Psalm 118:15

Psalm 118:15

The tents of the righteous

Before we can get a handle on this verse, we need to establish the true identity of the “righteous.” When the Lord God separated the peoples of the earth, after the shame of Babel, there was only one nation that was chosen to belong to Him. This was astonishing because 70 others are listed as originating at this point in history and the nation that God chose had not yet been born! In Deuteronomy 32:8-9 we are told that the Lord distributed the earth according to the nations. The 70 were disinherited because He chose Israel, “For the Lord’s portion is His people, Jacob His allotted inheritance.” (v9) In other words, God let all the other people’s go their own way BUT, at Babel, He chose to inherit Israel or Jacob as His own. These, the people of Israel, were known as the righteous, not because they were better than the others, anything but, but because God was with them, and they were righteous by faith.

It follows that when God protected His righteous people and gave them victory over their enemies, they had every right to shout with joy and celebrate the success that had been granted to them. Substitute the word “tents” for “homes” and we too have every right to proclaim the victories of the Lord with shouts of joy.

Once again, we are reminded that it is the Lord’s right hand that is responsible for the victory, when He intervenes and demonstrates His superiority over the armies of the world and the powers and principalities that surround us, we have every reason to celebrate and to extol the virtues of His authority and rule. What a mighty God we serve! What a glorious privilege to be counted amongst the righteous, for we too have been chosen to belong to Him, not by virtue of our goodness but because of His choice. Our confidence in Him should know no bounds for the same God goes with us and the same right hand guards us as guarded those ancient Israelites. 

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