Mon, 14 November, 2005: Today’s Bible readings.
3 Put not your trust in princes,
in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.
4 When his breath departs he returns to the earth;
on that very day his plans perish.5 Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the LORD his God,
6 who made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them,
who keeps faith forever;
As we come to the end of the Psalter, we are now in a group of Psalms that all start and end with the phrase Praise the LORD! This is a great doxology of praise to conclude the hymnbook God has given for His church to sing.
In this midst of the praise in Psalm 146, we are told in verses three and four that we should not trust in people. But in contrast, we are told in verses five and six that God blesses those who trust in Him.
What do we learn from this?
We are told to praise God and trust in Him but not to trust in man. Even the noblest of man, the princes of the land, are not trustworthy, according the Psalmist. Put not your trust in princes.
Why aren’t princes trustworthy? Why can’t we rely upon them? Well, in a certain sense, and to a certain degree, we can trust in them. They are in charge of our governments. They can possibly do a good job of governing our society, and may be trustworthy in that respect. There is no guarantee that our leaders will do well in governing, and even the best of them will govern badly on occasion, so we know we can’t trust even the best of them fully. But the Psalmist makes it clear that the issue isn’t how well they govern. We can not trust in our princes at all for salvation. There is no salvation in our princes.
This is something we need to loudly proclaim in our modern culture. There is no salvation in our political leaders. They are just people like us who breath for a while, and then die. There is no salvation in our government. It is made up of people with plans who will die, and their plans will die with them. Government is a God-given institution, and it provides much needed protection and organization for our society. But it cannot provide salvation. There are people who look to government to provide everything for us from cradle to grave, including protection from disasters natural, man-made, and economic, but government can’t keep us from dying. Government can extend our lives through offering medical care for the people and regulating dangerous and harmful behavior, but we will all eventually die, and no government can ever change that. Do not put your trust in the government. There is no salvation there.
But in contrast to our princes who have no salvation and die along with their plans, God has power. He is the one who created and maintains everything. He is forever faithful. Therefore, God is worthy of our trust. And He is worthy of our praise.
Where is Christ in this passage?
The Psalmist tells us not to trust in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. Instead we are to trust in God who does save. Son of man is an interesting choice of words, as Jesus Christ is the Son of God who became man to earn salvation for His people. He liked to use the phrase Son of man when He was speaking of Himself.
