Latest / Reformed Thinking / God’s Banner Over a Broken People (Psalm 60) | Charles Spurgeon

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God’s Banner Over a Broken People (Psalm 60) | Charles Spurgeon · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome to Reformed Thinking. We are opening up a a massive
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  volume of work today, a true classic in the library of
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  Christian literature. We're cracking open Charles
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  Spurgeon's The Treasury of David.
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  It really is a monumental work. I mean, Spurgeon didn't just
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  write a commentary. He he basically compiled a
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  library he pulls from the Puritan giants, the early Church
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  fathers, and of course his own deep well of theological insight
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  to open up the Psalms. And we aren't trying to tackle
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  the whole book today. That would be well, that would
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  take a lifetime. It would.
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  We're zooming in specifically on Psalm 60, the.
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  Psalm 60 is a fascinating choice.
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  It's a Mitchum of David, written in a moment of supreme crisis.
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  If you just look at the title alone, it sets a scene that is
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  absolutely terrifying for a national leader.
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  Right, the title is almost a chapter in itself.
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  It says this was written when David was striving with Aram
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  Naharam and with Aram Zoba, and when Joab returned and smote
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  12,000 Edomites in the Valley of Salt.
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  That that sounds like a lot of geography and a lot of fighting.
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  It's a war on 2 fronts, which is, you know, the nightmare of
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  any military commander. David is in the north fighting
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  the Syrian tribes. That's the Aram Naharam and Aram
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  Zoba reference. He's miles away from home with
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  the main army, and while his back is turned, Edom, his old
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  enemy from the South, seize an opportunity.
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  They invade Judah. So the king is away, the
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  defenses are thin, and the old enemy kicks in the back door.
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  Precisely. And the Kingdom isn't stable to
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  begin with. You have to remember, David
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  hasn't been king of all Israel for very long.
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  The civil war between the House of Saul and the House of David
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  has left the nation completely fractured.
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  The walls are cracked, the people are frightened.
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  It feels like the whole experiment of the Kingdom of God
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  is about to just collapse. That sets up the context for the
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  mission of our discussion today. Then we want to look at how a
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  believer handles a moment like that, when it's not just a bad
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  day, but a a national and personal disaster, when it feels
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  like God has actually cast you off.
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  And, crucially, how you move from that feeling of total
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  abandonment to the absolute confidence of victory.
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  Because that's what Psalm 60 does.
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  It starts with a trembling Earth and ends with valiant action.
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  Let's start where Spurgeon starts, then, which is with the
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  title. It has the strange phrase in it
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  upon Shoshana death. Yes, translated, that means the
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  Lily of testimony. The Lily of testimony.
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  That seems like a really odd name for a war song.
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  I mean, when I think of battle hymns, I don't think of flowers.
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  No, you don't. And Spurgeon points out that
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  contrast immediately. He notes that Psalm 45 was also
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  set to the tune of the lilies. But that was a wedding song.
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  It was about the king and his beauty.
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  Here in Psalm 60, we have the King and the mud and blood of
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  battle. So why the Lily?
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  What's the connection? Well, Spurgeon suggests a few
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  things. First, he references a line from
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  Macaulay's Song of the Huguenots.
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  It goes charge for the golden lilies, now upon them with the
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  Lance. So sometimes a flower is the
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  symbol on the flag, the national Ensign Ah.
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  I see a rallying symbol. Exactly.
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  But deeper than that, Spurgeon sees a connection to the
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  testimony. The Lily stands for something
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  lovely and cheering in the law, specifically the promise of God.
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  So even in the middle of the war, the title calls attention
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  to something beautiful. It calls attention to the fact
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  that the war is being fought for something beautiful.
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  We're dividing the spoil and bearing testimony to the glory
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  of God. It isn't violence for the sake
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  of violence. It's the protection of God's
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  Lily, His truth. The title also calls it a
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  miktom. What's the definition there?
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  Miktom means a golden secret or a Psalm intended to teach.
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  David isn't just venting his emotions here.
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  He's obeying the precept to teach the children of Israel.
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  He's recording this dark moment so that future generations can
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  understand how God works. Spudgeon has a great line about
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  this. He says golden secrets are to be
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  told on the housetops. That's right, And it's so
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  counterintuitive to us, isn't it?
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  We tend to want to hide our disasters or our difficult
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  times, but a victim says no. This is a golden lesson.
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  Victories and deliverances are not to be buried in silence.
