The General Conclusion of the Psalm (Verse 23)

Ps. 33:23. The Lord will deliver the souls of His servants, and none who hope in Him will err.

A lot is foretold for the servants of God that is opposite to that predicted for sinners.

The Lord will deliver the souls of His servants. That is: having led them out of the prison of the body, He will not allow any hostile action toward them on the part of enemies, and having freed them from all the sorrows that oppressed them in time, He will, through the shadow of death, transfer them directly to bright and refreshing places, where there is no grief or sighing. Therefore, whereas for sinners death is dreadful, the death of the saints is precious before the Lord (Ps. 115:6). And fittingly did someone pray: let my soul die with the souls of the righteous (Num. 23:10). This is the conclusion of the deliverances that the Prophet promised throughout the whole psalm (verses Ps. 33:5, 8, 18, 20). Like a bird freed from snares, delivered from all the bonds of flesh and the world, the soul of the righteous will soar to the abodes of its Heavenly Father and there begin a song of thanksgiving and praise for deliverance. Looking back on the course it has run amid straits, sorrows, and afflictions, with the unceasing and clearly visible help of God, it will breathe with relief and, with conviction penetrating its whole being, will declare: the Lord has delivered—as one pursued by an enemy says this with conviction when he steps onto the safe ground of his homeland, within the circle of his own forces. All temporal deliverances, whether inner or outer, are only forerunners and foretastes of that final deliverance that will be known and tasted upon departure from the body and entry into the blessedness of paradise—though still in a preliminary way.

It will then become palpably clear that those who hope in the Lord do not err. On earth, where we walk as in twilight and see all things as through a dim mirror, a doubtful thought may sometimes still be stirred up—lest one err in one’s hope. At any rate, the enemy of those being saved loudly insists to some: God has forgotten you; or, as is so often heard today from those who have lost faith: our hope is vain; the spirit, like vapor, will dissolve into the air, and—all is finished. There, the inerrancy of hope will pass into vision and touch, or there the saving action of hope will cease, swallowed up by the tasting of what was hoped for. But now, when there are many circumstances capable of shaking it, there is an urgent need to repeat often that those who hope in the Lord do not err—especially when some person must believe in hope against hope.

Those who hope will not err! The Lord will deliver! This is the truth that the Prophet develops in various ways throughout the whole psalm—now setting forth his own hopeful turnings to God that drew deliverance, now pointing to the unshamed hopes of other righteous ones who cried out to the Lord, now portraying the laws of the Lord’s merciful care for us as our Provider. And at the end, having carried our thought beyond the bounds of life and introduced us into the contemplation of the promised inheritance into which God’s servants are brought, he crowns everything with the call: thus the Lord will deliver the souls of His servants. And thus their hope will be shown to be without error!

Here is a program of life! Live in submission to the will of God and, animated by the fear of God, be zealous in fulfilling the commandments of the Lord. The shelter of the Most High will always be over you, and God’s consolations will not cease to pour abundantly into your heart. Amid sorrows, needs, and straits, the thread of God’s power will safely draw you along the chosen path, until, having led you through all trials through the door of death, it introduces you into eternal rest, where is the dwelling of all who are glad. The contemplation of this God-established and God-guarded path, and especially the contemplation of its blessed end, has animated and continues to animate all those who labor in Christian piety. And the aim for which this psalm is heard so frequently in the Church is none other than this same animation to the labors of doing good and the exploits of piety, under the influence of the certain hopes of Christians. Each person who goes out from church after the Liturgy, having listened with the heart to this psalm, ought to go out with an exhortation repeating itself in the heart: labor, endure, and you will not err in your hope. The same was also the aim of composing these notes: to kindle in some, to revive in others, the same animation to patient walking in the commandments of God, in the expectation of eternal rest. May the Lord grant this to all who read and hear.