The Mighty One becomes the glory of Jerusalem

The title is “A Song and Psalm.” So a song is a psalm and a psalm is a song! In Psalm 46, God is our Refuge; in Psalm 47, God is a great King, and here the confession is made, “This God is our God.” In Psalm 46, God dwells in His city, the church, and here the city is described. The church is depicted as a noble and beautiful city, the cause of joy to the whole world.

Such should be our estimation, and we should appreciate more and more the glory, the grandeur and the greatness of the structure of the city of God. Our minds should constantly take a walk around its walls, battlements and towers, so that we could also declare that she has gates of praise. And with Isaiah 26:1, confess, “We have a strong city, Salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks.” The architecture and impregnability has been ordained, for Christ has said, “I will build my church.” This sovereign and only wise God dwells in the midst, and is our God.

Pastor Jeff O’ Neil

Recommended Tune: Milton, St Magnus

Psalm 48

¹Great is the LORD, and greatly he
Is to be praised still,
Within the city of our God,
Upon his holy hill.

²Mount Zion stands most beautiful,
The joy of all the land;
The city of the mighty King
On her north side doth stand.

³The Lord within her palaces
Is for a refuge known.
⁴For, lo, the kings that gather’d were
Together, by have gone.

⁵But when they did behold the same,
They, wond’ring, would not stay;
But, being troubled at the sight,
They thence did haste away.

⁶Great terror there took hold on them;
They were possess’d with fear;
Their grief came like a woman’s pain,
When she a child doth bear.

⁷Thou Tarshish ships with east wind break’st:
⁸As we have heard it told,
So, in the city of the LORD,
Our eyes did it behold;

In our God’s city, which his hand
For ever stablish will.
⁹We of thy loving-kindness thought,
Lord, in thy temple still.

¹⁰O Lord, according to thy name,
Through all the earth’s thy praise;
And thy right hand, O Lord, is full
Of righteousness always.

¹¹Because thy judgments are made known,
Let Zion mount rejoice;
Of Judah let the daughters all
Send forth a cheerful voice.

¹²Walk about Zion, and go round;
The high tow’rs thereof tell:
¹³Consider ye her palaces,
And mark her bulwarks well;

That ye may tell posterity.
¹⁴For this God doth abide
Our God for evermore; he will
Ev’n unto death us guide.