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  If God pulls you out of the fire, you don't hide the burn
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  marks you show them as proof of His might.
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  OK, now before we get into the verses themselves, we have to
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  address this this bit of a numbers problem, right?
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  The title here says JOAB Smote 12,000 Edomites but if you go to
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  First Chronicles 18 it says Abishai Smote 18,000 and then in
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  Second Samuel 8 it gives the credit to David for 18,000.
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  It's the kind of apparent discrepancy that skeptics love
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  to jump on. But Spurgeon, and the Reformed
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  tradition in general, has a very clear way of handling this.
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  It comes down to the concept of headship and attribution.
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  Break that down for us. What does that mean?
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  Well, think about the hierarchy. David is the king.
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  He's the federal head of the nation Abushai and Joe Abar his
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  generals. In military history, we often
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  say Napoleon won the Battle of Austerlitz.
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  Did Napoleon personally kill every soldier?
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  Of course not, but the victory is attributed to him as the
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  head. That makes perfect sense.
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  So David gets the credit for the 18,000 because he's the king.
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  Correct. Now regarding Joab and Abishai,
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  they were brothers. They often worked in tandem.
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  It's very likely that Abishai began the engagement and broke
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  the enemy lines, accounting for the total of 18,000 casualties
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  in the whole operation. Joab, arriving perhaps a bit
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  later or commanding a specific division, was responsible for
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  cutting down 12,000 specifically on the field of battle.
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  So the numbers aren't contradictory, they're just
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  looking at different layers of the same conflict.
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  One is the total, 1 is a specific part of it.
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  Precisely. And Spurgeon also notes that the
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  12,000 might refer to the bodies left on the battlefield, while
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  the 18,000 includes those killed in the route and flight.
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  But the theological point is what really matters, that the
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  glory flows upward. The generals fight, but the King
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  gets the name. And in our theology, we fight
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  our battles, but Christ our King gets all the glory.
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  The setting for the slaughter, though, is so grim.
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  The Valley of Salt. It's a harsh, harsh place.
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  Spurgeon quotes the explorer Edward Robinson, who had visited
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  the area. He describes it as the Gore
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  South of the Dead Sea. It's a solid mass of rock salt
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  furrowed by rain, with actual cliffs of salt.
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  Wow. Robinson talks about the ground
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  being covered with debris and thistles.
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  It is a desolate, thirsty, stinging landscape.
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  The very stones beneath your feet are salt.
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  It's a place of intense heat and barrenness.
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  Can you imagine fighting a hand to hand battle in a literal salt
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  mine under the desert sun? That's the reality behind this
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  song. So David is in this absolute
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  pressure cooker. Let's look at the first first,
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  He doesn't start with. We can do this.
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  He starts with Oh God, thou has cast us off it.
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  Is a brutal opening. The Hebrew word implies being
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  treated as something foul or rancid, like a dead bowel torn
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  from a tree or something offensive that you just want to
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  get away from. And he blames God directly.
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  He says Thou has scattered us, Thou has been displeased.
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  And this is a core reformed concept.
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  David does not blame bad luck. He doesn't blame poor tactics or
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  the weather or his intelligence reports.
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  He traces the disaster directly to the first 'cause he knows
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  that if Israel is losing, it's because God is displeased.
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  That is a hard pill to swallow for a lot of modern listeners.
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  I think we like to think God only sends the good stuff, the
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  blessings. But that's not biblical
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  thinking. David's politics are at their
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  root, the politics of piety. He knows that the Edomites are
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  just the instrument. The real problem is that God has
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  withdrawn his hand. If God is with us, the Edomites
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  are nothing. If God has cast us off, then we
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  are utterly helpless. Spurgeon says to be cast off by
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  God is the worst calamity that can befall a man or a people.
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  But notice the nuance Spurgeon adds.
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  Right after that. He says the worst form of it is
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  when the person is not aware of it.
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  They're indifferent. The very fact that David is
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  crying out, Oh God, thou has cast us off proves that there's
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  still a relationship. A truly cast off soul doesn't
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  pray. They don't care.
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  That's a huge comfort, actually. The pain of feeling abandoned is
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  in itself a sign of spiritual life.
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  That is correct. It's the mourning and repentance
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  that shows the casting off is only partial and temporary, a
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  chastisement, not a final rejection.
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  In verse 2, David uses this really powerful earthquake
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  metaphor. Thou hast made the earth to
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  tremble. Thou hast broken it.
