Psalms 73:21 - Meaning and Application

The psalmist now turns the bitter lesson of temptation into gain. Like Samson’s riddle, “Out of the eater came food, and out of the strong came sweetness,” what nearly ruined him became a source of wisdom. God would not allow his people to be tempted if his grace were not enough to keep them safe and even help them grow through it.

He first learned to think humbly about himself and to blame himself before God. He looks back with shame on the trouble and danger he brought on himself by entertaining the temptation and arguing with it. “My heart was grieved, and I was pricked in my reins” means that his inward pain was sharp and deep, like severe kidney pain. Evil thoughts are never a sweet delight to a godly person, but a burden. Paul spoke of a similar trial as a “thorn in the flesh” (2 Corinthians 12:7).

This temptation, envy mixed with discontent, was especially painful. If such a spirit stays on the heart, it becomes “the rottenness of the bones” (Proverbs 14:30). If it only visits for a time, it is still like a sharp sting. Fretfulness is a sin that carries its own correction, because it harms the one who gives in to it.

So the psalmist admits, “So foolish was I.” He was his own tormentor, and he knows it. People who are quick to complain should learn to say the same thing and shame themselves out of their discontent. He also confesses, “So ignorant was I. I was like a beast before you.” Beasts live only for the present and never look ahead, and he had acted in much the same way. He should have known better than to envy wicked people because they seemed to prosper. When good people fall into sin for a time, they later look back with sorrow, shame, and self-hatred. They speak of themselves as fools, as Job and others did (Proverbs 30:2; Job 42:5-6; 2 Samuel 24:10).

From this, he moves to a fresh confession of God’s grace. “Nevertheless,” he says, “I am continually with you; you hold my right hand.” This can mean that God had cared for him all along, even when life was hard. Though he had complained that he was plagued all day long (Psalm 73:14), he now corrects himself. God had not cast him off. He had been near, present, and faithful, and had kept him from abandoning him or collapsing under his burdens. If we have been kept in the way of duty and upheld in our integrity, we must credit God’s free grace for that preservation. If he has kept the spiritual life alive in us, the promise of eternal life, then we have no right to complain about present troubles.

It can also mean that the psalmist is thinking of his recent rescue from this temptation. Though he was foolish and ignorant, God still had compassion on him and taught him (Hebrews 5:2). Our unworthiness does not stop God’s free grace. We do not keep ourselves safe in temptation by our own wisdom, because we are foolish and ignorant. We are kept by God’s gracious presence and by Christ’s intercession, so that our faith does not fail. He says, in effect, that his feet were almost gone, and would have slipped beyond recovery, if God had not held his right hand.

That leads him to hope for the future. The God who delivered him from this evil will also keep him all the way to heaven, as Paul says, “The Lord will deliver me from every evil work and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom” (2 Timothy 4:18). Since God has upheld him already, he will guide him with his counsel and then receive him to glory (Psalm 73:24). That is the full happiness of the saints, and it gives them no reason to envy the success of sinners.

All who give themselves to God will be guided by his counsel, through both his word and his Spirit, the best guides anyone can have. The psalmist had nearly paid dearly for trusting his own judgment in this temptation, so he resolves to seek God’s advice in the future and follow it. And all who are guided by God in this life will be received into his glory in the next. If we aim at God’s glory in us, he will make our lasting joy with him the end of our hope. With that in view, we should stop envying sinners and instead rejoice in our own blessedness. If God directs us in duty and keeps us from turning aside, he will afterward receive us into his kingdom and glory. The hope of that final welcome helps quiet the dark providences that now trouble us and eases the pain caused by tempting thoughts.

This also drew the psalmist closer to God and made him even more sure and glad in the choice he had made. His heart now rests with delight on the happiness found in God, which he sees as far greater than the prosperity of the wicked.

He saw little reason to envy them what they had in created things when he found how much more, and better, surer, and sweeter comfort he had in the Creator. He also saw how much reason he had to be thankful for that. He had complained about his troubles before (Psalm 73:14), but now they seemed light and easy. All is well if God is mine.

Here we hear the longing of a holy soul toward God, and its rest in him. To a godly man, this is what the success of worldly people is to them in their imagination. "Whom have I in heaven but you?" Few verses in the Psalms are more moving than this. It shows a soul that rises toward God, follows after him closely, and yet is fully satisfied in him.

First, it assumes that God alone is the happiness and highest good of man. Only the one who made the soul can make it happy. No one in heaven or on earth can claim that place besides him. Second, it shows the heart’s movement toward God in light of that truth. If God is our happiness, then we must have him. We must choose him and be sure that we belong to him. What good is it if he is the happiness of souls, unless he is the happiness of our souls, and unless we make him ours by living faith, joining ourselves to him in an everlasting covenant?

