We were just remembering our Lord’s death on the cross two days ago. We read about His terrible suffering. His body was given for us and for our sins. It is now Easter Sunday morning… But before we rush to the tomb to look for His buried body and before we shout a loud Allelujah, let us hear of His last cry on the cross (v.19-21).
When I studied this psalm I thought about these verses as ‘The final prayer on the cross’. I want you to see how it is structured in its form and what the Lord prays for. We will also see how His prayer is fulfilled.
But be not thou far from me
“But be not thou far from me,
O LORD: O my strength, haste thee to help me.
Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion’s mouth:
for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.” v. 19-21
The prayer is framed between two words: But & for. It starts “But be not thou far from me”. It is like a but at the end of all the suffering Lord Jesus endured. The face of the Father was hidden from Him and He felt abandoned and forsaken, yet He knows that the Father is not afar. Our God is never too far from us. He is omnipresent.
The prayer ends with “for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.” This is almost like our Lord’s AMEN. The for of His prayer is as if He was saying: the reason why I bring this prayer to you Father, is that thou hast heard me. Despite all the sins of this world that I carried, all the horns of the unicorns, thou hast heard.
This is the frame of this prayer: Be not thou far from me – thou hast heard me. We can see how this can apply as a framework for any prayer. We plead with our God with our but, we call upon Him for He has heard us through Jesus blood. God always listens. We can always call upon His name. He is never too far.
How practical and applicable is the prayer that we find in verse 19? It is very well worth memorising. “O LORD: O my strength, haste thee to help me.” How many times in our life it is the only hope to call upon Him?
We have to always remember, that when we have no more strength of our own, our God is ready to become our strength. Do you feel oppressed and afflicted? Think about the cross and call like Lord Jesus did. “Haste thee to help me.” He will listen and answer.
Now we established the ‘but’ and ‘for’ of this prayer, its framework of pleading and reasoning with God. We also see that powerful invocation to the LORD, let us know see the specifics for what is Jesus praying for. He is asking three things:
| Deliver | my soul | from the sword; |
| [Deliver] | my darling | from the power of the dog. |
| Save | me | from the lion’s mouth: |
Lord Jesus prays for His soul, for His darling and for Himself. He asks to be delivered and saved. The things that threat Him are the sword, the power of the dog and the lion’s mouth. Note how the pivotal subject of His prayer is His darling. Lord Jesus prays for His bride, for His beloved church. He prays for you!
This is why He came to earth, the purpose of His mission and the reason why He is on that cross. He came to deliver and save you. His church, His darling is to be saved from the power of the dog. She is to be given freedom from sin. How is this accomplished?
He prays for His soul to be delivered from the sword. His Spirit remains Holy and spotless throughout all His ministry up to the very end on the cross. No lie has ever come out of His lips. No false accusation can cause His soul to be affected. Our spotless Saviour is delivered from the sword. We can take any Scripture and every single law that can be found in the Bible and be assured that the Lord has fulfilled it.
Remember how men were driven out of the garden of Eden, God placed at the east of it Cherubims and “a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life”. The soul of Christ went right through that flaming sword, fulfilling God’s law and absorbing God’s wrath for the sins of this world. This is what He prays for. “Deliver my soul from the sword.” He goes right through to the centre of the Garden of Eden. He is that sweet fruit of the tree of life. He is the eternal life.
Finally, Lord Jesus prays: “Save me from the lion’s mouth.” This is the only way to make this prayer complete. In order for His sacrifice to be accepted and for His darling to be saved from the power of sin, the body of Christ needs to remain alive. It cannot stay buried in the grave.
We can see how this whole prayer, all three requests are fulfilled in Lord’s death and resurrection. “Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.” Acts 2:27
I will declare thy name unto my brethren
We can now see our Lord resurrected and in His glorious victory over death. He is risen and He is alive.
“I will declare thy name unto my brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee”. v. 22
He is the one who calls His people unto Him. He declares the name of the Lord to all them for whom He died. We remember what happens when Peter has this divine revelation of who Lord Jesus is. He says: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Mt. 16:16.
This revelation is declared unto Him. Our Master tells Peter: “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.”
The Son and the Father and the Holy Spirit are one God. “The Lord our God is one Lord”. Mk. 12:29. Therefore the Son can reveal Himself to whom He pleases. He declares the name unto all His brethren.
We find one more incredible promise in this verse. “In the midst of the congregation will I praise thee”. Wherever His people meet together to praise Him and worship Him, there is this wonderful presence of the Holy Spirit. Our Lord is in the midst. “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” Mt. 18:20
Ye that fear the LORD, praise him
Let us now try to identify who is His darling that Lord Jesus was praying for and for whom He died on the cross.
“Ye that fear the LORD, praise him; all ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him; and fear him, all ye the seed of Israel.”
We read earlier in verse 22, the Lord referred to His darling, as “my brethren”. Now in verse 23, He seems to expand to further clarify who are they that belong to Him. “Ye that fear the LORD”. We are only dust of the earth. We need to be restored to that reverence of Him, who is the Almighty God, who is the Creator of all the earth and heaven, of all things visible and invisible. His presence requires from us reverence.
“Ye that fear the LORD, praise him”. The fear of the LORD will result in us praising him. We will trust in him, we will pray to him, we will rely on him. We will live our lives trying to show with our actions that we belong to Him. The true praise is interconnected with the fear of the LORD. Faith needs to bare fruit.
They who have the fear of the LORD, are the born-again seed of Jacob. We are the children of promise that was given to Abraham. We are God’s darling. The seed of Jacob and the seed of Israel will live in the fear of the LORD. This is the only fear that needs to be present in our lives. This is how He is glorified as our God.
One more promise comes from these words of Jesus. “All ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him; and fear him, all ye the seed of Israel.” Nothing will be lost, for He is God. We read in the gospel of John: “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me;” J. 6:37 All the seed of Jacob and all the seed of Israel will come to fear him and glorify him.
We may ask how is He glorified? How do we glorify Him? Lord Jesus prays: “Father, glorify thy name.” J. 12:28. The name is glorified, when we believe in the Son of God. He is glorified, when we trust that He is the Christ and only what He had done for us on the cross is our justification. Believe that God was revealed to us through Jesus Christ and glorify Him!
