Bird's-eye view
Psalm 49 is a wisdom psalm, a potent meditation on the great leveler of mankind: death. It addresses the universal temptation to envy the rich and powerful, and it does so by pulling back the curtain to reveal the ultimate vanity of wealth when stacked up against the finality of the grave. The psalmist calls the whole world to attention, low and high, rich and poor together, to hear a "dark saying" about the utter inability of riches to redeem a man's soul. The passage before us, verses 16-20, is the capstone of this argument. It directly commands the righteous not to fear or be dismayed by the apparent prosperity of the wicked. Their glory is a temporary mirage, a vapor that cannot follow them into the next life. The central point, driven home in the final verse, is that a man's honor and wealth are meaningless if he lacks understanding. Without wisdom, which is the fear of the Lord, he is no different than a brute beast, destined only to perish.
This psalm is a frontal assault on the prosperity gospel of every age. It teaches us to weigh things on an eternal scale. The man who lives for his own glory, who blesses his own soul, and who receives the fleeting praise of men, is a man who is building his house on the sand. When the storm of death comes, and it comes for every man, his house will fall. The righteous, however, have a different hope. Though they too go down to the grave, God will redeem their soul from the power of Sheol (v. 15). This is the great antithesis of the psalm: the man who trusts in wealth perishes like a beast, but the man who trusts in God will be received by Him.
Outline
- 1. The Folly of Trusting in Riches (Ps 49:1-20)
- a. A Call for All to Hear Wisdom (vv. 1-4)
- b. The Impotence of Wealth Against Death (vv. 5-12)
- c. The Destiny of Fools and the Hope of the Righteous (vv. 13-15)
- d. The Final Verdict on Earthly Glory (vv. 16-20)
- i. Do Not Fear the Temporarily Rich (v. 16)
- ii. Earthly Glory's Dead End (v. 17)
- iii. The Self-Congratulatory Life (v. 18)
- iv. The Inevitable Descent into Darkness (v. 19)
- v. Man Without Understanding is a Beast (v. 20)
Context In Psalms
Psalm 49 is one of the wisdom psalms, standing alongside others like Psalms 1, 37, and 73. These psalms grapple with the perennial problem of evil and the prosperity of the wicked. They are didactic, intending to teach the people of God how to think rightly about the world. This psalm, attributed to the sons of Korah, does not cry out for immediate deliverance from enemies, but rather provides a theological framework for enduring the apparent injustices of life. It tells the believer how to think when he sees a wicked man's portfolio swelling. The answer is not to fret, but to look to the end of the story.
It functions as a corrective to a purely earthly perspective. The Pharisees of Jesus' day were covetous and derided Him when He taught that you cannot serve both God and mammon (Luke 16:14). This psalm is God's eternal word against their error. It insists that death is the great audit, and on that day, all the accounts will be settled. The man who lived for his 401(k) will find it has zero value in the economy of the kingdom. The man who lived for God's glory, however, will find he has an inheritance that can never fade.
Key Issues
- The Deceitfulness of Riches
- The Finality of Death
- Worldly Glory vs. True Glory
- The Necessity of Understanding
- Man as Beast
Verse by Verse Commentary
16 Do not be afraid when a man becomes rich, When the glory of his house increases;
The psalm pivots here to direct application. After laying the theological groundwork, the command comes. And it is a command not to fear. This is striking because our default emotion in the face of a rival's success is often envy, which is a form of fear. We fear being left behind. We fear that God is blessing them and not us. We fear that their power can harm us. The psalmist says to put it away. Do not be intimidated or unsettled when you see a man's bank account balloon and the "glory of his house" increase. This glory refers to all the external trappings of wealth: the big house, the fine clothes, the expensive chariots, the public acclaim. It is heavy, it is weighty, it is impressive to the watching world. But the command is to not let your heart be troubled by it.
