THE OIL OF GLADNESS

This psalm is described as a ‘song of loves’ - a Hebrew idiom which could be more literally translated as a ‘song of surpassing love’. It is clear from verses 13 and 14 that it is a song written for the wedding celebration of a king. Yet, before this wedding, the king is seen to go to battle and defeat his enemies. Words of grace are replaced by terrible things on the battlefield, vv. 2-5.

Then, after winning the battle, he establishes his throne and only then does he greet his guests and meet the ‘queen’. The identity of the king is revealed through comparing verses 6 and 7 with the quotations in Hebrews chapter 1. It is Israel’s Messiah God, who will come ‘out of the ivory palaces’ in a future day to deal with His enemies, establish His throne on earth and be joined with His people Israel.

The world described by the psalmist will have experienced the rule of the dragon and the beasts of Revelation chapters 12 and 13. It will have been a world characterized by lawlessness, where every divine principle was overthrown, but the Messiah will introduce a love of righteousness and a hatred of wicked­ness to such a scene. In that day, the words that he taught the disciples to pray will come to pass, ‘Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven’, Matt. 6. 10.

In the context, therefore, the gladness of Christ is associated with the thought that He has established divine rule on earth. Only a divine person could understand the feelings of God as He observed the rebellion and wickedness of man down through the ages of time. And, in that day, the King’s compan­ions, His ‘fellows’, will share in His gladness and yet not fully understand it. For, surely, they are the many sons carried to glory, Heb. 2. 10.

His joy will be ‘above’ that of His fellows for He will under­stand what they cannot. Glory is their eternal sphere and so the joy of Christ expressed in His reunion with Israel is something beyond their appreciation when, at last, Israel will, ‘no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate … and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee’, Isa. 62. 4, 5.