Psalm 72
Here God’s word, this is Psalm
72 and it’s of Solomon or it is by Solomon. And this is his
prayer. He says, give to the king your
justice, oh God, and your righteousness to the royal son. May he judge
your people with righteousness and your poor with justice. Let the mountains bear prosperity
for the people, and the hills in righteousness. May he defend
the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the
children of the needy, and crush the oppressor. May they fear
you while the sun endures, and as long as the moon throughout
all generations. May he be like rain that falls
on the mown grass, like showers that water the earth. In his
days, may the righteous flourish, and peace abound till the moon
be no more. May he have dominion from sea
to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth. May desert
tribes bow down before him and his enemies lick the dust. May
the kings of Tarshish and of the coastlands render him tribute. May the kings of Sheba and Seba
bring gifts. May all the kings fall down before
him. All nations serve him. For he
delivers the needy when he calls the poor and him who has no helper. He has pity on the weak and the
needy and he saves the lives of the needy from oppression
and violence. He redeems their life and precious is their blood
in his sight. Long may he live. May the gold
of Sheba be given to him. May prayer be made for him continually. and blessings invoked for him
all the day. May there be abundance of grain
in the land. On the tops of the mountains
may it wave. May its fruit be like Lebanon
and may people blossom in the cities like the grass of the
field. May his name endure forever,
his fame continue as long as the sun. May people be blessed
in him. All nations call him blessed.
Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who alone does wondrous
things. Blessed be his glorious name
forever. May the whole earth be filled
with his glory. Amen and amen. The prayers of David, the son
of Jesse, are ended. Amen. This is God’s holy word. One time I wrote a paper And
after receiving it back, it had red marks on it. And the comment
first at the bottom of the paper was, you put in too many exclamation
points. And by the time you use that
many, they mean nothing at the end of the paper. And so I don’t
use exclamation points. But another friend of mine who’s
an editor says I use too many commas. That’s another story. But do you notice how many exclamation
points there are in Psalm 72? It’s like the word awesome. You
know, you’re only allowed to use the word awesome about three
or four times a year, because after that many times, you’ve
overused it, and there is no greater word than the word awesome,
and so everything can’t be awesome, but that’s what comes out of
our lips. Psalm 72 is a Psalm that speaks
with exclamation about the greatness of David’s son Solomon, But really
it’s telescoping or it’s looking into the future to the greater
son of David, Jesus Christ. Think back to your knowledge
of Israel’s history. God began forming a people for
himself, a people for his own glory in Abraham. He called Abram
out of the land of Ur of the Chaldeans. He brought him into
the land of Canaan. He established him there. We
read through the scriptures and we know of the life of the patriarchs. We see after a couple hundred
years that the people of God went to Egypt during a famine.
They stayed there. They were enslaved by Pharaoh.
They built his cities and his granaries and his other monuments. They cried out to God for mercy.
He heard their cry. He raised up Moses, who delivered
them in the Exodus. They endured the wilderness because
of their sin. A generation died, and another
generation raised up another, and that generation entered the
promised land. And you know the story of the
Bible as it progresses, that God’s people lived in the promised
land. They had their leaders. They had their Joshuas and their
Moseses. They had their priests. They
had their religious leaders. But they decided one day that
they did not want to be ruled by Yahweh. They wanted a king. And they wanted a king like the
kings of the other nations. And God said to them, isn’t it
good enough that you have me? And they said, no, we want a
king. And God said, you’ll be ruled by a king. You’ll be ruled
by a king and he will tax you. He will oppress you. He will
put your children to work and it will not go well for you.
And yet they wanted a king. They wanted a king with qualities,
qualities not of Yahweh’s character, not of God’s kingly qualities,
but they wanted kings like all the other wicked pagan nations
had. And so God gave them a king.
And you remember their first one, Saul. He was a wicked king. He was not a man after God’s
own heart, and so God put him away as king, and while he still
ruled, he, through Samuel, chose the next one. And you remember
Jesse lined up all his boys, big and tall and handsome? Not
this one, not this one, not this one. Don’t you have any other
boys? Well, there’s David. the ruddy one out in the field,
keeping the sheep. And he comes and he is anointed
and he is the next king over Israel. He’s a man after God’s
own heart. And then after him comes Solomon.
