Psalm 88: A Song of Affliction

This Psalm is one of the darkest in the entire Psalter and it portrays a man of sorrows.

Many have seen it as a Messianic Psalm, speaking strongly of the sufferings of Christ.

There are two parts here: a complaint and a prayer – but with no hint of relief.

(1) A Song or Psalm for the sons of Korah, to the chief Musician upon Mahalath

Leannoth, Maschil of Heman the Ezrahite. O LORD God of my salvation, I have

cried day and night before You; (2) Let my prayer come before You; incline

Your ear to my cry; (3) For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draws

near to the grave.

• Another teaching Psalm from Heman; the title is obscure but may mean

something like “concerning afflictive sickness.”

• The Psalmist has been crying out to the Lord day and night without seeing change

in his condition. He senses that death is about to seize him.

(4) I am counted with those who go down into the pit; I am as a man who

has no strength; (5) Feeble among the dead, like the slain who lie in the

grave, whom You remember no more; and they are cut off from Your hand.

(6) You have laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. (7) Your

wrath lies hard upon me, and You have afflicted me with all Your waves.

Selah.
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• He views himself as being virtually dead already because of the wrath of God. The

waves are literally the “breakers” – a picture of continual blows.

(8) You have put away my acquaintance far from me; You have made me an

abomination to them; I am shut up, and I cannot come forth. (9) My eye

mourns by reason of affliction; LORD, I have called daily upon You, I have

stretched out my hands to You. (10) Will You show wonders to the dead?

Shall the dead arise and praise You? Selah.

• Here he begins to make intercession by telling God that He will receive no praise

from him if he dies. There is a picture here of Jesus in His loneliness and His

being viewed as a disgrace. In Isaiah 53 we see the suffering Messiah as “smitten,

stricken by God and afflicted” and an object of loathing.

(11) Shall Your lovingkindness be declared in the grave? Or Your

faithfulness in destruction? (12) Shall Your wonders be known in the dark?

And Your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? (13) But to You have I

cried, O LORD; and in the morning shall my prayer come before You.

• Again, more petitions based on the belief that there would be no praise in the

grave. Despite this he does not give up – he had been praying day and night and

he asserts that his prayer will come to God again in the morning.

(14) LORD, why do You cast off my soul? Why do You hide Your face from

me? (15) I am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up; while I suffer

Your terrors I am distracted. (16) Your fierce wrath goes over me; Your

terrors have cut me off. (17) They came round about me daily like water;

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Psalms Bible Study Psalms 88 & 90

they surrounded me together. (18) Lover and friend You have put far from

me, and my acquaintance into darkness.

• Here again we see the loneliness of Christ - rejected almost entirely by friends

and family. His brothers were not at the cross, nor His disciples save John.

Psalm 90: Before The Mountains

Here is the first Psalm of Moses; it is one of the most famous Psalms and it deals with

the eternity of God, repentance, and seeking God’s blessing upon His people.

(1) A Prayer of Moses the man of God. Lord, You have been our dwelling place

in all generations. (2) Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever

You had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to

everlasting, thou art God.

• This is seen as a “prayer,” and indeed we have several examples of Moses’ poetic

praying in the Law.

• Moses is called the “Man of God” and this is a title rarely given. Certainly Moses

had an intimacy with God which is virtually unmatched in the Old Testament.

• A common theme in many Psalms is the idea that God is a covering or a dwelling

place for us. Perhaps this originated with Moses. He sees that God is the shelter

of the people across time.

• God is God eternally – He remains the same across time and so, as Moses

indicates here it is not even proper to speak of Him in the past tense. We see an

echo of this in the Gospels when Jesus says, “Before Abraham was, I am.”

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Psalms Bible Study Psalms 88 & 90

(3) You turn man to destruction, and say, “Return, you children of men.”

(4) For a thousand years in Your sight are but as yesterday when it is past,

and as a watch in the night.

• God causes Man to look at his own smallness and frailty, showing him

destruction, or causing him to see the end of his brief life. God dwells in eternity

and He knows how rapid our time is. In doing this God’s purpose is not to terrify

but to induce Man to return to Him. We see His shepherd heart in the beginning

of the story when He hunts for Adam, and in the Gospel when He leaves the 99 to

seek the 1.

• The poetic language of verse 5 reminds us that our concepts of time are

meaningless to Him.

(5) You carry them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning

they are like grass which grows up. (6) In the morning it flourishes, and

grows up; in the evening it is cut down, and withers. (7) For we are

consumed by Your anger, and by Your wrath we are troubled.

• In this section he speaks of how rapidly human life passes – like a night’s sleep or

like grass.

(8) You have set our iniquities before You, our secret sins in the light of

Your countenance. (9) For all our days are passed away in Your wrath; we

spend our years as a tale that is told.

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Psalms Bible Study Psalms 88 & 90

• God’s anger is revealed against our sins; because of His holiness they are always

before His eyes. Even our secret sins are evident to Him. The Scripture tells us

that everything is naked and open to His eyes.

• The image of a story being told is another picture he uses to demonstrate the

fleeting nature of our lives.

(10) The days of our years are seventy years; and if by reason of strength

they are eighty years, yet their strength is labor and sorrow; for it is soon

cut off, and we fly away. (11) Who knows the power of Your anger? Even

according to Your fear, so is Your wrath. (12) So teach us to number our

days, that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.

• This is a somewhat pessimistic view of our situation – God is gracious to give us

joy and laughter in life as well as labor and sorrow. However, when contrasted

with eternity, we do indeed quickly fly away.

• In our modern age of entertainment we need the counsel of verse 12 to number

our days and realize that in many ways this life is merely the foyer to the next; we

should carefully consider our days and walk wisely.

(13) Return, O LORD, how long? And let it repent You concerning Your

servants. (14) O satisfy us early with Your mercy, that we may rejoice and

be glad all our days.

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• Prayer for God to return usually would be an indication that the people are in

trouble. We do not know, however, the circumstances under which the Psalm was

written.

(15) Make us glad according to the days in which You have afflicted us, and

the years in which we have seen evil. (16) Let Your work appear to Your

servants, and Your glory to their children. (17) And let the beauty of the

LORD our God be upon us; and establish the work of our hands upon us;

yes, the work of our hands, establish it.

• Moses asks to be paid back for the trouble – a good day for every day of calamity

the people had seen!

• The people would prosper when they see God’s work and glory. It is interesting

that the devotion of Israel and their fortunes declined when the generations who

had not seen His mighty deeds passed away.

• Moses concludes with a David-like prayer in verse 17: that God’s beauty would be

upon them and that He would establish their efforts.