The Apple of His Eye ... commentary of Psalm 74
The Apple of His Eye
… A commentary of Psalm
74
Verse Sixteen
Psalm 74:16: “The day is
thine, the night also is thine: thou hast
prepared the light and the sun.”
“…before the day…”
Who is before the day?
The Record gives the
answer! Turn to the book of Isaiah chapter
forty-three, verse thirteen:
“Yea, before the day
was I am he; and there is none
that can deliver out of my hand: I will work, and
who shall let it?” [Isaiah 43:13]
'Every dog has its day'
This phrase is recorded as being first
uttered by no less a notable as Queen Elizabeth I.
As Princess Elizabeth, in a letter to her brother
and in response to his request for a picture of her,
she wrote:
Notwithstanding, as a dog hath a day, so
may I perchance have time to declare it in deeds.
We all have a set time,
we have a day or a period of time to live: Job 14:6:
“Turn from him, that
he may rest, till he shall accomplish, as an
hireling, his day.”
There is a day for one’s
birth, and there is a day for one’s death.
That is the lot of man.
One’s death is
more important than one’s birth: Ecclesiastes
7:1:
“A good name is
better than precious ointment; and the day of death
than the day of one's birth.”
Death is coming for you
in a day: Ecclesiastes 8:8:
“There
is no man that hath power over the
spirit to retain the spirit; neither hath he
power in the day of death: and there is no
discharge in that war; neither shall
wickedness deliver those that are given to it.”
The Daysman
A person ought to be
focused on searching for and trusting in
his Daysman who has power over death: Job
9:33:
“Neither is there any
daysman betwixt us, that might lay his hand
upon us both.”
If a person refuses
to put their trust in the Daysman, he may end
up cursing the day he was born, like Job
did: Job 3:1:
“After this opened Job
his mouth, and cursed his day.”
Job cursed both
the day he was born, and the night he was
conceived [let it perish]: Job 3:3-5:
“Let the day perish
wherein I was born, and the night in which it was
said, There is a man child conceived.
Let that day be
darkness; let not God regard it from above, neither
let the light shine upon it.
Let darkness and the
shadow of death stain it; let a cloud dwell upon it;
let the blackness of the day terrify it.”
Though Job found
himself sitting in the ash pile, [Job 2:8:
“And he took him a potsherd to scrape himself
withal; and he sat down among the ashes.”], it
was necessary for him to come to the end of
himself, and arrive to these thoughts:
There is a day for
one’s prosperity to be enjoyed, and there is
another day for one’s adversity to be endured:
Ecclesiastes 7:14:
“In the day of
prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity
consider: God also hath set the one over against the
other, to the end that man should find nothing after
him.”
Something else:
Everyone, born on this earth, has his day.
Consider Job’s sons: Job 1:4:
“And his sons went and
feasted in their houses, every one his day;
and sent and called for their three sisters to eat
and to drink with them.”
Satan had his day
to play out his plan: Job 1:6:
“Now there was a day
when the sons of God came to present themselves
before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.”
Again: Job 2:1:
“Again there was a day
when the sons of God came to present themselves
before the LORD, and Satan came also among them to
present himself before the LORD.”
There is a day
for us to eat and drink together in our special
occasions: Job 1:13:
“And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:”
The Dayspring
Job 3:9: “Let the stars of the twilight
thereof be dark; let it look for light, but have
none; neither let it see the dawning of the day:”
The dawning of the day is called the
dayspring.
Job 7:4: “When I lie down, I say, When
shall I arise, and the night be gone? and I am full
of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day.”
DA'YSPRING, n. The dawn; the beginning
of the day, or first appearance of light.
'Another day, another dollar’
With the dawning of a new day, a man
springs forth to work another day to
earn another dollar. 'Another day, another
dollar' began as a sailor's expression in the 19th
century. It dates from the days when sailors were
paid a dollar a day.
On the long voyages at sea, each day seemed
the same as another day, and all that a man had to
show for each day's work was one more dollar in
their pocket.
