In this psalm we hear Messiah bemoan His going down into the depth of suffering where none can follow, the shame and butt of man, the forsaken of God on behalf of guilty man, and very especially for the most guilty of all, that said they saw, but rejected Him Who shone in fulness of light and love even for the blind that felt their need and cried to Him. Here it is not the "day of trouble" merely, but of God's abandoning His elect and beloved Servant that He might abandon none who repent and believe, and that He might proclaim pardon to the vilest in His name. It is Christ made sin; and then from the middle of 21 the resulting grace triumphant, as unmingled as the judgment which had befallen Him without mitigation, as described in the previous verses. It is therefore most fittingly His own voice exclusively that is heard, first in His lonely anguish, then in the joy that imparts the fruits of His deliverance in an ever-widening circle: "to my brethren," and "in the midst of the congregation" (22); next "in the great congregation" (25); then "all the ends of the earth" and all tribes of the Gentiles share the blessing and praise; and this abidingly. How striking the contrast with the result of Ps. 21! Both are perfectly in season. The title is peculiar, "To the chief musician, upon the hind of the dawn, a psalm of David."

Here is the transition (ver. 21). At this point when He is transfixed, the Lord is conscious of being heard. He bows His head in death, His blood is shed. So it must be in atonement. Without this there would be no adequate offering for sin; but He Who so died can commend His soul to His Father, and say, It is finished. The verses that succeed express the deep joy of a deliverance out of such a death, commensurate with a death so unfathomable, which He first sings in the midst of those who share His rejection, and pursues with enlarging circles of blessing into the kingdom, though the fellowship then will not be so profound as that which is immediately consequent on His death and resurrection. Compare John 20:17-23; Joh 20:26-29; and John 21:1-14.

Such is this wondrous psalm; the suffering's that pertain to Christ, and the glories after these. No voice is heard throughout but Christ's; none could be with His atoning cries to God, though we may join in praising God and the Lamb, and are we assured that the truth that He was alone in those sorrows is the guarantee of that efficacious work, whereby all our evil is annulled and we stand in His acceptance as believers in Him Who contrasts Himself with those before Him that cried and were heard. And how different all since, who if they fear have only to praise! Nothing but grace flows out of His atonement.