.
Beautiful
Inheritance
God, My Beautiful
Inheritance
Inheritance
.
“The lines
have fallen for me in pleasures, I have a beautiful inheritance.”
In Psalm 16:6, David exults in what this means for him. Because God holds his lot, “The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.”
The “lines” here are probably borderlines — the borders or boundaries God has appointed for him.
They may be figurative, or literal, or maybe both.
I say this — that the borderlines may be figurative — because the phrase “pleasant places” is a single Hebrew word that means “pleasures.”
It’s the very same word as the one in Psalm 16:11 translated “pleasures”: “At your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”
So the translation here in Psalm 16:6 should perhaps be: “The lines have fallen for me in pleasures, I have a beautiful inheritance.”
“The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places” would then be: “Your sovereign goodness has fenced me in to God himself. The borders of my life are boundaries around where God is.”
And when he adds, “I have a beautiful inheritance,” the ultimate meaning would be: God.
God is my inheritance, and He is beautiful.
Therefore, exulting God as his Sovereign is almost the same as exulting in God as his Treasure.
God is the Sovereign who holds my lot.
And He uses that power to make Himself my beautiful inheritance — to fence me in to the pleasures of knowing Him.
He makes Himself my treasure.
John Piper (@JohnPiper) is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary. For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is author of more than 50 books, including Reading the Bible Supernaturally.
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