Thus, the days of a man’s life consists of
looking for his next meal. He knows
inherently, within his breast and with all
his being that trouble is just only
around the corner in the impending darkness of
night.
It is, as it says it is, in the book
of Job chapter fifteen, verse twenty-three:
“He wandereth abroad for bread,
saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the
day of darkness is ready at his hand.”
[Job 15:23]
The brevity of life all around him
gives a man the sense that he needs to move fast
and improvise. See chapter seventeen,
verse twelve:
“They change the night into day: the
light is short because of darkness.”
[Job 17:12]
In the human chain, others watch
what unfolds:
“They that come after him shall
be astonied at his day, as they that went before
were affrighted.” [Job 18:20]
Fear comes upon all. Judgment is
coming!
“…the great day
of his wrath” “that great day of God Almighty.”
It’s inevitable, a man will lose it all in
that day.
For this read in chapter twenty, verse
twenty-eight:
“The increase of his house shall depart,
and his goods shall flow away in the day of
his wrath.” [Job 20:28]
And again, this time for his soul in the
next chapter, verse thirty:
“That the wicked is reserved to the
day of destruction? they shall be brought forth
to the day of wrath.” [Job
21:30]
Now for the nations, an observation:
The nations of the earth are careening
forward toward an appointment that they must
keep in the meeting place with God Almighty in the
near future: Revelation 6:17:
“For the great day of his wrath is come;
and who shall be able to stand?”
Who shall be able to stand in this
battle? Revelation 16:14:
“For they are the spirits of devils,
working miracles, which go forth unto the
kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather
them to the battle of that great day of God
Almighty.”
Who shall not be able to stand in
the Day of Judgment?
John 3:19-20:
“And this is the condemnation, that
light is come into the world, and men loved darkness
rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
For every one that doeth evil hateth the
light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds
should be reproved.”
Who shall be able to stand in the
Day of Judgment?
It is the believer in Jesus Christ, the
adopted sons of God that will stand in the Day of
Judgment:
Here follow the promises of God:
·
“But he that doeth truth
cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made
manifest, that they are wrought in God.”
John 3:19-20
·
1 John 4:17: “Herein is
our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in
the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in
this world.”
·
1 Thessalonians 5:4-5:
“But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that
day should overtake you as a thief.
Ye are all the children of light, and
the children of the day: we are not of the night,
nor of darkness.”
·
1 Thessalonians 5:9: “For
God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain
salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ,”
The latter day…
With the second advent of Jesus
Christ, the Kingdom of Heaven will be established
here on this earth. Even Job saw this coming
afar off in his day. Job 19:25:
“For I know that my redeemer
liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter
day upon the earth:”
Verse sixteen, again: “The
day is thine, the night also is thine:
thou hast prepared the light and the sun.”
“…thou hast prepared the light and the sun.”
In the beginning
before anything was created that has been
created, God was.
This is the record:
John 1:1-3:
“In the beginning was
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God.
The same was in the
beginning with God.
All things were made
by him; and without him was not any thing made that
was made.”
God called the light Day
What is Day?
For this we go to the book of beginnings
to the First book of Moses called Genesis chapter
one, verses one through four:
“In the beginning God created the heaven
and the earth. And the earth was without form, and
void; and darkness was upon the face of the
deep.
And the Spirit of God moved upon the
face of the waters. And God said, Let there be
light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was
good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the
darkness he called Night. [Genesis
1:1-4]
God created light.
God called light by a name.
God called light Day.
Furthermore, God called the inverse
[or the absence] of light … Night.
Time: hours, months and years
Revelation 9:15: “And the four angels
were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a
day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third
part of men.”
Yet while the light is called Day
[capital D], God also established a day
[a small d] as a time interval [which
interval is equal to the sum of the period of the
night to the period of its consecutive Day].
Verse five: “And the
evening and the morning were the first day.”
[Genesis 1:5]
Thus, time is set in this division for
all the days to follow till the end of time.