17 For when he dies he will not take any of it; His glory will not descend after him.
Here is the reason for the command, the great "for." Why shouldn't we fear? Because the rich man's glory has an expiration date. There are no luggage racks on a hearse. He can't take it with him. All the gold, all the real estate, all the accolades, all of it remains behind. The glory that seemed so substantial in this life is shown to be utterly weightless at the threshold of the next. It will not "descend after him" into Sheol. This is the plain truth that every funeral procession demonstrates, yet it is a truth that men spend their entire lives trying to ignore. They build bigger barns, just like the fool in the parable, as though they could somehow wall off their possessions from the reach of death (Luke 12:16-21). But death is a thief that cannot be bribed.
18 For while he lives he blesses his soul, And men will praise you when you do well for yourself,
This verse describes the psychology of the wealthy fool. While he is alive, "he blesses his soul." He looks at all he has accomplished and says, "Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry" (Luke 12:19). He is the center of his own universe, the object of his own worship. He congratulates himself on his success. And the world joins in the chorus. "Men will praise you when you do well for yourself." This is one of the most insightful lines in the psalm. The world loves a winner. If you are successful, if you are a "self-made man," people will flatter you. They will write articles about you, they will want to be seen with you. But this praise is as fickle and superficial as the wealth that attracts it. It is the praise of men, not the praise of God. And the man who lives for it is drinking salt water.
19 But his soul shall go to the generation of his fathers; They will eternally not see light.
The "but" here is stark and terrible. Despite the self-blessing and the praise of men, his soul has an appointment. It "shall go to the generation of his fathers." He is not an exception. He will join the long line of all his ancestors who have gone down into the dust. And what will he find there? Darkness. They will "eternally not see light." This is a grim picture of the afterlife for those who die apart from God. Sheol is a place of shadow, of separation from the light of God's presence, which is the source of all life and joy. The glory he chased in this life was a false light, and his reward is an eternity of darkness. He loved the darkness rather than the light because his deeds were evil, and so to the darkness he goes.
20 Man in his honor, but who does not understand, Is like the animals that perish.
This is the refrain, the concluding hammer blow of the psalm's argument, repeating the substance of verse 12. A man can be decked out in "honor," he can have prestige, power, and wealth. But if he "does not understand," it is all for nothing. What is this understanding he lacks? It is the wisdom spoken of in the opening verses, the wisdom that begins with the fear of the Lord (Prov. 1:7). It is the understanding that life is more than the accumulation of stuff, that man does not live by bread alone, and that the only wealth that matters is to be rich toward God. Without this spiritual understanding, man, for all his honor, is no different than the beasts. He is "like the animals that perish." He lives, he eats, he sleeps, he dies, and that is the end of his story. He lives for the trough, and he dies in the sty. It is a brutal, humbling comparison, meant to shock us out of our materialistic stupor and drive us to seek the wisdom that comes from God alone.
Application
The application of this psalm is intensely practical. First, we are to mortify the sin of envy. When you are tempted to look at the ungodly rich and think that they are getting away with something, this psalm is the cure. You must learn to see their situation through God's eyes. Their prosperity is a fattening for the day of slaughter. Their glory is a cheap trinket that will tarnish and be left behind. Do not fear them, and do not envy them.
Second, we must constantly recalibrate what we value. This world, with all its advertising and media, is screaming at you 24/7 that your value is tied to your net worth, your job title, your possessions. This psalm screams back that all of that is a lie. The only thing that gives a man true honor is understanding, which is to say, a right relationship with his Creator through the fear of the Lord. We must pursue wisdom, righteousness, and a good name over fine gold.
Finally, this psalm points us to our only hope in the face of death. The psalmist says in verse 15, "But God will redeem my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will receive me." This is the gospel hope. The rich fool cannot ransom himself, but God has provided a ransom. We are redeemed, not with corruptible things like silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ (1 Pet. 1:18-19). He is the one who descended into the darkness of the grave and rose again, bringing light and life. Because He was received by the Father, all who are in Him will also be received. Therefore, let us not live like beasts that perish, but as sons of God, heirs of an incorruptible glory.