Commentary - Psalm 145:17-20

Bird's-eye view

This section of David's great acrostic psalm of praise brings us to the very heart of God's covenant relationship with His people. Having extolled God's greatness, majesty, and goodness in the preceding verses, David now focuses on the practical outworking of God's character for those who are His. These four verses present a tight, logical progression. They begin with the foundation: God's perfect and unwavering character (v. 17). From this foundation, David shows how this character translates into relational nearness for the true worshiper (v. 18). This nearness is not passive, but active; God hears and responds, working out the desires of His people and saving them (v. 19). The section concludes with the great summary of God's two-fold work in the world: the preservation of His saints and the destruction of the wicked (v. 20). It is a portrait of a God who is both transcendent in His righteousness and immanent in His love, a God who can be counted on.

The central theme is the radical difference between those who are inside the covenant and those who are outside. For those who call on Him in truth, who fear Him, and who love Him, God is a fortress of salvation. For the wicked, this same righteous and holy God is a consuming fire. The passage is therefore a profound source of comfort for the believer and a stark warning for the unbeliever. It all hinges on one's relationship to this covenant Lord, Yahweh.

Outline

Context In Psalms

Psalm 145 is the last psalm in the Psalter attributed to David, and it serves as a majestic capstone to his contributions. It is the only psalm to be explicitly titled a "Praise" (Tehillah). It is an alphabetic acrostic, with each verse beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet, signifying a complete, A to Z declaration of God's glory. This structure emphasizes the exhaustive and all-encompassing nature of God's praiseworthiness. The psalm is a pure hymn of praise, with no lament or complaint. It moves from declaring God's universal kingship over all creation to celebrating His specific, covenantal care for His people. Our passage (vv. 17-20) is the culmination of this second theme, showing how the great King of the universe relates to those who are His subjects by grace.

Key Issues

The Righteous and Relational God

It is one thing to believe in a God who is righteous in some abstract, philosophical sense. It is another thing entirely to know a God whose righteousness is the very bedrock of your relationship with Him. David, in these verses, is not engaging in abstract theology. He is describing the lived reality of a man who knows God. He moves seamlessly from the high doctrine of God's character to the intimate experience of answered prayer. This is how sound theology always works. It is never a sterile, academic exercise. The truth about who God is has immediate and profound consequences for how we live, how we pray, and how we face the future. The God who is perfectly just is also the God who draws near. In fact, He can only draw near in grace precisely because He is perfectly just, having dealt with our sin in the person of His Son.

Verse by Verse Commentary

17 Yahweh is righteous in all His ways And holy in all His works.

This is the foundation upon which everything else is built. David makes two comprehensive claims about God. First, He is righteous in all His ways. "Ways" refers to His paths, His dealings, His administration of the world. There is no action God takes, no decree He makes, no providence He ordains that is tinged with injustice. He is not mostly righteous; He is righteous in all His ways. Second, He is holy in all His works. The Hebrew word here is hasid, which is often translated as gracious, kind, or merciful. It is the word connected to God's covenant loyalty, His hesed. So God is not only just, He is also full of steadfast love in everything He does. His justice is a loving justice, and His love is a just love. There is no conflict in His attributes. Every single thing God does is both perfectly right and perfectly loving. This is a staggering thought, and it is the reason we can trust Him, even when we cannot trace His hand.

18 Yahweh is near to all who call upon Him, To all who call upon Him in truth.

Because God is righteous and faithful, He is accessible. The gods of the pagans are distant, capricious, and deaf. But Yahweh is near. This nearness, however, is conditional. He is near to all who call upon Him, but David immediately qualifies this with a crucial phrase: to all who call upon Him in truth. What does this mean? It means calling upon Him without hypocrisy. It means our prayers are not a performance for others. It means we are not trying to manipulate God with clever words. It means we come to Him as we are, confessing our sins, and acknowledging Him for who He is. A prayer "in truth" is a prayer that aligns with the reality of who God is and the reality of who we are. It is the opposite of the self-justifying prayer of the Pharisee in the temple. God draws near to the honest man, the man who has stopped pretending.

19 He will work out the desire of those who fear Him; He will hear their cry for help and He will save them.

This verse describes the practical effect of God's nearness. He is not just near in a passive, comforting way. He is near to act. Notice the progression of verbs: He will work out, He will hear, He will save. And notice who the beneficiaries are: those who fear Him. This is parallel to those who call on Him in truth. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and it is also the beginning of answered prayer. This is not a promise that God will give us anything we happen to want, like a cosmic vending machine. The fear of the Lord reorders our desires. As we grow in reverence and awe of God, our desires begin to conform to His will. We want what He wants. And so, when God works out the desire of those who fear Him, He is often working out His own desires in and through them. He hears their cry, their desperate plea for help, and the result is salvation. He saves them from their enemies, from their circumstances, and ultimately, from their sin.

20 Yahweh keeps all who love Him, But all the wicked He will destroy.

Here we have the great continental divide of Scripture. There are two groups of people, and only two. First, there are all who love Him. These are the same people who call on Him in truth and who fear Him. Love and fear are not opposites here; they are two sides of the same coin of genuine faith. And what does God do for them? He "keeps" them. The Hebrew word is shamar, which means to guard, to watch over, to preserve. This is a promise of divine preservation. God will not lose any of His true children. He is a faithful shepherd who guards His flock. But there is another group: all the wicked. Their destiny is starkly different. God will destroy them. This is not something to be mumbled or apologized for. The same righteousness and holiness that guarantees the salvation of the believer guarantees the destruction of the unrepentant. A God who refuses to judge evil is not a good God. His justice is part of His glory. The comfort of His preservation of the saints is made all the sweeter by the certainty of His judgment on wickedness.

Application

These verses should drive us to our knees in two ways. First, in profound gratitude. The God of the universe, who is perfectly righteous and holy, has made Himself near to us. He invites us to call on Him, and He promises to hear and to save. This access was purchased for us at an infinite cost. The Lord Jesus Christ is Yahweh made near. He is Immanuel, God with us. He is the only one who ever called upon the Father perfectly "in truth," and it is only because we are in Him that our own feeble, distracted prayers are heard. He is the one who feared the Lord perfectly, and God heard His cry from the grave and saved Him. When we love God, it is because He first loved us. And our security, our "keeping," is not in our weak grip on Him, but in His mighty grip on us.

Second, these verses should drive us to sober self-examination. Are we calling on God in truth? Or is our religious life a sham, a performance? Do we fear Him? Do our desires reflect a heart that is being shaped by His will? Do we love Him? We must not presume upon His nearness. The same God who is a saving fire for His people is a consuming fire for His enemies. The great division described in verse 20 is real and it is eternal. The gospel is the good news that through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, we can cross over from the side of the wicked, who will be destroyed, to the side of those who love Him, who will be kept forever.