Chapter 16

1 1 David’s festival sacrifice. 4 He ordereth a choir to sing thanksgiving. 7 The psalm of thanksgiving. 37 He appointeth ministers, porters, priests, and musicians, to attend continually on the ark.

2. Burnt offerings. These signified the consecration of the nation to Jehovah, and the peace offerings expressed the joy and peace that the people felt as they united in thanksgiving and praise to God for His tender mercies. For the Levitical law on burnt offerings, see Vol. I, p. 698.

3. Dealt to every one. David was a kind and generous king. He loved his people and expressed his love in deeds that brought from the people a greater love and a more complete devotion.

4. To minister. Once the ark had been brought into its tent in Jerusalem, services were instituted which later developed into the elaborate ritual of the Temple.

5. Jeiel. Spelled “Jaaziel” in ch. 15:18.

6. Continually. Heb. tamid, a word employed in connection with the daily, continuous services that were to be conducted in the sanctuary (see Ex. 25:30; 27:20; 29:38; 30:8; etc.).

7. David delivered. The psalm here recorded corresponds almost verbatim with the following passages of our present book of Psalms:

vs. 8-22=

Ps. 105:1-15

vs. 23-33=

Ps. 96

v. 34=

Ps. 107:1

vs. 35, 36=

Ps. 106:47, 48

8. Give thanks. The psalm is a hymn of praise and adoration to God.

10. Rejoice. Religion was an experience of delight and beauty to David. In his knowledge of God’s goodness he found earth’s greatest joy.

11. Seek his face. To seek the Lord is to be the constant, continual activity of life, bringing the seeker ever nearer to the perfection of heaven.

12. Remember. A constant remembrance of the Lord’s blessings brings to the child of God an abiding sense of joy and delight. When man forgets God’s manifold goodness he loses the real zest and joy of living, and his spiritual experience begins to decline.

15. His covenant. As long as human beings exist they are to be mindful of God’s eternal presence and His never-ceasing blessings promised in the covenant He made with them.

16. Which he made. Compare Gen. 12:1–3; 15:5, 6, 18; 17:1–8; 22:16–18. The covenant God made with Abraham was originally made with Adam (see PP 370). It is the covenant God makes with every believer in His Son Jesus Christ, though after its ratification by the blood of Christ it is termed the “new covenant” (Heb. 8:8–13).

18. Unto thee. The land of Canaan, which God promised to His ancient people, was a pledge of the future inheritance of all the earth by the saved of all nations.

21. Suffered no man. This is a poetic generalization expressing the idea that God considers His people the object of His supreme regard. In the care exercised toward Israel He manifested His infinite love and never-failing solicitude. When man turns from God he turns away God’s protecting arm, and evils that might otherwise have been averted now befall him. However, not all the evils that afflict the human family arise from this source. Because of the involvements of the great controversy between good and evil Satan is permitted to persecute the righteous so that an experience of suffering is not necessarily an evidence that the Lord has forsaken the sufferer (see Job 1 and 2; John 9:2, 3).

He reproved kings. See Gen. 12:17; 20:3; Ex. 3:20; 12:29–33.

23. All the earth. All the world receives blessings from God and is honor bound to return glory to God. As men sing praises to God they bring joy to themselves and peace and good will to the peoples of the earth. Man does the greatest injustice to himself and to the world in which he lives when he fails to raise his voice in joyous praise to God for the manifold blessings of heaven.

24. Among the heathen. When men go forth among the nations, telling the touching story of God’s wonderful love, hearts will be moved and many will be won to the cause of the Lord. The world is waiting, not so much to hear the theory of truth as to see a living demonstration of the power of truth. When men really love God and go forth to the world declaring His praises among the heathen and sharing with them the story of His matchless mercy and grace, the dark corners of earth will come to resound with songs of rejoicing and glory to God.

25. Great is the Lord. No being on earth has begun to appreciate the greatness and goodness of God. The more we allow ourselves to think of the glories of the Lord, the less inclined we will be to seek our own selfish interests or to find fault with our fellow men.

26. Gods of the people. False gods are the product of man. The true God is man’s Creator, the Sustainer of the world in which man lives.

27. Gladness. Every man who knows the Lord has much to be happy about. To the true child of God, religion is an experience of joy and gladness. Heaven will be a happy place, because open communion with God will result in the realization of the highest joys.