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  He's describing the state of the nation.
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  Remember the civil war I mentioned earlier?
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  The House of Saul against the House of David?
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  The country was split right down the middle.
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  The priests had been murdered by Saul.
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  The army was demoralized by the Philistines.
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  The civil authority was despicable.
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  So it wasn't a literal earthquake then?
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  He's speaking figuratively. It felt like 1 the earth, the
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  solid ground of their society, was cracking open.
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  Spurgeon compares it to a house that is shaking so badly the
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  walls are showing fissures ready to collapse.
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  And David prays heal the breeches thereof for it shaketh.
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  That is the prayer we all need, isn't it?
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  When we see the Church of the Nation divided cracking apart,
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  we we try to patch it with programs or politics or new
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  initiatives. David knows that only the one
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  who shook the earth can heal its breeches.
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  Then comes this phrase in verse 3 that I found really arresting.
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  Thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.
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  It's a very vivid image. The Hebrew concept is 1 of
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  infatuation or bewilderment. It's the idea of reeling,
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  staggering, not being able to walk a straight line.
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  Spurgeon calls it a potent potion.
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  He does. He uses a medical analogy.
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  He calls God the Great Physician.
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  And sometimes to cure a deep seated chronic disease, the
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  physician has to give a medicine that makes the patient stagger.
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  It's a purgative. It makes you sick to make you
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  well. The whine of astonishment.
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  It's like they're drunk on tragedy.
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  I think that's a great way to put it, Spurgeon says.
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  When grief becomes so habitual as to be our drink and to take
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  the place of our joys, then are we in an evil case Indeed?
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  It's that state where you're so overwhelmed by a stream of bad
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  news that you're just dizzy with it.
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  You can't think straight. But then right in the middle of
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  this drunkenness and shaking, we hit verse 4 and the tone just
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  changes completely. This is the pivot point of the
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  entire Psalm. Yeah, Thou has given a banner to
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  them that fear thee. A banner like a flag.
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  Yes, an Ensign. A standard.
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  Think about what a banner means on a chaotic battlefield.
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  It's a rallying point. You're scattered and confused.
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  You look for the banner. It tells you where your
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  commander is. It tells you who you are.
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  And Spurgeon makes a great point here.
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  He says God would not give them a banner if he meant to destroy
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  them. That is the logic of faith.
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  It's beautiful. You don't issue a regiment of
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  flag just before you send them to be massacred.
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  The banner is a proof of Commission.
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  It's a guarantee that there is a battle to be fought and a
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  victory to be won. He connects it to the truth.
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  The verse says that it may be displayed because of the truth.
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  Spurgeon immediately quotes the Latin motto Magna ES Veritas ET
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  prevalibit. Great is truth, and it will
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  prevail. The banner is not just a piece
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  of cloth, it is the gospel. It is the truth of God.
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  And he says it is to be displayed.
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  Yes, banners are for the breeze. They're not for the closet.
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  Spurgeon is very, very insistent on this point.
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  To be ashamed of the banner, to hide it, is a deadly sin.
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  Israel might have been trembling, but they were
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  commanded to lift up the standard.
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  So even when things are going wrong, even when we feel cast
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  off, we still have this banner of truth.
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  That's our only hope. We don't rally around our
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  feelings, which are like the shifting sand.
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  We rally around the truth, which is the unshakable rock.
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  Verse 5 brings in another heavy theological word, Beloved, that
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  thy beloved may be delivered. This touches on the doctrine of
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  election. David refers to the people as
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  God's beloved. Spurgeon notes that God saves
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  the nation not for the sake of the whole Mass, but for the sake
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  of the elect remnant, the intercede.
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  And the prayer is so urgent, it says, Save with thy right hand
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  and hear me. There's a real desperation
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  there, Spurgeon points out the order save first and hear
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  afterwards. It's like a drowning man crying
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  out. He doesn't want a conversation.
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  He wants a hand to pull him out of the water.
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  And David sees himself as interceding for these beloved
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  ones. Just as Christ intercedes for
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  us, David is a type of Christ. Here he is pleading for the
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  deliverance of his people, and he appeals to God's right hand
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  that is the symbol of strength and dexterity.
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  He's saying I need a miracle and I need it now.
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  So we've had the complaint and we've had the rallying cry of
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  the banner, and now in verse 6, God speaks.
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  This is the anchor of the whole Psalm.
