The lexicons give the word for God here as El, one of the Hebrew words for God, and it is not the personal name that turns up in the next verse. They give it the sense of might, and that is where it comes from.

David is asking God to keep him, and he gives his reason in the verse. In thee do I put my trust. He does not say in thee only, and that I hear him leaning nowhere else is my reading of the man.

And here YHWH, or Jehovah, which the lexicons give as the personal name of the Lord, the one the King James prints as LORD in capitals. That the name is explained as the self-existent one is teaching that has grown up around it, and not something this verse stops to say.

David is owning God for himself. Thou art my Lord. And my goodness extendeth not to thee, which I read as David saying that nothing he brings adds anything to God. Like my sister said a while ago, “even a beat-up penny is better than us.” But I thank God for His grace and His mercy, because He did not leave us there, and that praise is mine and not this verse.

In whom is all my delight. That is his word, delight, and he puts it on the saints in the earth. What I take from it is that a man who loves God will not be cold toward the people who love Him too.

David says what will come of it, their sorrows shall be multiplied. Then he says what he will not do. He will not offer their drink offerings, and he will not take up their names into his lips. He does not tell me what he is feeling, and I will not put it in his mouth. He tells me what he will not do.

The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup. That is the word he chose, portion, and it is the language of a man being handed his share. And thou maintainest my lot. What I hear in it is a man whose share is God and whose share is held for him.

The lines are the surveyor’s cords, the measuring out of a portion of ground. Pleasant places, and a goodly heritage. Those are David’s two words for what he was given. And that I read it as a life that fits the man is mine.

And that word reins is the old English for the inward parts. What David is saying is that something inside him instructs him, and he says when. In the night seasons. He does not say always, and he does not tell me how it came to be so.

I have set the LORD always before me. Set, and always before me, and that is David doing it. Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. That the right hand is the place of help is background I bring, and David simply says He is there and I am not moved.

David’s joy reaches every part of him, heart, soul, and body. Even his flesh shall rest in hope, and his confidence is not in circumstances but in God.

One word here needs saying plainly, because it will be heard wrong. Hell in this verse is the Hebrew word sheol, and the lexicons give it the grave and the realm of the dead. It is not the lake of fire. So whatever else is in this verse, it is not a man being spared a burning.

And I cannot stop here, because the New Testament stops here first. Peter stood up and preached this very verse.

David is dead and buried, and Peter says so plainly. So Peter does not read this as David being kept out of the ground. He reads it as David speaking beforehand of Christ.

Being a prophet, Peter says, and knowing the oath. That is Peter’s reason, and he does not leave it to be guessed. Then he lands it. THIS JESUS HATH GOD RAISED UP, WHEREOF WE ALL ARE WITNESSES.

And that is the one I will follow, because Peter is the one preaching it. That I still hear David holding hope and preservation for himself, while the verse was carrying a Man who would come out, is my way of holding the two together. Peter does not split it that way. He says David was a prophet and spoke of Christ.

God does not only preserve life, He shows the path of life. And the joy David names is not temporary pleasure and it is not in things. It is fulness of joy, and it is in His presence.

Closing Thought

Psalm 16 shows a man who knows where his help comes from, who his God is, and why he is secure. David is not claiming perfection, he is declaring trust. And what I take from the whole psalm is that everything he has, everything he is, and everything he hopes for is resting somewhere other than himself. That is refuge, that is confidence, and that is inheritance.