Psalm 33 has the imposing theme of God’s power and rule in the events that go on in history and in the affairs of the world. It moves from an initial command to play instruments and praise the Lord, to acknowledging the Lord as one who loves righteousness and truth because He, the Lord, is righteous and true. Then it turns to acknowledge the Lord as the creator of everything there is. He spoke and it came about.

In the literal sense, this psalm is saying that, in comparison with God’s greatness and grandeur, the affairs of men count for nothing. Nations should be built on God, who sees all things and knows the hearts of all people. Kings are not saved by their armies, nor mighty men by their strength. The Lord watches over those who hold him in awe and who hope in him, and he will keep them alive in times of need. So, we are to turn to the Lord God and rejoice in him, knowing that his mercy is with us, just as our hope is in him.

The spiritual meaning of this psalm, with its unfolding theme about the futility of the affairs of men who do not serve the Lord, is that evil and falsity ultimately bring about their own destruction by self-serving and opposing. This itself is a relevant lesson for us. When we pursue our own desires and selfish intentions, and justify doing so, we lose sight of the Lord. Then, we come to grief, either in our lives or in our own hearts. (See Sacred Scripture 60)

The ‘musical’ opening to the psalm has a delightful spiritual meaning. In praising God we are to make this sing out through our whole being, so that we hear it well. We are to see the variety and the harmony which the Lord brings out in us, like an instrument with ten strings being plucked, or the harp. And our praise is to be ever renewed so that we ‘sing to Him a new song’. (See Apocalypse Revealed 792)

Verses 6-9 tell us that the Lord commanded heaven and earth and seas and everything that is in them to be made. The spiritual meaning here is that these ‘vast and fundamental’ things in creation represent what the Lord provides and preserves in us for our support and guidance. We live in a permanent God-given framework, a spiritual creation that will never fail us.

The next three verses follow on quite logically. If the Lord sets a framework for our protection, then whatever opposes this or comes to harm us will be brought to nothing. The counsels and plans of the Lord are there forever, and the nation of the Lord and the people of the Lord are blessed.

The spiritual meaning of this strong encouragement to us comes in pairs of words. In the Word such pairs always represent the need for what is good and what is true. They spiritually work together to produce our spiritual life and our regeneration, and they are really paired in a kind of ‘marriage’ union, the marriage of what is good with what is true. (See the description of this in Conjugial Love 516)

We move on, in verses 13 to 15, to see that the Lord knows everything about everything in his creation, including all that we think, feel, and do in all our hearts - in each person’s will or intention. It is put in terms of space, ‘looking from heaven’, ‘from the place of his dwelling he looks’ but this is merely an appearance. God is not at some distance from us. This passage is emphasising the all-knowingness of the Lord, understood by us in terms of vast space.

After this comes the powerful truth that a ruler is not powerful because of the size of his army, nor a man mighty by his enormous strength. When we think spiritually, we see that power lies in being obedient to the Lord’s truth, and not in self-will or importance.

A horse corresponds to our understanding, and it can carry us safely and well - but if is our own twisted understanding, it will not serve us. (See Heaven and Hell 228-230)

One last point made is that it is the Lord’s great intention to deliver us from the spiritual death which hell would bring us to if it could, and to keep us alive – confident, provided for, and safe – in any spiritual famine, when we feel our hunger for the return of the Lord.

After this, the psalm ends expectantly, confidently and prayerfully.

60. The opposite is the case with people who read the Word in the light of a false religion’s doctrine, and still more with people who use the Word to defend that doctrine and have an eye then to their own glory and to the world’s riches. In their case the Word’s truth exists, so to speak, in the dark of night, and falsity in the light of day. They read something true, but do not see it, and if they see some shadow of it, they falsify it. These are the people of whom the Lord says that they have eyes but do not see, and ears but do not understand (Matthew 13:14-15). For nothing so blinds a person as his own self-interest and affirmation of falsity. A person’s self-interest is his love of self and his consequent conceit in his own intelligence. And an affirmation of falsity is thick darkness masquerading as light. Their light is a merely natural one, and their sight like that of one seeing apparitions in the dark.