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  God hath spoken in His Holiness. What does that mean exactly?
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  Why in His Holiness? Because God's holiness is the
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  absolute guarantee of His Word, He cannot lie.
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  It is against His nature. If He speaks, it is as good as
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  done, Spurgeon says. David stops looking at the
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  disaster, at the broken walls, the invading Edomites, and he
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  plugs his ears to the noise of the battle and listens to the
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  promise of God. And what follows is this, this
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  geography lesson. But it's not just a map, it's a
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  claim. David starts listing places.
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  I will divide Shechem and meet out the valley of Sukkhov.
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  This is what you could call the internal map.
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  These are places inside Israel. Shekhem and Sukhov were areas
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  that have been contested or shaky during the Civil War with
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  Saul's house with Ishbusheth. By listing them, David is saying
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  mine. It is a declaration of
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  ownership. He's claiming his inheritance by
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  faith by. Faith, that's the key.
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  He hasn't fully secured everything yet, but because God
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  has spoken, he treats it as already done.
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  He says I will divide, which is the act of a victor distributing
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  conquered land. Then he gets metaphorical with
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  the tribes. Gilead is mine and Manasseh is
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  mine. Ephraim also is the strength of
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  mine head. Ephraim was a massive warlike
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  tribe. Spurgeon calls it the helmet,
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  the strength of my head. David is looking at the military
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  might that is now unified under his rule and he's thanking God
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  for. It and Judah is my lawgiver.
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  That goes straight back to the prophecy in Genesis 49.
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  The scepter shall not depart from Judah is the seed of civil
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  power, of royal authority. So David is looking at his own
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  Kingdom, the military might from Ephraim and the civil authority
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  from Judah, and saying God has given this to me.
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  It is united, it is whole. But then he looks outside the
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  borders, and this is where the language gets, well, it gets
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  colorful. He starts mocking his enemies.
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  It's the confidence of faith turning into a holy contempt for
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  the enemy. He looks at Moab, Edom and
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  Philistia, the three nations that were causing all this
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  trouble. First, Moab, he says.
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  Moab is my wash pot. It is a shocking image.
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  In the ancient world, a wash pot or a basin was a vessel of
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  complete dishonor. It was what you used to wash the
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  dirt and filth off your feet after a long journey.
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  So he's reducing an entire nation to a foot bath?
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  That is correct. Moab was once this dangerous,
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  proud enemy. Now David says they are just a
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  pot for my slops. Spurgeon has a wonderful note on
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  this. He says Faith finds a wash pot
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  even in filthy Moab. What does he mean by that?
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  He means that even the wicked, in the end, will only function
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  to cleanse and purify the church.
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  They're reduced to servitude. Their opposition ultimately
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  serves God's purposes for His people.
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  Then he turns to Edom over Edom. Will I cast out my shoe?
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  There are two layers to this image.
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  First, it's a gesture of raw contempt.
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  It's like throwing your slipper at a slave.
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  Which is still a huge insult in many cultures today.
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  Very much so, but secondly, and maybe more to the point, it is a
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  legal symbol in the book of Ruth or Deuteronomy.
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  Removing the shoe symbolize the transfer of property or the
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  giving up of a right. By casting his shoe over Edom,
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  David is claiming it as property.
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  He's saying this land is mine. These people are my slaves.
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  So Edom, the very nation that invaded him, becomes his
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  personal possession? Yes.
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  The text implies a total effortless subjugation.
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  He doesn't even need a sword for Edom anymore, he just throws his
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  shoe at them. The fight is over in his mind.
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  And finally, philistia. Philistia triumph, though
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  because of me. That sounds sarcastic.
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  It is biting irony. Some translations render it as a
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  taunt, like go ahead, shout your war cry, now see what happens.
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  Or it could mean you will be forced to join my triumphal
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  procession. You will shout, but it will be
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  because you were walking in chains behind my chariot as a
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  conquered foe. It's a complete reversal.
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  He went from thou has cast us off to Moab is my wash pot.
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  And the pivot point was one sentence God hath spoken.
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  Once the believer truly grasps the promise of God, the enemy
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  shrinks. The terrifying Moabites become a
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  basin for dirty water. But there's still a practical
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  problem to solve. Edom has a stronghold.
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  Verse 9 asks who will bring me into the strong city?
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  Who will lead me into Edom? He is talking about Petra, the
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  city of Rock. I've seen pictures of Petra, the
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  incredible buildings carved right into the red cliffs.
