Man in his pomp, yet without understanding is like the beasts that perish.
– Psalm 49:20
What a good verse. And it’s not the only time this chapter speaks like this. Earlier in verse 12, the psalmist writes, “Man in his pomp will not remain. He’s like the beast that perished and talks about those who have foolish confidence in themselves.” Where they’re boasting in themselves and other people are encouraging them to boast in themselves. Encouraging them to put confidence in themselves. And when I read this I think, is this not the mantra of this world? Believe in yourself. trust in yourself. Be confident in yourself. This is where the message of the gospel in Jesus’s invitation is totally countercultural. In a world that says believe in, trust, in, and have confidence in yourself. Jesus says, die to yourself.
Psalm 49:20 is a calling to see ourselves with the proper perspective.
And that’s what verse 20 is saying, Man in his pomp, in his boasting, yet without understanding, is like the beasts that perish. God is telling us in his Word today not to boast in ourselves. God is calling us to have understanding in our lives, to see our lives in proper perspective, to see ourselves in proper perspective. That we don’t trust in ourselves. We don’t put our confidence or our hope and ourselves. And that we don’t have faith in ourselves.
We put our trust and our hope and our faith in the God who made us, the God who knows us better than we know ourselves, and the God who gives us every good thing. When you think about things that we’re tempted to boast in, in ourselves, our strength, our wisdom, our money, our skills, our position, our success, our fill-in-the-blank, our looks, whatever it might be that you might be tempted to boast in yourself, or at least have confidence in yourself, realize that every good thing you have in you is a gift from God, which would lead you then when you think about those things to boast in God.
This is why Jeremiah 9 says, “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom. The mighty man boasts and the rich man boasts in riches. Let him who boast, boast in this that he understands.” That’s what Psalm 49 is saying, that he understands and knows me.
Psalm 49:20 reminds us that our only boast should be the Lord.
God says that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. That’s your boast. That you know and understand the Lord, the Lord of love and justice and righteousness. The way Paul talks in Galatians 6 is our only boast is in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, where he paid the price for our sins. And he made the way for you and I to experience the river of delights and all the goodness that flows from God’s hand as we deny ourselves and we trust in him.
So God, we pray for this kind of understanding in our hearts today. We pray that you would remove all pride from us. God we pray, crucify our pride in any way, way where we are tempted to trust in ourselves and our ways, that our ways are better than your ways to trust in our might and our strength to get through whatever’s before us today, to trust in our wisdom to make decisions or to navigate this or that in our lives.
God, help us to deny ourselves to die to ourselves today. To take up a cross and follow you… To boast in the fact that you have died on the cross for our sins risen from the dead. You’ve put your spirit in us and we as a result know you and walk with you. So help us to walk humbly with you today and God help us not to point anyone to ourselves, but to point people all day long to you to live for your glory. John 3:30, may you become greater. May we become less today. We pray for this throughout our lives.
Prayer for the Makhuwa People
We pray for this among the nations. God, we pray specifically today for the Makhuwa people of Mozambique. This group of people filled with so many who depend on fishing for their livelihood. God, we think about your early disciples who you pursued as fishermen. God, we pray that you would pursue the Makhuwa people. That you would draw all half a million of them to knowledge of you, to be able to boast in you the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. Oh God, we pray all this according to your Word in Psalm 49:20. In Jesus name, amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
