Contentment (Psalm 49)
Summary
The week the world got its first trillionaire, Psalm 49 has something to say. Written by the Sons of Korah—descendants of a man who had everything and reached for more—this ancient wisdom song cuts through the noise with a bluntness that feels almost rude: people, despite their wealth, do not endure. Matt Crummy traces the story behind the psalm and the subtle danger of ambition dressed up as piety. What Korah couldn't accept, his family line turned into a song—and it turns out the question it asks is still the right one. Is nearness to God enough?
Questions for reflection
Korah used a genuine theological principle as cover for self-promotion. Where in your own life do you see that pattern—ambition or envy dressed up in spiritual language?
The psalm asks, in effect, whether nearness to God is enough. How would you honestly answer that question right now?
Matt lists other ways to be rich—in mercy, friendship, forgiveness, courage, and understanding. Which of those feels most lacking in your life? Which do you have more of than you realize?
The sermon points out that the Sons of Korah learned through their own family line what it costs to refuse contentment. Is there something in your own story—inherited or hard-won—that has taught you the same lesson?
"But God" appears right in the middle of a psalm about death and the limits of wealth. What does that pivot mean to you personally? Where do you need a "but God" moment right now?
-
This week, something historic happened. Not the US men's soccer team, though that was exciting. Not the third batch of declassified UFO files. Not even the New York Knicks winning their first NBA title since 1973. Though, as it turns out, there were a few historic things that happened this week.
What I have in mind is this: for the first time in recorded human history, an individual became a trillionaire. I'm talking, of course, about Elon Musk.
So — what would you do with all that money? Would it change how you see yourself? How you see other people? Would it change your relationship to your own mortality? Would it make you more suspicious? More anxious? More carefree? Harder to say. I think I'd be stressed out managing a trillion dollars.
Earlier this year, Elon was on a podcast when the conversation turned to human lifespan and the possibility of immortality. He said this: You are programmed to die. And so if you change the program, you will live longer.
What's fascinating is that he named something genuinely central to Christian doctrine: death is inevitable. Even the richest person in the world seems to know that. Silicon Valley is now trying to crack that problem and make a lot of money along the way. And I can almost hear the haunting refrain of Psalm 49 underneath it — people, despite their wealth, do not endure. They are like the beasts that perish.
Or as Elon put it: you are programmed to die.
But in the Christian frame, that's neither the beginning of the story nor the end. We believe God created us for life, not death — and that through Jesus Christ, the curse of death is already unravelling. You could say our code is being renewed. In Christ, we are again programmed to live.
Today we're studying Psalm 49. It's a beautifully blunt, lyrically focused song — one that acknowledges both the temptation toward self-reliance and accumulation, and our hope for a renewed relationship with God and his power to redeem us. Let's pray, and then we'll look at our text together.
God, we thank you for your word and for this time together — to reflect on who you are, who we are, and who our neighbours are. Use this time to encourage us, challenge us, expand our view. Help us to see you this morning and to leave changed. In Jesus' name, amen.
A Blank Check
If you have a few grey hairs like me, you might remember the absolutely awful, weirdly creepy 1994 film Blank Check. A kid gets a blank check, fills it in for a million dollars, and spends it on a mansion, a water slide, a go-kart — basically every childhood fantasy the 1990s had to offer. For most of the movie, it looks like a dream come true. Money solves everything. Money is everything.
But of course it doesn't. And it isn't. Not for that kid. Not for Elon Musk. Not for anyone — not the foolish or the wise, not the richest person in the ancient world or the richest person alive today. No one can write a check big enough to buy their way out of death.
Today we'll learn that a group called the Sons of Korah knew something about that. Their ancestors had everything — position, proximity to God, privilege. Korah wanted more. And the ground took him back. More on that in a moment.
The Structure of the Song
Let's look at verses 1 through 4 again:
Hear this, all you peoples. Listen, all who live in this world, both low and high, rich and poor alike. My mouth will speak words of wisdom. The meditation of my heart will give you understanding. I will turn my ear to a proverb. With the harp, I will expound my riddle.
