The Sure Mercies of David

A Study in Divine Purposes

"Incline your ear, and come unto me: hear, and your soul shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David." (Isaiah 55:3)

What are the "sure mercies of David"? They are the subject of a promise of considerable importance, for the offer is to those who will incline their ears to God, and so find life eternal. This fifty‑fifth chapter of Isaiah is a Messianic chapter; there is not much doubt about that, but just because the Messianic Age is the one in which all the good purposes of our God converge together toward their glorious conclusion, it is only meet (right)that we give it our earnest attention, for here there must surely be good and sound doctrine for our own hearts and minds.

This expression, the "sure mercies of David," is evidently either a synonym for the "everlasting covenant" of the same sentence, or something intimately associated with that covenant. This everlasting covenant is very clearly the covenant under which Messianic work is to be conducted; that much is plain from the intimate association of this verse with the remainder of the chapter, which deals with the evangelising work of the Messianic Age. That is the covenant which in Jeremiah is referred to as the New Covenant, the one under which men’s hearts are to be changed from hearts of stone to hearts of flesh, and none will need to ask his neighbour if he knows the Lord, because all, from the least unto the greatest, will know him. (Jer.31:34) Only in the Messianic Age will that be true. Now David had nothing to do with the making of the New Covenant. It is true that God did make a covenant with David but it was rather a reaffirmation of the original Abrahamic Covenant than one having direct application to the reconciliation work of the Millennium. We cannot say therefore that the "sure mercies of David" are one and the same with the "everlasting covenant." Rather are they the characteristic features of the arrangement by which the everlasting covenant will be carried into effect, and those characteristic features are all pre‑figured by David and his reign back there in the days of Israel.

Let David himself tell us of this. He has enshrined the truths of this matter in the 89th Psalm, and in that Psalm David tells of the promises that God made to him, promises that were fulfilled only to a very limited degree in his earthly life but will be fulfilled in their glorious entirety in days yet to come. "I will sing of the mercies of the LORD for ever" he cries (v.1) "with my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations." These "mercies of the LORD" are the things of which we are now thinking. The word itself means "loving kindness" and when the adjective "sure" (aman, faithful, stedfast) is prefixed we have the "faithful loving kindness" which the Lord has promised David, and through him, the whole world. In this introductory verse David is telling us that the loving kindness and faithfulness of God is to be made known for ever, proclaimed to all generations, an apt way of saying that what he has to tell is intended not only for his own day and people but also, and much more urgently, for the people of "the Age," the Day of reconciliation, which even now is still future. Here in this Psalm is the record of the Covenant God made with David, a covenant so very like the Abrahamic promise in its phraseology that we ought clearly to see that it is but a re‑affirmation of the kingly phase of that great Covenant. "I have made a covenant with my chosen, I have sworn unto David my servant, thy seed will I establish for ever, and build up thy throne to all generations." (vv.3‑4). In ecstasy of this revelation of the Divine purposes David goes on to speak of the glory and power of God and the absolute righteousness of his rule. "Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: mercy and truth shall go before thy face." (v.14). So, he goes up, step by step, to the lofty height from which he views the "sure mercies," the "faithful loving kindnesses" which are to constitute the salient features of the Messianic Age. A King, reigning in righteousness! An Administration, ruling in righteousness! A Kingdom built upon righteousness! These are the sure mercies of David and these are to be "given" to those who hear and respond to Isaiah’s call; those who, thirsting, come to the waters where they may drink and buy wine and milk without money and without price. The kings and the administrations and the kingdoms of this world demand money and sacrifices from the people their subjects. There is nothing to be had "without money and without price;" all must be paid for and oft‑times the price is a heavy one. Jeremiah says in another place of the inhabitants of Babylon "the people shall labour in vain, and the folk in the fire, and they shall be weary." (Jer.51:58). Those who receive this inestimable gift, the "sure mercies of David" will not be weary, for they are to "go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands." (Isa.55:12). Small wonder that David was joyful when he composed the 89th Psalm.

It is in verse 19 that he rises to this theme of the "sure mercies." "Then thou spakest in vision to thy holy one, and saidst, I have laid help upon one that is mighty; I have exalted one chosen out of the people. I have found David my servant; with my holy oil have I anointed him...My faithfulness and my mercy shall be with him: and in my name shall his horn be exalted...also I will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth. My mercy will I keep with him for evermore, and my covenant shall stand fast with him." (vv.19‑28) This is clearly intended to refer much more definitely to David’s great antitype, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, in his office as earth’s King, than ever it could to David himself. David, the man, great as was his faith and loyal as was his heart, time and again showed himself a man of like passions with other men, guilty of grievous offences against God’s holiness. Only in an illustrative sense can he ever be said to have fulfilled these glowing prophecies. We who look back upon the words from the standpoint of the Christian dispensation see here a vivid word‑picture of the future, of the day when Jesus, whose right it is, takes the throne of earth and rules, as Isaiah said He would rule, a King in righteousness. That is the first and the principal of the sure mercies of David.

