1For the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. O LORD, the king rejoices in Your strength. How greatly he exults in Your salvation! 2You have granted his heart’s desire and have not withheld the request of his lips. Selah 3For You welcomed him with rich blessings; You placed on his head a crown of pure gold. 4He asked You for life, and You granted it— length of days, forever and ever. 5Great is his glory in Your salvation; You bestow on him splendor and majesty. 6For You grant him blessings forever; You cheer him with joy in Your presence. 7For the king trusts in the LORD; through the loving devotion of the Most High, he will not be shaken. 8Your hand will apprehend all Your enemies; Your right hand will seize those who hate You. 9You will place them in a fiery furnace at the time of Your appearing. In His wrath the LORD will engulf them, and the fire will consume them. 10You will wipe their descendants from the earth, and their offspring from the sons of men. 11Though they intend You harm, the schemes they devise will not prevail. 12For You will put them to flight when Your bow is trained upon them. 13Be exalted, O LORD, in Your strength; we will sing and praise Your power.
Matthew Henry's Commentary
Thanksgiving for victory. (1-6) Confidence of further success. (7-13) 1-6 Happy the people whose king makes God's strength his confidence, and God's salvation his joy; who is pleased with all the advancements of God kingdom, and trusts God to support him in all he does for the service of it. All our blessings are blessings of goodness, and are owing, not to any merit of ours, but only to God's goodness. But when God's blessings come sooner, and prove richer than we imagine; when they are given before we prayed for them, before we were ready for them, nay, when we feared the contrary; then it may be truly said that he prevented, or went before us, with them. Nothing indeed prevented, or went before Christ, but to mankind never was any favour more preventing than our redemption by Christ. Thou hast made him to be a universal, everlasting blessing to the world, in whom the families of the earth are, and shall be blessed; and so thou hast made him exceeding glad with the countenance thou hast given to his undertaking, and to him in the prosecution of it. The Spirit of prophecy rises from what related to the king, to that which is peculiar to Christ; none other is blessed for ever, much less a blessing for ever. 7-13 The psalmist teaches to look forward with faith, and hope, and prayer upon what God would further do. The success with which God blessed David, was a type of the total overthrow of all Christ's enemies. Those who might have had Christ to rule and save them, but rejected him and fought against him, shall find the remembrance of it a worm that dies not. God makes sinners willing by his grace, receives them to his favour, and delivers them from the wrath to come. May he exalt himself, by his all-powerful grace, in our hearts, destroying all the strong-holds of sin and Satan. How great should be our joy and praise to behold our Brother and Friend upon the throne, and for all the blessings we may expect from him! yet he delights in his exalted state, as enabling him to confer happiness and glory on poor sinners, who are taught to love and trust in him.