And this Psalm tonight speaks of Solomon’s desires as king
over Israel. And there are five sections to
this psalm that help us understand what Solomon desired, what Solomon
wanted in his kingship. Now, you remember Solomon. God
came to him and said, your father was a good man, a man after my
own heart. He followed my ways. He kept my covenant. He was a
good guy. Did some bad things, we know that, but overall, he
was a man after God’s own heart. And so he says to Solomon, what
do you want? And Solomon says, I want wisdom. I want to judge
between right and wrong. I want to work through the issues
with the people. And so he prays for that and
God grants it. Well, here’s another set of his
prayers. And the first thing we see that he asked for, that
he wants, he desires, we find in verses one through four, he
wants a kingdom of righteousness. And he says in one through four,
give the king your justice, oh God, and your righteousness to
the royal son. May he judge your people with
righteousness and your poor with justice. Let the mountains bear
prosperity for the people and the hills in righteousness. May he defend the cause of the
poor of the people and give deliverance to the children of the needy
and crush the oppressor. You know, we just got through
a presidential election, what, a year and a half ago, and we’re
probably fixing to get into another one, wouldn’t you think? And
we have these little jingles we hear, you know, America needs
change or we need to make America great again. Or I was reminded
with the death of Barbara Bush this week of a kinder, gentler
America. You remember that from the 1980s? Some of you do, at least. But
we have these political platforms, these jingles. And you know what
the jingle for Solomon was? Righteousness. I want to do things
right. I want to do things in a just
way. way. And you can see through
the progression of verses one through four of Psalm 72, if
Solomon can possess righteousness, he can then judge with it. And
if he judges with righteousness, then the nation of Israel will
bear the fruit of that. Could you imagine living in a
nation where you had a righteous king? who ruled in righteousness. He made laws in righteousness.
He judged the laws in righteousness. And the fruit of that was a pleasant
place to live. What a wonderful joy that would
be. And we know that for a time under
Solomon’s rule, that the kingdom of Israel, the 12 tribes of Israel,
they are ruled well, things go well, but it disintegrated. Solomon
went after other women. He went after foreign wives.
He went after concubines. He went after other gods. He
built high places. He worshiped other gods than
Yahweh. And it did not go well for the
people of God. But nevertheless, here he prays
for a kingdom of righteousness. You know, we’re called to pray
for our rulers. We’re called to pray for those who rule over
us. You know, we should pray for our parents. We should pray
for the elders of the church. We should pray for our civil
magistrates, our judges, our law enforcement folks. We should
pray for these people. And what’s the best thing we
can pray for? Is that they would live and rule and reign in righteousness. But you know, we are served by
humans. We’re served by humans. And what
begins to happen when a person rises to power? Their head gets
a little big, their ego gets a little thicker, their self-centeredness
begins to grow. As we speak of in today’s terms,
there’s narcissistic tendencies pop up. And so what happens to
Solomon? He no longer needs God. He no longer needs the people
around him. And he raises himself up as if he himself was a God. And aren’t we thankful that though
we look to Solomon as a great king, even David, we can look
to Christ, a greater king. a greater king of greater and
more perfect righteousness. Well, verses five through seven,
take us through a second perspective. And that perspective is in addition
to the kingdom of righteousness, we have an eternal kingdom. You know, we serve are served
by kings with time limits. Every four years, we get a new
king, we get a new president. It’s a certain way, and under
monarchies around the world, it’s, well, not so great. Under
dictators, or people who steal power, or people like some of
the dictators and rulers we see around, they just add a few more
years by their rule. We’re talking at lunch today,
it’s not how many vote for you, it’s who’s counting your votes.
That’s what really matters. But we, in Christ, have an eternal
kingdom. What does Solomon pray for here
in verses five through seven? Well, he says, may they fear
you, may they fear the king while the sun endures. As long as the
moon throughout all generations, may he be like rain that falls
on the mown grass, like showers that water the earth. In his
days, may the righteous flourish and peace abound till the moon
be no more. Oh, what do we cry out when we
think we have a good president? We see them in their first term
and we say, four more years. We want that peace and that pleasantness,
the economic stability, the turn of the tide. We want it to last.
But kingdoms come, kingdoms go. Look in your history book. Every
king who’s ever reigned, dead. Most kingdoms that have risen
have fallen. Most nations have changed hands,
they’ve changed names, they’ve been up and they’ve been down,
and some exist no more. But God’s kingdom, Jesus’ kingdom,
lasts as long as the sun shines and the moon gives off its light.
It’s a kingdom that never ends. Well, we’re going to move through
these kind of quickly. The third stanza we come to is verses eight
through 11, and it speaks of a wide and expansive kingdom. So we have a kingdom of righteousness.
We have an eternal kingdom, and now we have an expansive kingdom.
Verses eight through 11 say this, may he have dominion from sea
to sea and from the river, that’s Euphrates, to the ends of the
earth, may desert tribes bow down before him and his enemies
lick the dust. May the kings of Tarshish and
of the Coastlands render him tribute. May the kings of Sheba
and Seba bring him gifts. May all the kings fall down before
him. All nations serve him. This is a kingdom where the borders
expand from the east to the west, to the north and to the south.
David, remember, expanded the kingdom, and it got closer and
closer in its borders to what God had promised, but Solomon
takes it to its completion. And so he prays that his borders
would be extended, but he also prays that peoples, all the peoples
of the earth would come and worship. Some of you maybe listen to classical
music, you’ve heard What is that wonderful piece, The Queen of
Sheba Visits Solomon? Is it by George Frederick Handel?
A wonderful, beautiful piece. And you think about all the glory,
all the wonder as people looked in on Solomon’s efforts, his
building campaigns and his rule over Israel. This is an expansive
kingdom where people from all over the earth came and they
looked in They looked in on what Solomon was doing. And all of
this points us to that wonderful passage in Revelation chapter
11, where we read these words, the kingdom of the world has
become the kingdom of our Lord and his Christ, and he shall
reign forever and ever. And so this kingdom of God is
an expansive kingdom. It’s an eternal kingdom. It’s
a kingdom of righteousness. The fourth stanza takes us I
think to a tender spot. Verses 12 through 14 teach us
that it’s a kingdom of kindness. Verse 12 says he delivers the
needy when he calls. poor and him who has no helper.
