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All the end of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him, for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations.
Psalm 22:27-28
From the earliest pages of the Bible we are told that the Lord rules the nations. This is right because he is their creator and sustainer. But we are also told that because of sin and the resulting exclusion from his presence, the nations are in need of salvation, which cannot be achieved through their own efforts. The solution to this humanly-unsolvable problem comes in the form of divine promises made to Abram, so that through him, all people on earth will be blessed. (Gen 12:3)
As we read the Old Testament, we are constantly reminded of this divine redemption plan, however over and over we see only the repetition of promise, without fulfilment. This is where we find David in Psalm 22, one of the most famous chapters of the Psalter, in despair crying out to the Lord. He is surrounded by mockers and persecutors who relish in his suffering and laugh at his appeals to his god. And yet he persists in his cries, knowing that his God who seems presently silent is on his throne, worthy of trust as he has been in the past.
David begs for quick deliverance, for rescue from the wild ones who surround him. (Ps 22:19-21). Such is his confidence in the Lord that immediately after this petition David speaks about his future declaration of his goodness and exhortation for his audience to do the same. (v22-25).
But that is not all. In David’s envisioned future, not only will he boldly and thankfully worship the Lord because of his redemption, and not only will the descendants of Jacob join his praise, in verse 27 he declares that this worship will be truly international! Reminding the readers of God’s promises to Abram and the creation-wide redemption towards which we are heading, David sees the ends of the earth, the nations bowing down before the Lord, the one who has dominion over them all.
What a turnaround! David’s perspective in Psalm 22 radically shifts from his anguish in suffering and forsakeness to declarations of international praise – all founded on the promises of the Lord and the evidence of his faithfulness to those promises.
While the last section of the Psalm is marvellously positive and an appropriate response to the goodness and faithfulness of the Lord, it cannot go unnoticed that this is all described in the future tense. In my English translation the word ‘will’ occurs eleven times in the last ten verses – David is looking forward to these wonderful things, not seeing them himself. He confidently longs to see these things happen, rather than accurately recalls them happening to him now. Psalm 22 doesn’t contain any new promises, just a repetition of the ones that the Lord has already made.
For those promises to be fulfilled, we need to wait another thousand years beyond Psalm 22, for the one who is unjustly despised and scorned, who cries out to God using the words of Psalm 22. The one who is mocked by those who witness his dying breath, who defeats death in his bodily resurrection. The one in whose death redemption to the sinner is declared to the nations, as his gospel is proclaimed to the ends of the earth. The one around whom a great multitude from every nation, tribe, people and language stand and cry out in unison Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. (Rev 7:10). He, Jesus, is the endpoint of the trajectory of promise, the fulfilment of God’s redemptive plan, through which we, as people from all nations are able to be in the presence of, and worship the nation-creating and nation-ruling Lord.
At times, we may feel like the task of taking the gospel to the nations is overwhelming or just takes too many resources. Psalm 22 reminds us that the nations hearing the gospel and responding in thanks and praise is, and always has been, the plan of God. Our task is to joyfully join those who have gone before us in obediently participating in this great task, so that the nations may come to know him.
Rev Canon Peter Sholl
International Director, CMS Australia