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  It is a. Fortress Protected by nature
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  itself, it's accessible only by a long, narrow gorge called The
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  Sick. From a military standpoint, it
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  is, for all intents and purposes, impregnable.
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  You can hold off an entire army with just a handful of men.
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  So David has defeated them in the open battle in the Valley of
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  Salt, but now the remnants of their army have retreated up
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  into the rocks. And this brings David back to
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  reality. Joab and Abishai won in the
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  Valley, in the open field. But who can take the rock?
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  Human generalship cannot do it. Human bravery cannot do it.
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  So he asks who will lead me? And the answer in verse 10 is
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  Wilt not thou, O God? The same God who had cast them
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  off at the beginning of the Psalm.
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  This is the maturity of faith. David realizes that the hand
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  that struck him is the only hand that can save him.
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  He doesn't go looking for a new God.
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  He doesn't go looking for a political alliance with Egypt.
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  He goes back to the very God who disciplined him.
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  And he says in verse 11, give us help from trouble, for vain is
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  the help of man. Vain is the help of man.
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  Israel had learned this lesson the hard way, hadn't they?
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  They chose Saul because he looked like a king.
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  He was tall, strong, a man's man.
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  And he failed them miserably. And even Joab and Abishai, as
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  effective as they are, are just men.
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  They're just instruments. Spurgeon quotes a beautiful line
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  here. He says a man is stronger
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  standing on the Rock of Zion alone than with a multitude of
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  human props. We so often look for our human
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  props, the right experts, the right politicians, the right
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  financial advisors. David strips all of that away
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  against the city of Rock. You need the Rock of Ages.
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  Nothing else will do. This leads us to the final
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  verse, verse 12. Through God we shall do
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  valiantly, for he it is that shall tread down our enemies.
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  This is the summary statement of the Christian life and you have
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  to look at the perfect balance in it.
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  Through God we shall do valiantly.
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  Notice it does not say God will do it so we can sleep.
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  It says we shall do valiantly. There is action, there is
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  fighting, there is human effort and courage.
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  But it's through God. Correct.
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  The power source is divine, the activity is human.
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  We fight, but we fight with His strength, not our own.
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  And then the second-half for he it is that shall tread down our
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  enemies. This is the ultimate agency.
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  The foot that steps on the neck of the enemy is the foot of the
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  believer, but the weight that crushes them is the weight of
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  God. That's a fascinating and
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  important distinction. Spurgeon puts it this way.
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  Divine operation is the supreme motivation for human activity.
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  We don't fight to get God to work.
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  We fight because God is at work. Because we know he is treading
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  them down, we can do valiantly. It takes us right back to that
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  banner, doesn't it? We carry the flag, we March into
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  the battle, but the victory is guaranteed by the one who gave
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  us the flag in the first place. And that changes everything
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  about how you fight. If you think the outcome depends
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  entirely on your sword arm, you'll be paralyzed by fear when
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  you see a fortress like Petra. But if you know that God is the
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  one trading down the enemy, you can charge the gates with
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  confidence. So we have travelled such a long
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  way in just 12 short verses. We started with a broken earth
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  and a people who felt cast off. We ended with valiant soldiers
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  treading down their enemies. And the bridge between those two
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  realities is the holiness of God and the faith of His people
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  which lays hold of His promises. It's a remarkable progression
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  from the trembling earth to the valiant action.
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  It is the pattern of the Christian life, really.
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  We are often shaken, we often feel the whine of astonishment,
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  but we possess the banner of truth, and because of that, we
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  are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.
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  Spurgeon had that provocative thought about the banner, though
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  he was so insistent that it is given to be displayed.
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  Yes. And I think that's a question we
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  have to leave with you, our listener today.
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  If you are holding the banner. If you possess the truth, if you
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  have the gospel, but you are hiding it because you're going
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  through hard times. If you folded up the flag
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  because the earth is trembling in your life, are you actually
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  delaying your own victory? The banner is meant for the
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  wind, not the closet. Precisely.
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  Even in the valley of salt, Especially in the valley of
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  salt, that is when you unfurl it.
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  That's a challenging thought to end on.
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  We want to thank you for joining us on this deep dive into
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  Spurgeon's Treasury of David. It's a rich mine of gold and
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  we've barely scratched the surface, but we hope this look
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  at Psalm 60 has been an encouragement to you.
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  Keep the banner flying. We will see you next time on
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  reformed thinking.