Like sheep they are destined for Sheol. Death will be their shepherd. The upright will rule them in the morning, and their form will decay in Sheol, far from their lofty abode. Sermons
There have been several different views entertained of the state after death. The realm of departed seals was called by the Hebrews Sheol, or the all-demanding world; by the Greeks Hades, or the unknown world. Practically, either word may be used, since the two simply refer to the same realm looked at under different aspects. To the pagan, Sheol (or Hades) was a dim and grim underworld, with no light beyond. To the Hebrews, Sheol was a dim underworld, with the light at the end - "in the awakening" To the Christian, Hades is a realm of perfect rest in Christ, where the righteous are awaiting the resurrection morn. And we may now set forth the believer's hopes as to that day in far brighter and more vivid tones than were possible to the psalmists and seers of old. I. THERE WILL BE A RESURRECTION FROM THE DEAD. Whether or no the psalmist descried this, we cannot tell; but we do, for Jesus has brought life and incorruption to light through the gospel. He is the Resurrection and the Life. He is the Saviour of the body; and "whosoever liveth and believeth in him shall never die." It will be indeed a glorious "morning" when death shall be swallowed up in victory. II. JEHOVAH-JESUS WILL THEN BE THE SHEPHERD OF HIS FLOCK. As he was their Shepherd when here, and had guard of them between death and the resurrection, so he will be their Shepherd still, to lead and feed them with his own hand. "The upright" will have no such doleful shepherd as death; they will know nothing of dying. In the loving care of Jesus they will know only life and joy. III. THEN THOSE WHO HAVE FOLLOWED THE LORD JESUS WILL HAVE THE SUPREMACY. "Many that are last shall be first, and the first last," even within the kingdom. But how much more will this reversal be seen in the case of those who are not in the kingdom at all! Many who were among the great, the high, the noble, of earth will not then be owned by the King; while many a poor but humble Christian, whom the world knew not because it knew him not, will hear a voice saying, "Friend, come up higher." Then many of earth's despised ones shall enter into the presence of the King; they shall sit with him on his throne; and they shall have dominion "in the morning." God will cause "all things" to work together for good to those that love him. Evil may ride high for a time, but it must hide its head at last. And when the wicked are ashamed, the righteous will lift up their heads, for the day of their redemption will have come. - C. Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them! (with Revelation 7:17): — These two verses have a much closer parallelism in expression than appears in A.V. The R.V. renders the former of my texts, "Death shall be their shepherd," and the latter, "The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall be their Shepherd." The Old Testament psalmist and the blew Testament seer have fallen upon the same image to describe death and the future, but with how different a use! The one paints a grim picture, all sunless and full of shadow; the other dips his pencil in brilliant colours, and suffuses his canvas with a glow as of molten sunlight. The one is speaking of men whose portion is in this life, the other of men who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. I. THE GRIM PICTURE DRAWN BY THE PSALMIST. 1. Death a shepherd! What a grim and bold inversion of a familiar metaphor! "Death is their shepherd." Yes, but what kind of a shepherd? Not one that gently leads his flock, but one that stalks behind the huddled sheep, and drives them fiercely, club in hand, on a path on which they would not willingly go. The unwelcome necessity, by which men that have their portion in this world are hounded and herded out of all their sunny pastures and abundant feeding, is the thought that underlies the image. Ask yourself the question, Is the course of my life such as that the end of it shall be like that? — a grim necessity which I would do anything to avoid. 2. This first text suggests not only a shepherd, but a fold. "Like sheep they are thrust down to the grave." He does not mean either the place where the body is deposited, or a place where there is punitive retribution for the wicked, but he means a dim region, or, if I might so say, a localized condition, in which all that have passed through life are gathered, where personality and consciousness continue, but where life is faint, stripped of all that characterizes it here; shadowy, unsubstantial, and where, according to the metaphor, there is inactivity, absolute cessation of all the occupations to which men were accustomed. But there may be restlessness along with inactivity; may there not? And there is no such restlessness as the restlessness of compulsory idleness. That is the main idea that is in the psalmist's mind. 3. The kind of men whom the grim shepherd drives into that grim fold. The psalmist is speaking of men who have their portion in this life. Of every such man he says, "when he dieth he shall carry nothing away" — none of the possessions, none of the forms of activity which were familiar