Introduction: Good poetry, like novels, can describe things happening at the same time in different places and because scripture is apocalyptic as well as historical it can and does describe as yet in the future events as if they have already occurred. This allows us to see how the future is already in God’s eye!
8 but you, O LORD, are on high forever. – I’m using this to connect the two halves of the Psalm. Possibly go back and read yesterday’s devotional again.
9 For behold, your enemies, O LORD,
for behold, your enemies shall perish;
all evildoers shall be scattered. – this because of the tense of the verbs is obviously looking into the future!
10 But you have exalted my horn like that of the wild ox;
you have poured over me fresh oil. – This reads as a completed action from the past. For the Jew this had already happened, God had blessed them – when they met God’s conditions which He puts on His promises. They were exalted because of God’s promise to Abraham! Christians, when not just used as a loose title but who for those are real followers of Jesus, are already blessed because of a restored relationship between God and Christians – the result of God’s dealings in the Easter events.
11 My eyes have seen the downfall of my enemies;
my ears have heard the doom of my evil assailants.
12 The righteous flourish like the palm tree
and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
13 They are planted in the house of the LORD;
they flourish in the courts of our God. – This is seen as if it had already happened (in the future) because the author believed that God’s Promises were absolutely sure even if they included that which is still to happen in the future! Evil sent to the pit, goodness flourishing in God’s courts!
14 They still bear fruit in old age;
they are ever full of sap and green,
15 to declare that the LORD is upright;
he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him. – This is true of the present because God is the God who He is! I AM!
Malachi 3: 6 – “For I the LORD do not change”; Hebrews 13: 8 – “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
Prayer: Thank You, Thank You, Father God!