Psalm 116 Part 2

In the painful grip of death(v3-4), the psalmist knew nothing but ‘distress and sorrow. The parallelism of v3 puts death and ‘sheol’ (the grave) as aggressive, clutching at the living to waste them with sickness or crush them with despondency. Many centuries later Peter used the phrase ‘the pains of death’ to describe the peril from which God the Father delivered Jesus Christ through His resurrection (Acts 2:24). It adds a powerful prophetic and messianic meaning to the psalm since this was sung in the upper room at the conclusion of the meal. Perhaps while singing the phrase of v3 Jesus considered the linen windings (The cords of death) that would soon be wrapped around His dead body.  What else can we do in times of trouble but cry out the prayer of v4.

In light of his deliverance through answered prayer, the psalmist praised (vs5-7) the gracious, righteous, and compassionate character of God. 
In a backward look, the psalmist testifies that he was delivered from death (v8) and followed this with praise that matched the greatness of the deliverance. The agitations of life can shake us and we need to be mindful that the presence of doubt and fear does not prove the absence of trust.  
Once again we are moved by the thought that Jesus sang these words with His disciples on the night of His betrayal and arrest. Knowing all the suffering set before Him, Jesus sang with the confidence of deliverance from His coming death, His coming tears, and falling under the weight of the cross soon to come.

V9 is the grateful words of the psalmist after his deliverance. They were also the confident words, sung in faith, by Jesus before every agony of the coming cross. He could go to the cross with full confidence that having been rescued from falling feet, He would once again walk ‘in the land of the living.’ The Apostle Paul quoted v10 (I believed, therefore I spoke) and applied the principle to his own times of trusting God and speaking from the experience of that trust, even in trying times (2Cor4:13-14).