to him here on earth. He will go into a state where he finds nothing which interests him, and nothing for him to do. Surely there can be no more tragic folly than the folly of letting myself be so absorbed and entangled by this present world as that when the transient has passed I shall feel homeless and desolate, and have nothing that I can do or care about amidst the activities of eternity. II. THE SUNNY LANDSCAPE DRAWN BY THE SEER. To begin with, note the contrast of the other shepherd. "Death shall be their shepherd." "The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall be their shepherd." All Christ's shepherding on earth and in heaven depends, as do all our hopes for heaven and earth, upon the fact of His sacrificial death. It is only because He is the "Lamb that was slain" that He is either the "Lamb in the midst of the Throne," or the Shepherd of the flock. He is the Lamb, and He is Shepherd — that suggests not only that the sacrificial work of Jesus Christ is the basis of all His work for us on earth and in heaven, but the very incongruity of the metaphor making one who bears the same nature as the flock to be the Shepherd of the flock, is part of the beauty of the metaphor. They follow Him because He is one of themselves, and He could not be the Shepherd unless He were the Lamb. But then this other Shepherd is not only gracious, sympathetic, kind to us by common participation in a common nature, and fit to be our Guide because He has been our Sacrifice and the propitiation of our sins, but He is the Lamb "in the midst of the throne," wielding therefore all Divine power, and standing in the middle point between it and the ring of worshippers, and so the Communicator to the outer circumference of all the blessings that dwell in the Divine centre. He shall be their Shepherd, not coercing, not driving by violence, but leading to the fountains of the waters of life, gently and graciously. And it is not compulsory energy which He exercises upon us, either on earth or in heaven, but it is the drawing of a Divine attraction, sweet to put forth and sweet to yield to. There is still another contrast. Death huddled and herded his reluctant sheep into a fold, where they lie inactive but struggling and restless. Christ leads His flock into a pasture. He shall guide them "to the fountains of waters of life." () The whole psalm pours contempt on wealth, pursues it with the most incisive and biting irony. Its pictures of the man who devotes his whole life to amassing a treasure of which, when he takes the inevitable journey of death, he cannot carry so much as a single shekel with him; of the man who calls his lands after his own name, as if to cheat death itself, and to secure a bastard immortality, perpetuating his name on earth while he himself perishes in Hades; and of the man who thinks it possible to bribe death, and buy the power "to live on for ever," are quick with a scorn beyond that of satire. They tremble with a fervid moral indignation and contempt for the folly which can mistake wealth for man's chief good. Wealth is not man's chief good; it is wrong, it is wicked, it is a profound and fatal violation of the Divine law and order, to make it the governing and supreme aim of life. For all who do that, even though they violate no human law, end even though they acquire but little of the wealth they seek, the psalmist cherishes a pure, unutterable scorn. To him they are losing the very form and status of men. They are sinking to the level of "beasts that perish"; i.e. they are living as though they had no life but this, as if death were not, as if there were no light beyond the grave. But there is one picture of them, still hidden from us by a thin veil of words, in which his scorn for these brutish people culminates in a figure as terrible, perhaps, as any in the whole range of Scripture. In verse 14 he depicts them as the "sheep of death." The opening clauses of the verses, rightly translated, run, "Like sheep they are gathered to Hades; death is their Shepherd" (He who feeds or finds pasture for them; not he who feeds on them). What the psalmist means is that men who make wealth their ruling aim are not simply like the beasts that perish, but are in very deed the sheep of death; that it is death whom they have chosen for their shepherd, instead of God, the Author and Source of life; that it is Death who finds pasture for them while they live, and who, when they die, drives them to his fold in the unseen world. Think of it! The sheep of death — men following that grim shadow to the darkness in which it dwells! And these the men who "bless their souls" (ver 18), whom the world praises because they have done good to themselves, whose "sayings" the world quotes and approves after they have gone to their long, dark home! Was there ever a more grisly and dreadful metaphor? And yet is it one whir too dreadful? Is it not true that every man who trusts in riches, or longs for them as his chief good, is pursuing death, not life; has taken for his shepherd "the dark Shadow feared of man," although he knows it not? Can we not see in that very trust or longing the very brand of death, the private and distinctive mark of that grim Shepherd? () People Asaph, Korah, PsalmistPlaces JerusalemTopics Appointed, Beauty, Death, Decay, Destined, Dominion, Feed, Flock, Forms, Grave, Mansion, Mansions, Morning, Princely, Rule, Sheol, Shepherd, UprightOutline 1. An earnest persuasion to build the faith of resurrection
