Saturday, April 26, 2014
Psalm 22:30-31 A posterity shall serve Him. It will be recounted of the Lord to the next generation, they will come and declare His righteousness to a people who will be born, that He has done this.
FROM GRAVE TO GLORY -- COMPLETION
The final sign of the Lord's victory in this psalm is that His righteousness would continue to be proclaimed to the next generation and beyond. This is the same parting message that Jesus left with His disciples when He ascended (Acts 1:8). We are living proof of the validity of these words. Looking again to Paul's discourse on the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 we see that without Christ's seal of victory there would be no message to proclaim or believe in. Paul says that if Christ is not raised then our preaching is empty and our faith is futile (vv. 14, 17).
It shouldn't surprise us that Psalm 22 predicts the sanctifying influence of the Gospel ministry. Jesus Himself prayed to His Father about this very subject when He asked for blessings upon those who would believe through the Word (John 17:20). Jesus was praying for you, just as David was prophesying about you. The very fact that God's Word continues today and is proclaimed to generation after generation is proof of this prophecy's fulfillment.
The final words of the Psalm show why this is so; Christ "has done this." This is parallel to our Savior's declaration on the cross of His work being "finished." It is trustworthy, it is accomplished, nothing more is needed for your salvation. Talk about coming full circle! Psalm 22 opened by describing the Messiah's agony at being forsaken by His Father on account of our sins. It ends by declaring the certainty of His victory. What an example of the vast treasures of God's Word at our fingertips and at work in our homes and churches! All that we see through the resurrection, all that we receive is because Jesus has done it!