If God is our happiness, then our desire must be toward him and our delight in him. The words mean both. We must enjoy what we have of God and long for what we still hope to receive from him. Our desires must not only be lifted up to God, they must end in him. We should want nothing more than God, yet always want more of him. This includes all our prayers, "Lord, give us yourself." And that includes all the promises, "I will be their God" (Jeremiah 31:33). "The desire of our souls is for your name" (Isaiah 26:8).

We must also prefer him above every other thing we desire. "There is none in heaven but you." There is none to seek, trust, court, or long for besides him. God is more glorious in himself than any heavenly being (Psalm 89:6), and he must be far more desirable in our eyes. There are excellent beings in heaven, but only God can make us happy. His favor matters more than the refreshing dew of heaven, more than the kind influence of the stars, more than fellowship with the saints in heaven, and more than the service of angels there.

"I desire none on earth besides you." Not only none in heaven, a place far away that we know little about, but none on earth either, where we have many friends and many present concerns. Earth draws the desires of most people, yet he says he has no person, no thing, no possession, no pleasure that he wants besides God, or alongside God, in comparison with God, or in competition with God. We must desire nothing besides God except what we desire for his sake, and nothing except what we desire from him and can do without if he makes up the lack. We must want nothing besides God as though it were needed to help make us happy with him.

If God is our happiness, then we must rest in him with full satisfaction (Psalm 73:26). Here great distress is assumed: "My flesh and my heart fail." Others have experienced this, and so must we. The body fails through sickness, age, and death. What affects the bone and flesh touches us deeply, because it reaches the part of ourselves we have often loved too much. When the flesh fails, the heart is ready to fail too. Courage, guidance, and comfort all give way.

But in that distress, a strong help is provided: "God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." Holy people, in their greatest troubles, lean on God as their spiritual strength and their lasting share. He is the strength of my heart, the rock of my heart, a firm foundation that can carry my weight and not give way. I have found him to be that, I still find him to be that, and I hope always to find him so.

In the distress he pictured, he spoke of two failures, flesh and heart. But in the relief, he leans on one support. He leaves out the flesh and what happens to it. It is enough that God is the strength of his heart. He speaks like one who is no longer concerned about the body, since that must fail and there is no remedy, but deeply concerned about the soul, that the inner person may be strengthened. God is also my portion forever. He will not only support me while I live here, but make me happy when I leave this world. The saints choose God as their portion, and they have him as their portion. Their joy is that he will be their portion forever, as long as the immortal soul lasts.

He was also fully convinced of the miserable state of all wicked people. He learned this in the sanctuary, and he would never forget it (Psalm 73:27). Those who are far from God, in a state of distance and separation, and who want the Almighty to leave them alone, will surely perish. That will be their end. They choose to stay far from God, and they will be far from him forever. God will rightly destroy all those who turn away from him in unfaithfulness, that is, all who have been joined to him in profession but leave him, leaving their duty to him and their fellowship with him to follow another lover.

The doom is severe, nothing less than perishing and being destroyed. It is universal, all of them without exception. It is certain: "You have destroyed," meaning it is as sure as if it had already happened, and the ruin of some wicked people is a warning sign of the destruction of the rest. God himself takes this matter in hand, and it is a fearful thing to fall into his hands. Though he is infinitely good, he will still defend his injured honor and answer for abused patience by destroying those who turn from him in unfaithfulness.

He was greatly encouraged, then, to hold fast to God and trust in him (Psalm 73:28). If those who are far from God perish, then let that drive us to live in fellowship with him. If it goes so badly for those who stay at a distance from him, then it is good, truly good, the highest good, the best thing a person can seek and secure in this life, to draw near to God and have God draw near to us. The Hebrew can include both. But for my part, I would read it this way: the nearness of God is good for me. Our drawing near to God begins with his drawing near to us, and that happy meeting is what brings blessing.

Here a great truth is stated, it is good to draw near to God. But the strength of it is in the personal claim, "It is good for me." Wise people know what is good for themselves. "It is good," he says, and every good person agrees, "it is good for me to draw near to God. It is my duty. It is my advantage."

Let us therefore live in constant dependence on God. We should be able to say, “I have put my trust in the Lord God, and I will never turn away from him to trust any created thing.” If wicked people, despite all their success, will still perish and be destroyed, then we should trust in the Lord God. Trust him, not them (see (Psalm 146:3-5)). Trust him, not our worldly success. Let us trust God and neither worry about them nor be afraid of them. Let us trust him for a better share than theirs.

While we do that, we should not doubt that we will have reason to praise his name. We trust in the Lord so that we may tell of all his works. Those who sincerely put their trust in God will never lack reasons to thank him.