1 Praise Jehovah, all nations,
Laud Him, all peoples.
2 For great is His lovingkindness over us,
And the troth of Jehovah endures for ever.
Hallelujah.
This shortest of the psalms is not a fragment, though some MSS. attach
it to the preceding and some to the following psalm. It contains
large "riches in a narrow room," and its very brevity gives force to
it. Paul laid his finger on its special significance, when he quoted
it in proof that God meant His salvation to be for the whole race.
Jewish narrowness was an after-growth and a corruption. The historical
limitations of God's manifestation to a special nation were means to
its universal diffusion. The fire was gathered in a grate, that it
might warm the whole house. All men have a share in what God does for
Israel. His grace was intended to fructify through it to all. The
consciousness of being the special recipients of Jehovah's mercy was
saved from abuse, by being united with the consciousness of being
endowed with blessing that they might diffuse blessing.
Nor is the psalmist's thought of what Israel's experience
proclaimed concerning God's character less noteworthy. As often,
lovingkindness is united with troth or faithfulness as twin stars
which shine out in all God's dealings with His people. That
lovingkindness is "mighty over us"--the word used for _being mighty_
has the sense of _prevailing_, and so "where sin abounded, grace did
much more abound." The permanence of the Divine Lovingkindness is
guaranteed by God's Troth, by which the fulfilment of every promise
and the prolongation of every mercy are sealed to men. These two fair
messengers have appeared in yet fairer form than the psalmist knew,
and the world has to praise Jehovah for a world-wide gift, first
bestowed on and rejected by a degenerate Israel, which thought that
it owned the inheritance, and so lost it.