16. Worldly prosperity is not to be admired
Dictionary of Bible Themes Psalm 49:14 4684 sheep Psalm 49:13-14 5288 dead, the Psalm 49:13-20 4938 fate, final destiny Psalm 49:14-15 9040 grave, the
9540 Sheol Library Two Shepherds and Two Flocks
'Like sheep they are laid in the grave; Death shall feed on them.' --PSALM xlix. 14. 'The Lamb which is in the midst of the Throne shall feed them.' --REV. vii. 17. These two verses have a much closer parallelism in expression than appears in our Authorised Version. If you turn to the Revised Version you will find that it rightly renders the former of my texts, 'Death shall be their shepherd,' and the latter, 'The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall be their Shepherd.' The Old Testament …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy ScriptureWesley's Hymns Reconsidered
Bernard Manning A paper read before the Cambridge University Methodist Society on February 9, 1939. SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, sometime Scholar of Jesus College in the University of Cambridge, once wrote some ingenious verses {Metrical Feet: Lesson for a Boy.} to help his sons to remember the chief sorts of metre. If Coleridge had been a Methodist instead of a pilgrim from Anglicanism to Unitarianism and back again, he would have needed to do no such thing: he would have needed only to advise his boys …
Bernard L. Manning—The Hymns of Wesley and Watts: Five Papers The Lapse of Time.
"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest."--Eccles. ix. 10. Solomon's advice that we should do whatever our hand findeth to do with our might, naturally directs our thoughts to that great work in which all others are included, which will outlive all other works, and for which alone we really are placed here below--the salvation of our souls. And the consideration of this great work, …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII The Care of the Soul Urged as the one Thing Needful
Luke 10:42 -- "But one thing is needful." It was the amiable character of our blessed Redeemer, that "he went about doing good," this great motive, which animated all his actions, brought him to the house of his friend Lazarus, at Bethany, and directed his behavior there. Though it was a season of recess from public labor, our Lord brought the sentiments and the pious cares of a preacher of righteousness into the parlor of a friend; and there his doctrine dropped as the rain, and distilled as the …
George Whitefield—Selected Sermons of George Whitefield The Three Parables of Warning: to the Individual, to the Nation, and to the Theocracy - the Foolish Rich Man - the Barren Fig-Tree - The
The three Parables, which successively follow in St. Luke's Gospel, may generally be designated as those of warning.' This holds specially true of the last two of them, which refer to the civil and the ecclesiastical polity of Israel. Each of the three Parables is set in an historical frame, having been spoken under circumstances which gave occasion for such illustration. 1. The Parable of the foolish rich man. [4439] It appears, that some one among them that listened to Jesus conceived the idea, …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah Sense in Which, and End for which all Things were Delivered to the Incarnate Son.
For whereas man sinned, and is fallen, and by his fall all things are in confusion: death prevailed from Adam to Moses (cf. Rom. v. 14), the earth was cursed, Hades was opened, Paradise shut, Heaven offended, man, lastly, corrupted and brutalised (cf. Ps. xlix. 12), while the devil was exulting against us;--then God, in His loving-kindness, not willing man made in His own image to perish, said, Whom shall I send, and who will go?' (Isa. vi. 8). But while all held their peace, the Son [441] said, …
Athanasius—Select Works and Letters or Athanasius Notes on the Second Century
Page 94. Line 9. The Book of ---- The reference here is to the apocryphal Wisdom of Solomon xiii. 1-5. Page 104. Med. 33. As originally written this Meditation commenced thus: Whether the sufferings of an. Angel would have been meritorious or no I will not dispute: but'---- And the following sentence, which comes after the first, has also been crossedout: So that it was an honour and no injury to be called to it: And so great an honour that it was an ornament to God himself, and an honour even to …
Thomas Traherne—Centuries of Meditations The Kinsman Redeemer
'After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him.'--LEV. xxv. 48. There are several of the institutions and precepts of the Mosaic legislation which, though not prophetic, nor typical, have yet remarkable correspondences with lofty Christian truth. They may be used as symbols, if only we remember that we are diverting them from their original purpose. How singularly these words lend themselves to the statement of the very central truths of Christianity--a slavery …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture Out of the Deep of Doubt, Darkness, and Hell.
