0528. The King Rejected

The King Rejected

"Hide not Thy face from me in the day when I am in, trouble; incline Thine ear unto me: in the day when I call, answer me speedily" (Psa_102:2).

Psalms 102 places before us the first coming of our Lord. Christ came and was presented to Israel as King, but He was refused. This Psalm describes His refusal. It is the picture of the One Who came to His own, and His own received Him not. It is the picture of the One Who stood before Jerusalem, the city of the King, and said: "If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong to thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes." It is the picture of Jesus Christ hanging upon the Cross, while over His head are written the words, "This is Jesus the King of the Jews." Let us pick out just a few of the groanings in the first eleven verses of the chapter.

1. "For My days are consumed like smoke." Our Lord was despised and rejected of men. He came to the earth and tarried but a little while, His days were short. He died while yet in His prime. He was cut off from the land of the living.

2. "My heart is smitten, and withered like grass." Not only were our Lord’s days cut off, but His heart was broken. He was "A Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief."

Longfellow beautifully describes one who stood on a bridge looking at the water below. In his reverie he said:

"And like the waters rushing, among the wooden piers,

A flood of thoughts comes o’er me, that fills my heart with tears."

And yet the grief was not a grief of his own, it was a grief of others. The poem continues:

"I see the long procession, still marching to and fro;

The young heart hot and restless, the old subdued and slow."

Their grief was his–their sorrows were his.

So our Lord Jesus, when upon earth, had a heart broken and crushed by the sorrow and sinning of others.

3. "I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl of the desert." The pelican and the owl were unclean birds. Our Lord did not say, "I am like the dove," He was like the pelican and like the owl, because He became sin for us–He was numbered with the transgressors. The Holy One bore our guilt–He stood clothed with our iniquities. He was described as "in the wilderness," and "in the desert," because He was separated from His Father’s face, and suffered, forsaken and alone, upon Calvary’s Cross.

4. "I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the housetop." There is no bird more common than the sparrow, therefore the picture of this verse seems most striking. Who ever heard of a sparrow alone upon the house top? Yet this was doubly true of our Lord.

(1) He was alone among men, because "they knew Him not," and understood Him not. Even His very disciples failed to enter into the spirit of our Lord. They neither sensed His passion, nor fathomed His compassion. He was alone, among the thousands who thronged the streets–"alone upon the house top."

(2) More particularly was our Lord alone when He died. "There is not a sparrow that falleth without your Father." Yet, our Lord was a sparrow, "without the Father." The Father hid His face.

5. "Mine enemies reproach Me all the day." This is a step further. Not only forsaken of the Father, but reproached of men. The people were mad against Christ. They walked beneath the Cross wagging their heads, and gnashing their teeth.

6. "For Thou hast lifted Me up, and cast Me down." Not only forsaken of the Father; not only scoffed by His enemies; but also under the wrath of God. No wonder our Lord says, "I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled My drink with weeping."

7. "My days are like a shadow that declineth; and I am withered like grass."

Psa_102:11 is similar to Psa_102:1, in that Christ is described bemoaning the brevity of His earth life. He says, "I am withered like grass." Of course, we know that this was true because "all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of the flesh as the flower of the grass; the grass withereth and the flower fadeth." For this reason, our Lord Who took upon Him the likeness of sinful flesh, and was made sin for us, passed away, even as the grass that withereth.

The eternal Son came forth from the Father, and for the suffering of death took upon Him a body in likeness of sinful flesh. His days passed like a shadow that declineth, He was soon "cut off."

From resurrection heights He now says: "I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore."

Autor: R.E. NEIGHBOUR