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20. Psalm 20

1 May the LORD answer you when you are in distress;
   may the name of the God of Jacob protect you.

2 May he send you help from the sanctuary
   and grant you support from Zion.

3 May he remember all your sacrifices
   and accept your burnt offerings. The Hebrew has Selah (a word of uncertain meaning) here.

4 May he give you the desire of your heart
   and make all your plans succeed.

5 May we shout for joy over your victory
   and lift up our banners in the name of our God.

   May the LORD grant all your requests.

    6 Now this I know:
   The LORD gives victory to his anointed.
He answers him from his heavenly sanctuary
   with the victorious power of his right hand.

7 Some trust in chariots and some in horses,
   but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.

8 They are brought to their knees and fall,
   but we rise up and stand firm.

9 LORD, give victory to the king!
   Answer us when we call!


3. May he remember. I understand the word remember as meaning to have regard to, as it is to be understood in many other places; just as to forget often signifies to neglect, or not to deign to regard, nor even to behold, the object to which it is applied. It is, in short, a prayer that God would actually show that the king’s sacrifices were acceptable to him. Two kinds of them are here mentioned; first, the מנחה, mincha, mentioned in the first clause of the verse, which was the appointed accompaniment of all sacrifices, and which was also sometimes offered by itself; and, secondly, the holocaust, or whole burnt-sacrifice. But under these two kinds David intended to comprehend, by synecdoche, all sacrifices; and under sacrifices he comprehends requests and prayers. We know that whenever the fathers prayed under the law, their hope of obtaining what they asked was founded upon their sacrifices; and, in like manner, at this day our prayers are acceptable to God only in so far as Christ sprinkles and sanctifies them with the perfume of his own sacrifice. The faithful, therefore, here desire that the solemn prayers of the king, which were accompanied with sacrifices and oblations, might have their effect in the prosperous issue of his affairs. That this is the meaning may be gathered still more clearly from the following verse, in which they commend to God the desires and counsels of the king. But as it would be absurd to ask God to grant foolish and wicked desires, it is to be regarded as certain, that there is here described a king who was neither given to ambition, nor inflamed with avarice, nor actuated by the desire of whatever the unruly passions might suggest, but wholly intent on the charge which was committed to him, and entirely devoted to the advancement of the public good; so that he asks nothing but what the Holy Spirit dictated to him, and what God, by his own mouth, commanded him to ask.


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