The Scripture behind the Scripture
Into Thy Hands I Commit My Spirit
Psalm 31:5 prays Into thine hand I commit my spirit. Luke 23:46 records these as among the last words of Jesus on the cross.
“Into thine hand I commit my spirit: thou hast redeemed me, O LORD God of truth.”Psalm 31:5
“And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost.”Luke 23:46
In its own place
In its own place. Psalm 31 is a psalm of David, a prayer of trust in the midst of trouble. The psalmist is beset by enemies and distress, feeling forgotten as a dead man out of mind, yet he takes refuge in the Lord and appeals to God's righteousness and steadfast love. Early in the psalm he prays Into thine hand I commit my spirit, thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth. In its original setting this is an expression of complete trust in the face of danger and possible death. To commit one's spirit into God's hand is to place one's whole life and breath under his protection, entrusting oneself entirely to him rather than to human help. The word spirit here means the life or breath God gives. It was a prayer a faithful Israelite might make at any moment of peril, and it may have become a customary evening prayer of trust before sleep, when a person commends the day and the night to God. The psalm as a whole moves from anguish to confidence, ending with a summons to love the Lord and be of good courage. The verse breathes settled faith, not resignation.
Where the New Testament takes it up
This is a direct quotation, spoken by Jesus as his final utterance in Luke's account. Luke 23:46 records that Jesus cried with a loud voice, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit, and having said this, he gave up the ghost. Jesus quotes Psalm 31:5 almost exactly, adding only the address Father at the beginning, which reveals his unique relationship to God. Where the psalmist prayed to the Lord God of truth in distress, Jesus prays to his Father in the moment of death, transforming a prayer of trust into a deliberate act of self surrender. Luke, more than the other evangelists, presents Jesus dying in serene trust rather than in the cry of forsakenness recorded by Matthew and Mark. The two are not in conflict but show different facets of the same death, the depth of the anguish and the depth of the trust. Jesus follows the sense of the Hebrew closely, and the Greek wording matches the Septuagint. By choosing this verse, Jesus dies as the faithful sufferer of the Psalms, entrusting his very life to the Father even as he lays it down. It became a prayer the early Christians treasured, and Stephen echoed it at his own death.
How it points to Christ
How it points to Christ. Jesus takes a psalm of trust and speaks it in the extremity of death, showing that even there his confidence in the Father never broke. He does not cling to life but freely commends his spirit to God, laying it down as he said he would, with authority to take it up again. Where Psalm 31 celebrates a redemption already granted, thou hast redeemed me, Jesus is in the very act of accomplishing redemption for the world. His calm surrender models how his people may face death, not as a leap into darkness but as a committing of the spirit into faithful hands. Stephen, dying, prayed nearly the same words to Jesus himself, showing that the church learned from its Lord how to die. The One who commended his spirit to the Father rose again, and so those who trust him can entrust their last breath to God without fear.
Questions people ask
How does Luke's account differ from Matthew and Mark?
Matthew and Mark record the cry of forsakenness from Psalm 22, while Luke records this word of trust from Psalm 31. They are not in conflict but reveal different facets of the same death, both the anguish of bearing sin and the depth of Jesus' trust in the Father.
What does commit my spirit mean?
To entrust one's whole life and breath to God's keeping. In the psalm it was a prayer of trust amid danger. On Jesus' lips it became a deliberate surrender of his life to the Father in the act of dying.