O Lord God of my salvation, I have cried day and night unto Thee. Oh! let my prayer enter into Thy presence. For my soul is full of trouble and my life draweth nigh unto Hell. Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in a place of darkness, and in the deep.--Ps. lxxxviii. 1, 2. If I go down to Hell, Thou art there also. Yea, the darkness is no darkness with Thee; but the night is as clear as the day.--Ps. cxxxix. 7, 11. I waited patiently for the Lord; and He inclined unto me, and heard my calling. …
Charles Kingsley—Out of the Deep The Christian Business World
Scripture references: Proverbs 22:29; Romans 12:11; Psalms 24:1; 50:10-12; Haggai 2:8; Psalm 49:6,10,16,17; 62:10; Matthew 13:22; Mark 10:23,24; Job 31:24-26; Proverbs 3:9; Matthew 25:14-30; 24:45-51; 6:19-21; Luke 12:16-21. THE IDEAL IN THE BUSINESS WORLD There is often a wide difference between the methods actually employed in doing business and when they should be. Good men who are in the thick of the battle of competition and rivalry with other firms in the same line of trade, are the quickest …
Henry T. Sell—Studies in the Life of the Christian Adam's Sin
Q-15: WHAT WAS THE SIN WHEREBY OUR FIRST PARENTS FELL FROM THE ESTATE WHEREIN THEY WERE CREATED? A: That sin was eating the forbidden fruit. 'She took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also to her husband.' Gen 3:3. Here is implied, 1. That our first parents fell from their estate of innocence. 2. The sin by which they fell, was eating the forbidden fruit. I. Our first parents fell from their glorious state of innocence. God made man upright, but they have sought out many inventions.' Eccl …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity Some Helps to Mourning
Having removed the obstructions, let me in the last place propound some helps to holy mourning. 1 Set David's prospect continually before you. My sin is ever before me' (Psalm 51:3). David, that he might be a mourner, kept his eye full upon sin. See what sin is, and then tell me if there be not enough in it to draw forth tears. I know not what name to give it bad enough. One calls it the devil's excrement. Sin is a complication of all evils. It is the spirits of mischief distilled. Sin dishonours …
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12 "Boast not Thyself of To-Morrow, for Thou Knowest not what a Day May Bring Forth. "
Prov. xxvii. 1.--"Boast not thyself of to-morrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth." There are some peculiar gifts that God hath given to man in his first creation, and endued his nature with, beyond other living creatures, which being rightly ordered and improved towards the right objects, do advance the soul of man to a wonderful height of happiness, that no other sublunary creature is capable of. But by reason of man's fall into sin, these are quite disordered and turned out of …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning Letter Xlvi (Circa A. D. 1125) to Guigues, the Prior, and to the Other Monks of the Grand Chartreuse
To Guigues, the Prior, And to the Other Monks of the Grand Chartreuse He discourses much and piously of the law of true and sincere charity, of its signs, its degrees, its effects, and of its perfection which is reserved for Heaven (Patria). Brother Bernard, of Clairvaux, wishes health eternal to the most reverend among fathers, and to the dearest among friends, Guigues, Prior of the Grande Chartreuse, and to the holy Monks who are with him. 1. I have received the letter of your Holiness as joyfully …
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux—Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux The Covenant of Works
Q-12: I proceed to the next question, WHAT SPECIAL ACT OF PROVIDENCE DID GOD EXERCISE TOWARDS MAN IN THE ESTATE WHEREIN HE WAS CREATED? A: When God had created man, he entered into a covenant of life with him upon condition of perfect obedience, forbidding him to eat of the tree of knowledge upon pain of death. For this, consult with Gen 2:16, 17: And the Lord commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity Question Lxxxi of the virtue of Religion
I. Does the Virtue of Religion Direct a Man To God Alone? S. Augustine, sermon, cccxxxiv. 3 " on Psalm lxxvi. 32 sermon, cccxi. 14-15 II. Is Religion a Virtue? III. Is Religion One Virtue? IV. Is Religion a Special Virtue Distinct From Others? V. Is Religion One of the Theological Virtues? VI. Is Religion To Be Preferred To the Other Moral Virtues? VII. Has Religion, Or Latria, Any External Acts? S. Augustine, of Care for the Dead, V. VIII. Is Religion the Same As Sanctity? Cardinal Cajetan, …
St. Thomas Aquinas—On Prayer and The Contemplative Life The Resemblance Between the Old Testament and the New.
