The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.
Psalm 9:17 stands in David’s praise of God’s righteous judgments upon wicked men and nations. The heathen have sunk into the pit they made, their own foot is taken in the net they hid, and the LORD is known by the judgment He executes (vv.15-16). Verse 17 states where those judgments carry the wicked: down to death and the grave. Wicked men may oppress, nations may forget God, and earthly power may appear secure, but none escapes His rule. This is a verse of warning sung in worship: David praises God by confessing without apology what He has appointed for the wicked.
“The wicked.” Scripture does not hide the character of the men under judgment. They are wicked. Earlier in the psalm God rebuked the heathen and destroyed the wicked (v.5). Wickedness is not misfortune, lack of education, social disadvantage, or an unfortunate difference of opinion. It is opposition to God in heart and life. “The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts” (Psalm 10:4). Such men may rule, prosper in business, receive honor, or command nations, but outward success never changes God’s judgment of their character.
Wickedness also belongs to persons, not bare actions floating apart from those who commit them. David wrote elsewhere, “God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11). Men often want God to condemn wickedness while leaving the wicked man untouched, but divine judgment does not work that way. The sinner who loves and practices rebellion must answer for it. David therefore does not say wickedness shall be turned into hell. He says “the wicked.” God judges men according to their deeds, and no respectable name can hide a wicked course from Him. So much for the worldly saying, “God hates the sin, but loves the sinner”!
“Shall be turned.” “Shall” gives certainty. David is not describing a possible outcome. God’s judgment will come. The wicked may presently move forward in confidence, but God can turn their course suddenly and completely. Earlier David praised Him because his enemies were turned back at His presence (v.3). Here the turning reaches farther. Men who turned away from God are themselves turned down to the end He appointed. Korah and his company rose proudly against the order God had established, but “They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them: and they perished from among the congregation” (Numbers 16:33).
“Into hell.” In the Psalms “hell” is ordinarily the grave, the place of the dead, and that is what it means here. The heathen have just sunk down in the pit that they made (v.15), and God has destroyed the wicked and put out their name for ever and ever (v.5). The New Testament shows the same use of the word in a psalm. David wrote, “For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption” (Psalm 16:10), and Peter explains it of Christ’s resurrection, “that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption” (Acts 2:31). David elsewhere joins the same words together: “Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell” (Psalm 55:15).
God brings proud men and proud nations down to death in His own time. The king of Babylon boasted that he would exalt his throne above the stars of God (Isaiah 14:13), but the prophet answered, “Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit” (Isaiah 14:15). Strength, wealth, armies, and fame cannot hold a man above the grave when God turns him into it. The wicked who forget God will be cut off, and their memory will perish with them. Death is God’s sentence upon rebellion, not an accident of nature.
The verse speaks of the grave, but a further lesson may rightly be drawn from it, so long as it is understood as a lesson and not the meaning of the text. Death is not the end of God’s dealings with the wicked. “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:” (Hebrews 9:27). The Lord Jesus spoke of the rich man who lifted up his eyes in hell, being in torments (Luke 16:23), and He said of the wicked, “And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal” (Matthew 25:46). The grave that receives the wicked is not their last appointment.
“And all the nations.” David now broadens the warning from individual wicked men to nations. No group of people receives exemption because of size, military strength, wealth, history, culture, or political importance. God rules nations as truly as individuals. “God reigneth over the heathen: God sitteth upon the throne of his holiness” (Psalm 47:8). Nations may imagine themselves independent because they answer to no earthly superior, but they still live under God’s government. A nation may forget Him collectively, but He does not forget the nation.
“That forget God.” To forget God is more than suffering a lapse of memory. These nations know enough of God’s rule to owe Him regard, yet they live without Him in their reckoning. Moses warned Israel, “Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day:” (Deuteronomy 8:11). Forgetting God appears in conduct: His law is ignored, His benefits are taken without gratitude, His authority is discarded, and men order society as though He did not exist.
Forgetting God is especially wicked because nations live continually upon His goodness. He gives rain, fruitful seasons, food, life, breath, and all things (Acts 14:17; 17:25). Yet men receive the gifts and neglect the Giver. Prosperity can make this worse. Moses warned Israel that fullness, houses, herds, silver, and gold could lift up the heart until the nation forgot the LORD (Deuteronomy 8:12-14). A nation need not deny God in words to forget Him. It forgets Him when its laws, rulers, schools, families, and public life operate without fear of His authority.
Jesus Christ is plainly appointed as the Judge before whom nations and individuals must answer. Paul declared, “Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained” (Acts 17:31), giving assurance by raising Him from the dead. Christ warned men about hell, judgment, and everlasting punishment because He knew their reality perfectly. The risen Lord is not only Savior to His people; He is Judge over the wicked.
Do not envy wicked men or admire nations that prosper while forgetting God. Their present strength does not alter their appointed end. “Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver” (Psalm 50:22). Remember God, fear Him, obey His commandments, and measure every earthly power by the throne that remains when all human kingdoms are gone.
The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.