29. Bring an offering. No man who really appreciates the wonderful goodness of God will desire to come before Him with empty hands. What a man offers to God, evaluated by his abilities, is an index to the degree of his appreciation of the blessings of Heaven. Since man has so freely received, he should regard it as a happy privilege to freely give (see Matt. 10:8; 2 Cor. 9:7).

Beauty. Heb. hadarah, “adornment,” “glory.” True worship is a matter of beauty as well as holiness. Clad in their holy vestments, the ancient priests engaged in a service of worship that was both beautiful and impressive. But beauty of form and symbol is not an adequate demonstration of the “beauty of holiness.” The term may be regarded as including a spirit of quiet reverence, inward devotion and outward piety, devout earnestness and joyous gratitude. Neither heaven nor earth can know any greater beauty than the beauty of true holiness.

30. Fear before him. That is, stand before Him in a spirit of holy reverence. Man need not come into the presence of God with a spirit of abject terror and cringing fear. God is a friend to man and not an enemy. He is the sinner’s best friend. Jesus entered this world to come close to sinners and to save them from their sins (see Luke 19:10). Little children could come to Him without a trace of fear. But God is holy. He is the Lord of all heaven and earth, and thus man is ever to manifest toward Him that attitude of respect and reverence that befits His holy name. Such fear is not incompatible with love, yet it is wholly incompatible with the easy familiarity with which some people speak to and of their Maker and Redeemer.

31. The Lord reigneth. The most comforting message that can come to distraught mankind is that the Lord reigns over heaven and earth. If it were not so, there would be every reason for unrest and fear. “Amidst the strife and tumult of nations, He that sitteth above the cherubim still guides the affairs of this earth” (PK 536).

32. Fields rejoice. So wonderful is the thought of God’s boundless goodness and love that even inanimate nature by figure is called upon to rejoice in the presence of its Creator and Lord. To the man whose heart is in tune with the heart of God, nature speaks a cheering message of the glory of God, a message that brings gladness to the soul of man. In God’s earth, man and nature may rejoice together in the blessings that come from the bountiful hand of the Lord.

33. Judge the earth. The coming of the Lord as judge will be a matter of joy, for it will mark the end of earth’s reign of sin and terror, the removal of the curse from the earth, and the restoration of the earth to its former Edenic beauty and bliss. To those who have made their peace with God, the coming of heaven’s righteous Judge will mark the joyous consummation of all their hopes, the time toward which every patriarch and saint has looked for the realization of his fondest dreams. The world today stands in desperate need of the coming of the righteous Judge. Every injustice and oppression, every cruelty and every wrong, every aching heart and sin-sick soul, calls for the coming of God to judge the earth and to restore justice, honor, peace, and hope to the children of men. Compare Rev. 6:10.

34. His mercy endureth. As God is eternal, so also are His mercy, love, and long-suffering.

36. Amen. In this united cry of the people at the close of David’s psalm, we have at least an outward assent of all that had been said. The hearts of king and people vocally united in praise and thanksgiving to Heaven. In their fervent “Amen” the people reiterated their acceptance of the provisions of God’s eternal covenant. Once more they bore record to a desire to be the people of God.

37. Continually. The ministry of the priests in the sanctuary was a daily, continual service that was to go on without break or interruption—a type of the continual ministry of Jesus in heaven in behalf of His people.

38. Their brethren. The LXX, the Syriac, and the Vulgate read, “his brethren.”

39. At Gibeon. The narrative now turns from the tent in Jerusalem with the ark of the covenant, to the Mosaic tabernacle at Gibeon. The altar of burnt offering (ch. 21:29), together with everything pertaining to the tabernacle except the ark, was kept at Gibeon. The removal of the ark to its new abode in Jerusalem marked the first step toward the establishment of a new national sanctuary. For the time being the priesthood of Zadok at Israel’s ancient sanctuary continued at Gibeon. See on 1 Kings 3:4; 2 Chron. 1:3–6.

41. To give thanks. A distinctive part of the liturgical formula (see 1 Chron. 16:34; 136:1–3, 26).

Ellen G. White comments

1–3PP 708

10   ML 157

22   3T 94; 4T 229

35   PK 202

36   5T 318