A Blessed and Joyful Sound

Very often we come across a verse in our Gleanings in the Psalms that we would like to comment on further, but don’t feel inclined to take up an undue proportion of the space allocated to that series. One such verse is the first verse of the section that we come to this month in the 89th Psalm (verse 15.) and it reads:- “Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance.” It contains a precious truth that surely merits a few lines of our letter at this time.

Part of the dress of the High Priest of Israel consisted of a set of “bells” worn around the hem of the skirts of his priestly garments. When the High Priest went into the Holiest of Holies in the Tabernacle of Temple to offer the blood of the sacrifices on the behalf of the people’s sins, they were assured of his presence there, and his activities in that service by the sound of the bells from within. It was, therefore, “a joyful sound” that they heard, and they were a people greatly “blessed” on account of having such an approach to the Lord Jehovah.

In His great “High Priestly Prayer” in the 17th chapter of John’s gospel, we find our Lord Jesus Christ almost pausing in the midst of that prayer – indeed, right at the half-way mark according to our English Bibles, in verse 13 – and saying to His Father in heaven, “and now come I to thee; and these thing I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.” In other words, our Lord is now “speaking out” the words of this intercessory prayer to His Father on the behalf of His people. On this occasion in prayer He has not gone away into a “mountain,” or into a “desert place alone” to pray, but He prays, as it were, in a “public” fashion, so that the ears of His disciples, and all succeeding ages of disciples might hear something of the “joyful sound” that their Great High Priest will be engaged in as He will appear in heaven for them. “And now come I to thee; and these things I spake in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.” At this point in His prayer, our Saviour is telling us that we may put our ear to “that within the veil,” and hear something of the ministry that He is conducting on our behalf and something of the words that He is speaking concerning us. And what words they are:-

Verse 6. “I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.”
Verse 9. “I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.”
Verse 11. “And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.”
Verse 15. “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.”
Verse 17. “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.”
Verse 20. “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;”
Verse 24. “Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory….”
Verse 26. “And I have declared unto them thy name and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

A “joyful sound,” indeed. To know and realise and remember that it is this kind of ministry that our Saviour carries out for us in the glories of heaven itself is to give heart and feeling to our song:-

As the metrical version of the Psalm has it:-

Indeed we may “go on.” We know already that both our Great High Priest and the sacrifice of Himself that He made for our sins, have been accepted by Jehovah on high, and, therefore, all the works and words of His intercession for us are yea and amen. We only await the emergence of Him from “the excellent glory,” and then, shall be realised the great purpose of all His priestly work on our behalf:- “Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory …”

That is the “end” of all that perfect work of Christ. But in the meantime, He has not left us without a “token-sound” of the joyful sound that fills the presence of God where He now is: - “And these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.”

May we often incline our ears in the direction of heaven – press them up to the very “curtains” of the Holy Place itself – and “go on” to know Him more and serve Him better.