Understanding Psalm 102:19-22: God’s Compassion

Psalm 102:19-22

For He looked down from the height of His sanctuary;
From heaven the Lord viewed the earth,

To hear the groaning of the prisoner,
To release those appointed to death,

To declare the name of the Lord in Zion,
And His praise in Jerusalem,

When the peoples are gathered together,
And the kingdoms, to serve the Lord.

Spurgeon

“For he hath looked down from the heights of his sanctuary,” or “leaned from the high place of his holiness,” “from heaven did the LORD behold the earth,” looking out like a watcher from his tower. What was the object of this leaning from the battlements of heaven? Why this intent gaze upon the race of men? The answer is full of astounding mercy; the Lord does not look upon mankind to note their grandees, and observe the doings of their nobles, but “to hear the groaning of the prisoner; to loose those that are appointed to death.” Now the groans of those in prison so far from being musical are very horrible to hear, yet God bends to hear them: those who are bound for death are usually ill company, yet Jehovah deigns to stoop from his greatness to relieve their extreme distress and break their chains. This he does by providential rescues, by restoring health to the dying, and by finding food for the famishing: and spiritually this deed of grace is accomplished by sovereign grace, which delivers us by pardon from the sentence of sin, and by the sweetness of the promise from the deadly despair which a sense of sin had created within us. Well, may those of us praise the Lord who were once the children of death, but are now brought into the glorious liberty of the children of God. The Jews in captivity were in Haman’s time appointed to death, but their God found a way of escape for them, and they joyfully kept the feast of Purim in memorial thereof; let fill souls that have been set free from the crafty malice of the old dragon with even greater gratitude magnify the Lord of infinite compassion.

Verse 21.

“To declare the name of the LORD in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem.” Great mercy displayed to those greatly in need of it, is the plainest method of revealing the attributes of the Most High. Actions speak more loudly than words; deeds of grace are a revelation even more impressive than the most tender promises. Jerusalem restored, the church re-edified, desponding souls encouraged, and all other manifestations of Jehovah’s power to bless, are so many manifestoes and proclamations put up upon the walls of Zion to publish the character and glory of the great God. Every day’s experience should be to us a new gazette of love, a court circular from heaven, a daily dispatch from the headquarters of grace. We are bound to inform our fellow Christians of all this, making them helpers in our praise, as they hear of the goodness which we have experienced. While God’s mercies speak so eloquently, we ought not to be dumb. To communicate to others what God has done for us personally and for the church at large is so evidently our duty, that we ought not to need urging to fulfill it. God has ever an eye to the glory of his grace in all that he does, and we ought not willfully to defraud him of the revenue of his praise.

Verse 22.

“When the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the Lord.” The great work of restoring ruined Zion is to be spoken of in those golden ages when the heathen nations shall be converted unto God; even those glorious times will not be able to despise that grand event, which, like the passage of Israel through the Red Sea, will never be eclipsed and never cease to awaken the enthusiasm of the chosen people. Happy will the day be when all nations shall unite in the sole worship of Jehovah, then shall the histories of the olden times be read with adoring wonder, and the hand of the Lord shall be seen as having ever rested upon the sacramental host of his elect: then shall shouts of exulting praise ascend to heaven in honor of him who loosed the captives, delivered the condemned, raised up the desolations of ages, and made out of stones and rubbish a temple for his worship.

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Enduring Word

He looked down from the height of His sanctuary: The psalmist pictured God bending down low from heaven:

· To see (viewed the earth).

· To hear (the groaning of the prisoner).

· To act (to release those appointed to death).

· To proclaim (the name of the LORD in Zion).

· To gather (when the peoples are gathered together).

· To receive service (peoples are gathered…to serve the LORD). (Guzik)

i. Horne took these words and made them into a fit prayer for the afflicted believer today: “Look down, O Lord Jesus, yet once again upon thy servants, still under the dominion of death, and the bondage of corruption; loose these chains, even these also, O Lord, and bring us forth into the glorious liberty of thy children.”

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Barnes

Verse 19

For he hath looked down from the height of his sanctuary – From his high and holy dwelling-place, in heaven. The word here rendered “looked down,” means, in Kal, to lay upon or over; then, in Niphil, to lie out over anything, to project; and then, to bend forward. It then means to bend or incline forward with an intention to look at anything, as from a window, Genesis 26:8. Compare Psalms 14:2. See also Psalms 85:12, note; 1 Peter 1:12, note.

Verse 20

To hear the groaning of the prisoner – Meaning here, probably, the captives in Babylon; those who were held as prisoners there, and who were subjected to such hardships in their long captivity. See the notes at Psalms 79:11.

To loose those that are appointed to death – Margin, as in Hebrew, “the children of death.” Compare the notes at Matthew 1:1. This may mean either those who were sentenced to death; those who were sick and ready to die; or those who, in their captivity, were in such a state of privation and suffering that death appeared inevitable. The word rendered “loose” means, properly, to “open,” applied to the mouth, for eating, Ezekiel 3:2; or in song, Psalms 78:2; or for speaking, Job 3:1; – or the ear, Isaiah 50:5; or the hand, Deuteronomy 15:8; or the gates of a city, a door, etc., Deuteronomy 20:11. Them it means to set free, as by opening the doors of a prison, Isaiah 14:17; Job 12:14. Here it means to “set free,” to deliver. Compare Isaiah 61:1.