The psalm is structured a bit like a pop song. There's an intro, then a verse, then a chorus or refrain — and it repeats. The refrain, which appears twice, goes: people, despite their wealth, do not endure. They are like the beasts that perish. Not the catchiest hook ever written, admittedly. But the second version of it at the very end shifts slightly: people who have wealth but lack understanding are like the beasts that perish. Nearly identical — but that one word change, from wealth to wealth but lack understanding, is doing a lot of work. We'll come back to that.
If you weren't here last week or are less familiar with the Psalms, here's a quick orientation. The Psalms are the hymn book and prayer book of ancient Israel — 150 poems and songs collected over centuries, expressing the full range of human experience before God. Praise, lament, confession, thanksgiving, anger, longing.
What makes the Psalms unique is that they are simultaneously God's word to us and humanity's word back to God. They teach us how to understand our lives in his presence and how to speak honestly from within them.
This particular psalm comes with a header: to the chief musician — or depending on your translation, the choir director or music leader. The point is that it was delivered to a recognized leader in the community for ongoing liturgical use. It wasn't intended only as private meditation. It was formally dedicated to someone in charge of public worship — for gatherings like this one.
Like Psalm 1, which Dominic walked us through last week, Psalm 49 can be categorized as a wisdom psalm. One notable feature: not a single line is addressed to God. It reads more like the book of Proverbs — a song of wisdom, written to be heard and sung communally.
The Apostle Paul actually addresses this in Ephesians 5:15–20:
Be very careful, then, how you live — not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Notice the logic: be careful how you live. Not just what you think or believe — but how you live. And rather than filling ourselves with lesser things, we long to be under the influence of God's Spirit. And from that, we sing — to him, to each other, from our hearts.
Similarly, Colossians 3:15–17:
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom — through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
What does wisdom actually look like? We tend to picture an old person with a lot of advice — the grey-bearded sage. But wisdom isn't just age, and it's certainly not just information. If information were wisdom, Wikipedia would be the wisest thing on earth. What makes the Psalms useful is that they lay out the human experience for us to sit with. Reading or singing someone else's words lets us enter their viewpoint, even briefly — to see how they lived, thought, processed, felt. And to be confronted with the places where we experience those same things.
The Psalms are deeply relational. I'll say that again. The Psalms are deeply relational.
The Argument of the Psalm
Let's turn back to the first half of the passage, starting at verse 5:
Why should I fear when evil days come? When wicked deceivers surround me — those who trust in their wealth and boast of their great riches? No one can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for them. The ransom for a life is costly; no payment is ever enough — so that they should live on forever and not see decay. For all can see that the wise die, that the foolish and the senseless also perish, leaving their wealth to others. Their tombs will remain their houses forever, their dwellings for endless generations — though they had named lands after themselves. People, despite their wealth, do not endure. They are like the beasts that perish.
At first glance, this psalm seems to be primarily about money. And there's truth in that. But I don't think the Sons of Korah are only warning us about wealth. I think they're warning us about the kind of desire that always wants more.
To understand who they are, we have to go back to Numbers 16. Korah was a Levite — a descendant of Kohath, who was entrusted with carrying the most sacred objects of the tabernacle. This was one of the most privileged roles in all of Israel. Access to the holiest spaces. Proximity to God.
And yet, it wasn't enough.
Korah gathered around 250 leaders and confronted Moses and Aaron, accusing them of elevating themselves above the rest of the congregation. The accusation sounds, on the surface, almost reasonable — even spiritual. He said, the whole community is holy, every one of them. That sounds democratic, maybe even generous. He used a genuine theological principle as cover for self-promotion.
And isn't that how it goes with what I'd call religious grifters? The most effective lies — and the most effective self-deceptions — are often built from pieces of truth. What makes Korah's rebellion instructive is that his envy wasn't obvious on the surface. He wasn't just saying I want what you have. He was wrapping his ambition in the language of the people's rights. That's more dangerous than envy. It's almost a kind of blasphemy — taking not just the Lord's name in vain, but his generosity.
Moses responds:
In the morning the Lord will show who belongs to him and who is holy, and he will have that person come near him. The man he chooses, he will cause to come near him.
