REWARDS OF GODLY FEAR – Psalm 112

Psalm 112 joins Psalm 111 as a set complimenting one another in several ways. They match each other in length, stanza, even verse count. At many points, the stanzas align directly between the songs to emphasize ideas via parallelism. They are complimentary in theme. Whereas Ps 111 proclaims the glories of God, Ps 112 proclaims blessings attending those who truly appreciate the glory of God. Both songs begin with the same refrain... “Praise the Lord”, uniting them in their ultimate purpose to declare Yahweh alone as praise-worthy. Ps 112 has the markings of wisdom literature. The song shares structure and theme parallels with other wisdom Psalms – most notably perhaps – Psalm one. Here again the 'blessed man' theme appears in introduction. Ps 1 and 112 conclude in similar fashion as well. Having extolled the blessings and virtues of the one who fears the Lord, they close with a note of ominous reckoning for the wicked. Literary forms featured in the Psalms (parallelism, wisdom literature, and didactic poetry) are not common in popular writings of our day. It is, nevertheless, striking how precisely relevant their messages are for our time. Perhaps our text should inspire a generation of wisdom poets in the mold of the Psalmist. One thing is certainly true. Only a fool would deny we are starving for lack of Biblical wisdom.