He has pity on the weak and the needy and he saves the lives
of the needy from the oppression and violence. He redeems their
life and precious is their blood in his sight. We all live in
a world that has fallen, it is broken by sin, it is bruised,
it is nicked up by iniquity and there is oppression and and there
is great need in the world around us. People go hungry. People
do not have shelter. Storms and other plagues befall
us. And there are times when our
fellow human beings must cry out for help. And Solomon desires
to be a king who can meet these needs materially and spiritually
when they cry out. He is their helper. and he is
their defender and even their provider. And so you see in a
little way how Solomon is very God-like. There’s a fifth perspective
we find in 15, 16, and 17. It’s a prosperous kingdom. I
like to make this little joke, and hear me out before you think
I’m wacko. But there is a, I heard that
groan. There is a truth to the prosperity
gospel, not the one that’s being preached down at this place and
that place and hither and yon and by these jet setting ministers
with their gold watches and their Bentleys and whatever else. But
there is a sense if we love God and serve God and live for God,
if we obey God, that prosperity will come to our lives. Now,
I don’t mean that name it and claim it type. I don’t mean all
that. But God’s kingdom is a prosperous
kingdom. Verse 15 says, long may he live. May gold of Sheba be given to
him. May prayer be made for him continually
and blessing invoked for him all the day. May there be abundance
of grain in the land and on the tops of the mountains may it
wave. May its fruit be like Lebanon
and may people blossom in the cities. And then verse 17 says,
may his name endure forever. His fame continue as long as
the sun. May people be blessed in him. All nations call him blessed.
You know, we speak very often about God blessing his covenant
people. And very simply put, if you want
to understand how God blesses his covenant people, just think
of two words. He gives you grapes and grandkids. He blesses you
with the fruit of your labor. He blesses you with the fruit
of your womb. He blesses you with the necessities
of life. Now, you may not be rich. You
may not be poor. You may be somewhere in between.
Some Christians have lots. Some have very little. But the
understanding, the prosperity, I mean, is a wide prosperity. You have joy. You have harvest. You have family, you have church,
you have work for your hands to do. And you have the simple
blessings of life. We don’t measure prosperity and
the width of our widescreen or the speed of our microprocessors,
though those things are a joy to us and are helpful. We don’t
determine it by the amount of horsepower under our hood, though
God may sometimes give us those things. But we look at just the
normal, material and even spiritual blessings. And in the kingdom
of God, in the kingdom of Israel under Solomon, one could prosper
in all the ways that God meant. So what do we think about this?
You think about these verses, these prayers, these features,
these attributes of a kingdom, and you think of it in terms
of Israel’s kingdom, Solomon’s rule, David’s rule. Now we know
what happened to Israel. After David and Solomon sinned,
the kingdom was split. Judah, one tribe, went with the
south and went with David, and then the northern kingdoms carried
on. And as you read through your
history of Israel, they were good kings. They did what was
right in the eyes of the Lord, and God blessed, God prospered.
But there were many kings who did what was wicked in the sight
of God. And it led to the southern kingdom,
or first the northern kingdom, being exiled by Assyria, and
then the southern kingdom, Judah, being exiled by Babylon. The
glory of God departed, the temple in the city of Israel, or Jerusalem,
was destroyed, and God got the attention of his people. But
he got the attention of his people in a strange way. And the strange
way he got their attention was to point them to a greater kingdom,
greater than the borders of Israel, greater than the listing of rivers
and seas and peoples and lands and deserts that encompassed
the expansive kingdom. And he told about his own son,
the Lord Jesus Christ, who would come and would rule in righteousness.
He would rule in righteousness, an eternal kingdom, an expansive
kingdom, a kingdom of kindness, a kingdom of redemption, a prosperous
kingdom. a kingdom that would take a bankrupt
people, a spiritually bankrupt people, and would give them his
own son’s righteousness in place of their wickedness. And what
other fitting way could you end a psalm like this than to say
with exclamation point, the wonderful doxological words we find in
verses 18 through 20, blessed be the Lord. the God of Israel,
who alone does wondrous things. Blessed be his glorious name
forever. May the whole earth be filled
with his glory. Amen and amen. Pray with me. Our Lord and God,
we thank you so much for this word from The Psalms, we thank
you for giving us a kingdom that cannot be shaken, a kingdom that
will never end. You give us a king that will
not fail us, a king that will rule and reign and judge and
serve in righteousness. Lord, what a great blessing that
is. Whatever we face on this earth, whatever we see in this
life is no match. And so we look to King Jesus.
as our great king who has subdued us unto himself, who has written
his law upon our hearts that we might please him as his royal
subjects. Give us your grace to see this,
to taste it, to enjoy it, and to be your faithful children
who cry day after day, long live King Jesus. We ask it in his
name, amen.