The Apostle Paul saw this very clearly. When he came to Antioch of Pisidia in company with Barnabas and preached in the synagogue there he associated the fulfilment of this promise with the resurrection of our Lord. "As concerning that he (God) raised him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, he said on this wise I will give you the sure mercies of David." (Acts 13:34) Christ must needs rise again in the power of an endless life if He is to be given to humankind at his Second Advent to be their righteous and everlasting King in conformity with the terms of this promise. Without the risen Christ the prophecy could not even begin to be fulfilled.

The Divine Plan provides for some to be associated with the Lord Jesus Christ in his kingly work of the next Age. The promise is given to his faithful disciples of this present Age that they shall live and reign with him the thousand years of the Millennium. (Rev.20:4) The New Testament is so full of this theme, the future work and privilege of the Church of Christ, glorified and joined to him "beyond the Veil", that there is no shadow of doubt and no uncertainty about the matter. The work of the Church, under the direction and guidance of the Lord, will be the teaching and converting and reconciling of mankind. They will come to humanity as benefactors and helpers. They too, then, must be included in the "sure mercies of David." The Church is the promised Administration by means of which the Millennial blessings will reach the people. The Divine promise guarantees that they will be ready for their work when the time comes. There is no possibility of failure; that elect company which God foreknew will have been justified and sanctified and glorified in good time for the commencement of its great work. (Rom.8:29‑30) So is it promised in Psalm 89. "His seed also will I make to endure for ever, and his throne as the days of heaven…Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto David. His seed...and his throne...shall be established for ever as the moon, and as a faithful witness in heaven." (Verses 29‑37). Notice here how the "seed" and the "throne" are associated together. That is only to be expected, for the faithful in Christ Jesus, the "seed," are to sit with him in his throne (Rev.3:21) and both seed and throne are to continue eternally "as a faithful witness in heaven." What rare word of comfort and encouragement is this for the loving hearts who are tenaciously maintaining their loyalty and love for the Lord in the face of discouragement and opposition and persecution today. They will be to all eternity "a faithful witness in heaven" testifying to the mighty power and the tender love of our God who has wrought such wonderful things out of such unpromising material.

This is where the Psalm leaves the future. Verses 38 to 51 have no parallel in the future, no place in the prophecy. They voice David’s own bitter realisation that the outworking in his own day was not reaching up to the full measure of the prophecy. And the reason is not far to seek. David himself had proved unworthy. As a type and a picture of his Lord Who was yet to come he filled the requirements and pointed the way for us to follow and observe, but in actual literal truth the glowing words did not attain the limited fulfilment they could have attained in his own day had he himself been more faithful to the principles of righteousness and the duties of kingship. This part of the Psalm does not concern us therefore; we have a King, who, although tempted and proved in all points like as we are and like as David was, endured it all without sin, and attained to his Kingship in the triumph of absolute righteousness. We do not need to end our Psalm, as David did his, on a despondent note. We can finish at verse 37 and hold before our mental vision the glorious prospect of the Church, faithful and triumphant, witness in Heaven. The Church is, to humanity, the second of the "sure mercies of David."

What of the third? Solomon, the son and successor of David, dedicating the Temple that David himself was not allowed to build, touched upon the sublime truth that underlies the third. This Kingdom of righteousness which is also included in the offer "without money and without price" to mankind in "that Day" is the Kingdom of which the Temple of God is the centre, and that is why it is going to be so great a blessing to humanity. Ezekiel saw the same in vision, the Messianic Kingdom built around and depending upon the Temple of God as its centre. Out of the Temple is to flow the River of Life and from the Temple comes all the light that illuminates humanity in the Day of Blessing. So, Solomon, standing and dedicating the Temple he had built, which prefigured the dwelling of God with men in the day when all tears shall be wiped away, (Rev.21:3‑4), was moved by the Holy Spirit to associate what he was doing with the promise of God to his father. "O LORD God" he entreated "turn not away the face of thine anointed: remember the mercies of David thy servant." (2 Chron.6:42)

Just as that Temple became a place where God could meet his people, hear their prayers, accept their offerings, pronounce them clean and justified in his sight, and hold them in continuing covenant relationship with himself, so in the future Kingdom for which we look God will do all these things in much more real a fashion than He could do in those far‑off days of types and ceremonies. There was no lasting validity in what was done then, for it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin; in the future day men may accept for themselves the ransom‑sacrifice of Christ, and repent, and turn to him, and be justified by faith in him, and so be reconciled to God and enter into everlasting life. All these things that Kingdom will achieve, and the whole earth become as it were a golden city dominated by the abiding presence of the Father and the Son, jointly the life and the light thereof. (Rev.21:23). So, the Kingdom is the third of the "sure mercies of David," an abiding evidence of the faithful loving‑kindness of our God. And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it; and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it; and the gates of it shall not be shut at all (at the end of) day, for there will be no night there; and they who enter into it are they who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. (Rev.21:27)

Entrancing prospect! Is there not here great incentive for us, that we gird up the loins of our minds and resolve to run our race with a greater determination and more constant zeal than ever before, knowing that it is upon the completion of our course that the blessings of this coming Kingdom are waiting. Is it not true that the "earnest expectation of the creation waiteth for the manifestation of the Sons of God" (Rom.8:19 margin)? Then let us press forward in hope and expectation that at the completion of our Master’s work in us we shall become part of that inestimable blessing which God is preparing for the sons of men, and has promised to give them, saying to them "I will give you—the sure mercies of David."

AOH