, it is Jehovah (our everything) only (not our ourselves or the resources/intervention of any other) that maintains our personal lot. The Holy One remind Himself down in the deepest octaves.



kjv@Psalms:16:6 @ The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.



• Many would look at what has occurred and say that it has become a terrible place with no heritage other than the death common to us all only quicker. Shouldn't we also remind ourselves by these long distance echoes from B.C 1042 that inheritance is much much greater than from this sinful place it appears?



kjv@Psalms:16:7 @ I will bless the LORD, who hath given me counsel: my reins also instruct me in the night seasons.



• Ah there is counsel in the skies and on the ground, on the waters and the sunset. There is counsel in the sacred writings, the honest discussion of which, in the prayers and in the worship, in the fasting and feasts and appointed times. In the fabric of a man's heart that has been touched by God there is instruction even in night seasons.



kjv@Psalms:16:8 @ I have set the LORD always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.



• Why then fret? Why then stand weakened? Where else might I be moved and who else then is capable to move me if Jehovah is set before me and at my right hand?



kjv@Psalms:16:9 @ Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth: my flesh also shall rest in hope.



• I tell you one rehearsal of this song into my remembrance and I am feeling strengthened to sing it aloud a couple hundred more times to get everyone else in the camp awake and ready for any journey this path of life has in store for us. How about you?


• So what should the Holy One expect should the path of this life come down to Him dying on a cross in order to defeat it?



kjv@Psalms:16:10 @ For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.



• Should we expect anything different happen to those whom He has called to be His children by means of His paid in full redemption?






4. "Thine Holy One": 16:11
• There are plenty of other scriptures that suggest to us this same idea as my interpretation of 16. (that it is Messianic, describes Messiah preparing to enter human flesh, is Messiah speaking to His Father the Almighty One)



kjv@John:6:38 @ For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.

• Now we see Christ having come down from Heaven to do what He was going to do (the will of HIM that sent Him) (we have talked about Him having only done the will of the Father and that the Father has fully confirmed this).


• Along with Psalm 16 we would see that Christ not only came down to earth, Christ was also sent as far as Sheol (at least momentarily), that He was not left there by the Father and He was not dead long enough for His body to see corruption (begin to decay).


• Along with Psalm 16 we also see that after being sent as far as Sheol and that close to bodily corruption, Christ would be shown "the path of life" (resurrected life) (which amounts to being "in thy presence" and for Christ "at thy right hand")


• kjv@Romans:8:29 Paul suggest that Christ represents the first born of many brethren to follow "...that he might be the firstborn among many brethren".



kjv@Philippians:2:9 @ Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:

kjv@Philippians:2:10 @ That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;

kjv@Philippians:2:11 @ And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

• Surely Christ was highly exalted before He had ever been sent down into this flesh. kjv@Psalms:16:6 "The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage".


• Even more still is Christ exalted (in the eyes of man having come to them and preformed the Father's will completely) having become the first born to this "path of life/in Thy presence" of many brethren. kjv@Psalms:16:6 "The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage".


• kjv@Romans:8:29 also suggests to us "For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son" (In Christ it's not just His heritage we adopt but also portions of His spiritual inheritance)



kjv@Romans:8:17 @ And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

• kjv@Psalms:16:2-3 "...my goodness extendeth not to thee; But to the saints that are in the earth, and to the excellent, in whom is all my delight".


• Perhaps now you get a sense of just how significant this sending and accomplishing and resurrecting of Christ by the Almighty Father becomes to mankind.


• One scripture in particular I would like to explore is in Hebrews:2 I think will give this interpretation of 16: a much greater depth:



kjv@Hebrews:2:1 @ Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip.

kjv@Hebrews:2:2 @ For if the word spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward;

kjv@Hebrews:2:3 @ How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him;

kjv@Hebrews:2:4 @ God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?

• kjv@Psalms:16:4 puts it "Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god..."


• Paul puts it "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation" It's a valid question: How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?


• We ought to give it all the more heed, the word of the angels is stedfast, every transgression and disobedience (shall recieve) a just recompence of reward. Perhaps the biggest consequence of not paying heed is to not share in Christ's heritage and inheritance? God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?



kjv@Hebrews:2:9 @ But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.

kjv@Hebrews:2:10 @ For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.

kjv@Hebrews:2:11 @ For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren,

kjv@Hebrews:2:12 @ Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.

kjv@Hebrews:2:13 @ And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.