1. Introduction, showing the necessity of proving the similarity of both dispensations in opposition to Servetus and the Anabaptists. 2. This similarity in general. Both covenants truly one, though differently administered. Three things in which they entirely agree. 3. First general similarity, or agreement--viz. that the Old Testament, equally with the New, extended its promises beyond the present life, and held out a sure hope of immortality. Reason for this resemblance. Objection answered. 4. …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion The Greatness of the Soul,
AND UNSPEAKABLENESS 0F THE LOSS THEREOF; WITH THE CAUSES OF THE LOSING IT. FIRST PREACHED AT PINNER'S HALL and now ENLARGED AND PUBLISHED FOR GOOD. By JOHN BUNYAN, London: Printed for Benjamin Alsop, at the Angel and Bible in the Poultry, 1682 Faithfully reprinted from the Author's First Edition. ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR. Our curiosity is naturally excited to discover what a poor, unlettered mechanic, whose book-learning had been limited to the contents of one volume, could by possibility know …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3 The Resurrection of the Dead, and Eternal Judgment:
OR, THE TRUTH OF THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODIES, BOTH OF GOOD AND BAD AT THE LAST DAY: ASSERTED, AND PROVED BY GOD'S WORD. ALSO, THE MANNER AND ORDER OF THEIR COMING FORTH OF THEIR GRAVES; AS ALSO, WITH WHAT BODIES THEY DO ARISE. TOGETHER, WITH A DISCOURSE OF THE LAST JUDGMENT, AND THE FINAL CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE WORLD. BY JOHN BUNYAN, A SERVANT OF THE LORD'S CHRIST. "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3 Notes on the Third Century
Page 161. Line 1. He must be born again, &c. This is a compound citation from John iii. 3, and Mark x. 15, in the order named. Page 182. Line 17. For all things should work together, &c. See Romans viii. 28. Page 184. Lines 10-11. Being Satan is able, &c. 2 Corinthians xi. 14. Page 184. Last line. Like a sparrow, &c. Psalm cii. Page 187. Line 1. Mechanisms. This word is, in the original MS., mechanicismes.' Page 187. Line 7. Like the King's daughter, &c. Psalm xlv. 14. Page 188. Med. 39. The best …
Thomas Traherne—Centuries of Meditations Appendix ix. List of Old Testament Passages Messianically Applied in Ancient Rabbinic Writings
THE following list contains the passages in the Old Testament applied to the Messiah or to Messianic times in the most ancient Jewish writings. They amount in all to 456, thus distributed: 75 from the Pentateuch, 243 from the Prophets, and 138 from the Hagiorgrapha, and supported by more than 558 separate quotations from Rabbinic writings. Despite all labour care, it can scarcely be hoped that the list is quite complete, although, it is hoped, no important passage has been omitted. The Rabbinic references …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah Psalms
The piety of the Old Testament Church is reflected with more clearness and variety in the Psalter than in any other book of the Old Testament. It constitutes the response of the Church to the divine demands of prophecy, and, in a less degree, of law; or, rather, it expresses those emotions and aspirations of the universal heart which lie deeper than any formal demand. It is the speech of the soul face to face with God. Its words are as simple and unaffected as human words can be, for it is the genius …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament Links Psalm 49:14 NIV
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