Psalm 9:17 stands in David’s praise of God’s righteous judgments upon wicked men and nations. The heathen have sunk into the pit they made, their own foot is taken in the net they hid, and the LORD is known by the judgment He executes (vv.15-16). Verse 17 states where those judgments carry the wicked: down to death and the grave. Wicked men may oppress, nations may forget God, and earthly power may appear secure, but none escapes His rule. This is a verse of warning sung in worship: David praises God by confessing without apology what He has appointed for the wicked.
“The wicked.” Scripture does not hide the character of the men under judgment. They are wicked. Earlier in the psalm God rebuked the heathen and destroyed the wicked (v.5). Wickedness is not misfortune, lack of education, social disadvantage, or an unfortunate difference of opinion. It is opposition to God in heart and life. “The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts” (Psalm 10:4). Such men may rule, prosper in business, receive honor, or command nations, but outward success never changes God’s judgment of their character.
Wickedness also belongs to persons, not bare actions floating apart from those who commit them. David wrote elsewhere, “God judgeth the righteous, and God is angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11). Men often want God to condemn wickedness while leaving the wicked man untouched, but divine judgment does not work that way. The sinner who loves and practices rebellion must answer for it. David therefore does not say wickedness shall be turned into hell. He says “the wicked.” God judges men according to their deeds, and no respectable name can hide a wicked course from Him. So much for the worldly saying, “God hates the sin, but loves the sinner”!
“Shall be turned.” “Shall” gives certainty. David is not describing a possible outcome. God’s judgment will come. The wicked may presently move forward in confidence, but God can turn their course suddenly and completely. Earlier David praised Him because his enemies were turned back at His presence (v.3). Here the turning reaches farther. Men who turned away from God are themselves turned down to the end He appointed. Korah and his company rose proudly against the order God had established, but “They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them: and they perished from among the congregation” (Numbers 16:33).
“Into hell.” In the Psalms “hell” is ordinarily the grave, the place of the dead, and that is what it means here. The heathen have just sunk down in the pit that they made (v.15), and God has destroyed the wicked and put out their name for ever and ever (v.5). The New Testament shows the same use of the word in a psalm. David wrote, “For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption” (Psalm 16:10), and Peter explains it of Christ’s resurrection, “that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption” (Acts 2:31). David elsewhere joins the same words together: “Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell” (Psalm 55:15).
God brings proud men and proud nations down to death in His own time. The king of Babylon boasted that he would exalt his throne above the stars of God (Isaiah 14:13), but the prophet answered, “Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit” (Isaiah 14:15). Strength, wealth, armies, and fame cannot hold a man above the grave when God turns him into it. The wicked who forget God will be cut off, and their memory will perish with them. Death is God’s sentence upon rebellion, not an accident of nature.
The verse speaks of the grave, but a further lesson may rightly be drawn from it, so long as it is understood as a lesson and not the meaning of the text. Death is not the end of God’s dealings with the wicked. “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:” (Hebrews 9:27). The Lord Jesus spoke of the rich man who lifted up his eyes in hell, being in torments (Luke 16:23), and He said of the wicked, “And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal” (Matthew 25:46). The grave that receives the wicked is not their last appointment.
“And all the nations.” David now broadens the warning from individual wicked men to nations. No group of people receives exemption because of size, military strength, wealth, history, culture, or political importance. God rules nations as truly as individuals. “God reigneth over the heathen: God sitteth upon the throne of his holiness” (Psalm 47:8). Nations may imagine themselves independent because they answer to no earthly superior, but they still live under God’s government. A nation may forget Him collectively, but He does not forget the nation.
“That forget God.” To forget God is more than suffering a lapse of memory. These nations know enough of God’s rule to owe Him regard, yet they live without Him in their reckoning. Moses warned Israel, “Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day:” (Deuteronomy 8:11). Forgetting God appears in conduct: His law is ignored, His benefits are taken without gratitude, His authority is discarded, and men order society as though He did not exist.
Forgetting God is especially wicked because nations live continually upon His goodness. He gives rain, fruitful seasons, food, life, breath, and all things (Acts 14:17; 17:25). Yet men receive the gifts and neglect the Giver. Prosperity can make this worse. Moses warned Israel that fullness, houses, herds, silver, and gold could lift up the heart until the nation forgot the LORD (Deuteronomy 8:12-14). A nation need not deny God in words to forget Him. It forgets Him when its laws, rulers, schools, families, and public life operate without fear of His authority.
Jesus Christ is plainly appointed as the Judge before whom nations and individuals must answer. Paul declared, “Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained” (Acts 17:31), giving assurance by raising Him from the dead. Christ warned men about hell, judgment, and everlasting punishment because He knew their reality perfectly. The risen Lord is not only Savior to His people; He is Judge over the wicked.
Do not envy wicked men or admire nations that prosper while forgetting God. Their present strength does not alter their appointed end. “Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver” (Psalm 50:22). Remember God, fear Him, obey His commandments, and measure every earthly power by the throne that remains when all human kingdoms are gone.