• "made a little lower" (He wasn't originally lower and certainly is not any lower today having accomplished all of this, "at thy right hand")


• but "made a little lower" and that is why 16:1 He is asking the Almighty for preservation, receiving counsel and instruction from Jehovah 16:7, 16:8 setting Jehovah always before Him (as if it takes Him remembrance of a previous proximity).


• "it became him" "to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings" "For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one"


• ? How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?



kjv@Hebrews:2:14 @ Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;

kjv@Hebrews:2:15 @ And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

kjv@Hebrews:2:16 @ For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.

kjv@Hebrews:2:17 @ Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.

kjv@Hebrews:2:18 @ For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.

• Jesus ("thine Holy One") in His great prayer to our Father is quoted as saying:



kjv@John:17:20 @ Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;

kjv@John:17:21 @ That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

kjv@John:17:22 @ And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:

kjv@John:17:23 @ I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

kjv@John:17:24 @ Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.

kjv@John:17:25 @ O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.

kjv@John:17:26 @ And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.





5. "Thine Holy One:" - Conclusion 16:
• A further note 16:4 before we conclude = "their drink offerings of blood will I not offer, nor take up their names into my lips"


• In terms of the psalm it is meant to be in the voice of "thine Holy One's" as He petitions His Almighty One. (Curious that it would be even mentioned as a possibility)


• "their drink offerings" ties back to "hasten after another god". If Christ was just in this for Himself, wanted to be Savior for as many people as possible, one would think the best approach would be to be "all inclusive". (That's what the intellectuals do) (all paths lead to heaven; right?)


• There are many intellectual inconsistencies found in the "all paths" position. (Oh so you believe in the drinking of blood for instance of innocent young virgin children) (there is a preoccupation false religions seem to have with innocence; taking what is innocent and stealing it away as if yours)


• There is also the inconsistency that "he that stands for all things in fact stands for no thing". (This was not a play for popularity by Jesus; not even His own native religion)


• (Christ was careful not to mingle His obedience (by personal observance nor simple mention) to His Father God with any other form of worship. His beliefs were presented on their own merit and confirmed in ways no other belief before or since have been confirmed. He did not resort to talking other religions down, but rather focused of human tendencies that corrupt true religion (corrupt all religions) instead.


• While we are on the subject of false gods and blood drinking, let me also point out the modern generation's fascination with vampires and zombies.


• While most people are smart enough to understand that these characters are just fictitious, few understand the spiritual danger surrounding such obsession and fanaticism given them.


• To hear their apologists describe the craze, it is a psychological necessity to face our fears of mortality, face our nightmares, to face justice, teenage sexuality, to find the defeat-able weakness of a seemingly impossible enemy to out think and survive where so many others have failed.


• To me the genre is saying that God has abandoned you, the strength found in Christ is insignificant and juvenile, that your very survival comes down to your own wit and resource and nothing other, which I do believe to be the very mindset of evil.


• I suppose facing one's mortality and nightmares and perceptions of justice/sexuality/other's weaknesses through such superficial means as novels and movies become important to a generation that refuses to deal with these matters through God and real spiritual revelation. (If superficial is what you seek superficial then is what you'll get)


• I also have grave concern for the authors that imagine these dark things and producers that make it seem real, the tremendous amount of money flowing into these cinematic and literary endeavors, the power that they hold over the industry and the quickly developing CGI they now employ. The audience is certainly there for it to succeed, which is very concerning, and if the parents of small children in the theaters then the parents of small children in their own living rooms.


• None of this should distract us from the beauty of our Psalms:16 considerations today though:


• The Michtam of David where the Holy One Sings to His Almighty One nearly a millennium before His departure to the children of men sojourning on a dangerous costly journey in our flesh.


• A journey through which He would experience the path of life as it stands after the fall of Adam, the various individuals paths of life that He would encounter, the miracles and wonders the Almighty would perform through Him in their lives as confirmation of this Holy One's obediences.


• A journey that would show the Holy One to be the divine light, sent into this world in order to reveal our heart's intent, to prove the vanity of our own works, to show that we would rather recoil back into the darkness and love the darkness more than His divine light.


• A journey that would cost Him His own precious human life to pay for the liberation of ours, the forgiveness of an insurmountable debt each of us owes, that extends His goodness to those saints whom He has called out.


• And in this song we see the Holy One relying on the Almighty for everything needed, protection, strength, guidance/instruction, immovability, gladness and joy, and in the end resurrection into the Almighty's very presence. Just as we ourselves should rely on the Almighty just the same.


• It is a most beautiful psalm once it is seen in this beautiful light. It is a Michtam, an engraving stamp thats image of Christ should now be engraved into our hearts and lives forever more.





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