Verse 22

When the people are gathered together – When they shall be brought from their dispersion in distant lands; when they shall assemble again in the city of their fathers, and when public worship shall be celebrated there as in former ages.

And the kingdoms, to serve the Lord – The Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate render this, “kings.” The reference must be to the time when those of other lands – kings and their people – would be converted to the true religion; when the Gentiles as well as the Jews, then one undistinguished people, would be brought to the knowledge of the true God and would unite in his worship. See the notes at Isaiah 60:0. All of all lands, will yet praise the Lord “as if” they were one great congregation, assembled in one place. Thus, though separate, they will with united feeling recount the mercy and goodness of God to his people in past times.

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Gill

Verse 21.

To declare the name of the Lord in Zion,…. That is, that the prisoners and persons appointed to death, being loosed, might declare, in the church, what great things the Lord has done for them; and so speak well of his wisdom, power, grace, and goodness, in their deliverance; profess his name, and confess him before men, and express a value for his name, and show forth the honor of it, and seek his glory:

and his praise in Jerusalem; the Gospel church-state, the same with Zion; when it shall be the praise of the whole earth; then and there will those, that are delivered from the antichristian yoke, praise the Lord, sing the song of Moses and the Lamb, and glorify God for all that he has done for them.

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Henry

The prisoners under condemnation unjustly seem as sheep appointed for the slaughter, but care shall be taken for their discharge (v. 19, 20): God has looked down from the height of his sanctuary, from heaven, where he has prepared his throne, that high place, that holy place; thence did the Lord behold the earth, for it is a place of prospect, and nothing on this earth is or can be hidden from his all-seeing eye; he looks down, not to take a view of the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, but to do acts of grace, to hear the groaning of the prisoners (which we desire to be out of the hearing of), and not only to hear them but to help them, to loose those that are appointed to death, then when there is but a step between them and it. Some understand it of the release of the Jews out of their captivity in Babylon. God heard their groaning there as he did when they were in Egypt (Ex. 3:7, 9) and came down to deliver them. God takes notice not only of the prayers of his afflicted people, which are the language of grace but even of their groans, which are the language of nature. See the divine pity in hearing the prisoner’s groans, and the divine power in loosing the prisoner’s bonds, even when they are appointed to death and are pinioned and double-shackled. We have an instance in Peter, Acts 12:6. Such instances as these of the divine condescension and compassion will help,

- 1. To declare the name of the Lord in Zion, and to make it appear that he answers to his name, which he himself proclaimed, The Lord God, gracious and merciful; and this declaration of his name in Zion shall be the matter of his praise in Jerusalem, v. 21. If God by his providences declare his name, we must by our acknowledgments of them declare his praise, which ought to be the echo of his name. God will discharge his people that were prisoners and captives in Babylon, that they may declare his name in Zion, the place he has chosen to put his name there, and his praise in Jerusalem, at their return thither; in the land of their captivity they could not sing the songs of Zion (Ps. 137:3, 4), and God brought them again to Jerusalem in order that they might sing them there. For this end God gives liberty from bondage (Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name, Ps. 142:7), and life from the dead. Let my soul live, and it shall praise thee, Ps. 119:175.
- 2. They will help to draw in others to the worship of God (v. 22): When the people of God are gathered together at Jerusalem (as they were after their return out of Babylon) many out of the kingdoms joined with them to serve the Lord. This was fulfilled Ezra 6:21, where we find that not only the children of Israel that had come out of captivity, but many that had separated themselves from them among the heathen, did keep the feast of unleavened bread with joy. But it may look further, at the conversion of the Gentiles to the faith of Christ in the latter days. Christ has proclaimed liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those that were bound, that they may declare the name of the Lord in the gospel-church, in which Jews and Gentiles shall unite.

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Clarke

Verse 19

Verse Psalms 102:19. For he hath looked down — This, with the three following verses, seems to me to contain a glorious prophecy of the incarnation of Christ and the gathering in of the Jews and the Gentiles to him. The Lord looks down from heaven, and sees the whole earth groaning and travailing in pain; his eye affects his heart, and he purposes their salvation.

Verse 20

Verse Psalms 102:20. To hear the groaning — By sin, all the inhabitants of the earth are miserable. They have broken the Divine laws, are under the arrest of judgment, and all cast into prison. They have been tried, found guilty, and appointed to die; they groan under their chains, are alarmed at the prospect of death, and implore mercy.

Verse 21

Verse Psalms 102:21. To declare the name of the Lord — To publish that Messenger of the Covenant in whom the name of the Lord is, that Messiah in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwelt; and to commence at Jerusalem, that the first offers of mercy might be made to the Jews, from whom the word of reconciliation was to go out to all the ends of the earth.

Verse 22

Verse Psalms 102:22. When the people are gathered together — When all the Gentiles are enlightened, and the kings of the earth brought to pay homage to the King of kings.

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Geneva Bible 1560

Psalm 102:19-22

19 For he hath looked down from the height of his Sanctuary: out of the heaven, did the Lord behold the earth,

20 That he might hear the mourning of the prisoner, and deliver the o children of death:

21 That they may declare the Name of the Lord in Zión, and his praise in Jerusalém,

22 When the people shalbe gathered p together, & the kingdoms to serve the Lord.

o Who now in their banishment could look for nothing but death.

p He shows that God’s Name is never more praised, then when religion flourishes, and the Church increases: which thing is chiefly accomplished under the kingdom of Christ.

“The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”

Numbers 6:24-26 NKJV