And then:
Isn't it enough for you that the God of Israel has separated you from the rest of the Israelite community and brought you near himself to do the work at the Lord's tabernacle and to stand before the community and minister to them? He has brought you and your fellow Levites near himself. But now you are trying to get the priesthood too?
You can almost hear the exhaustion in Moses. The story escalates, and it ends like this:
The ground under them split apart, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and their households, and all those associated with Korah together with their possessions. They went down alive into the realm of the dead with everything they owned. The earth closed over them and they perished and were gone from the community.
Everything they owned. Their stuff went with them. It almost reads like a reversal of creation — the earth giving back what it made.
You are programmed to die. Thanks, Elon. But I don't think we're quite there yet.
So here's a question worth sitting with: do we ever cloak unhealthy ambition in piety? Do we dress up our obsession with success in spiritual language? For Korah, I think what makes his story so instructive is that his sin was subtle. He used a genuine theological principle — the holiness of the community — as a cover for self-promotion. And what's remarkable is that Psalm 49 is written by his descendants. They learned through their own family line what it costs to refuse contentment. There is something humbling and beautiful about that.
The argument of the psalm moves like this: everybody dies. No matter who you are, no matter where you're from. This underscores how fleeting life is — but it also highlights how incredibly valuable it is. When those who hoard wealth surround you, when they make themselves little gods to themselves and others, we remember that they are dust, destined to return to the earth as the animals do. This is not despair. It's clarity.
But God
Now here's the turn. Verse 13 through the end:
This is the fate of those who trust in themselves, and of their followers who approve their sayings. They are like sheep and are destined to die. Death will be their shepherd, but the upright will prevail over them in the morning. Their forms will decay in the grave, far from their princely mansions. But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead. He will surely take me to himself. Do not be overawed when others grow rich, when the splendour of their houses increases, for they will take nothing with them when they die. Their splendour will not descend with them. Though while they live they count themselves blessed — and people praise you when you prosper — they will join those who have gone before them. They will never again see the light of life. People who have wealth but lack understanding are like the beasts that perish.
Verse 15. Two words that I think nearly summarise the entire gospel:
But God.
But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead. He will surely take me to himself.
The word redeem here means to set free, to cut loose. It's a picture of liberation — freedom from bondage. And fast-forwarding through the biblical story, we see what that redemption looks like in the person of Jesus. Hebrews 2:14–17:
Since the children share in flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity, so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death — that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham's descendants. For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.
Jesus came to set us free from the curse of death and all its effects. And now we adopt his practices — his way — and we follow him.
But there's something else in verse 15. It's also a picture of reunion. Look again: But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead. He will surely take me to himself. Now go back to what Moses said to Korah in Numbers 16:5 — in the morning the Lord will show who belongs to him and who is holy, and he will have that person come near to him. The man he chooses, he will cause to come near him. And again in verse 9: He has brought you and your fellow Levites near himself.
Korah already had nearness to God and threw it away reaching for more. And now, in Christ, the promise of Psalm 49 is this: God will bring you near. He will take you to himself. The question Psalm 49 asks — and I think was also the question Korah couldn't answer — is whether that is enough.
In Christ, God has brought you near. Is that enough?
Rich in What?
Verse 16: Do not be overawed when others grow rich, when the splendour of their houses increases, for they will take nothing with them when they die. Their splendour will not descend with them.
I think one of our problems is that we let economics define what wealth means.
There are so many ways to be rich in this life. And I think the older you get, the more you start to see that. Rich in mercy. Rich in faith. Rich in friendship. Rich in patience and understanding. Rich in forgiveness. Rich in the knowledge of Scripture. Rich in generosity, in love, in courage.
I'd rather be around someone like that than someone who is simply rich.
This psalm — and the family line that produced it — serves as a warning about the ways we idolize possession. The ways our possessions can end up possessing us. Self-sufficiency, position, prestige, power, reputation. The earth opened and swallowed Korah along with his household and all their stuff. These were people of privilege. They had a great deal to lose — and still they wanted more.
There's a character in Parks and Recreation named Andy Dwyer, played by Chris Pratt, who falls into a pit in an abandoned lot. Later in the show he ends up moving into the pit. I can't fully explain why — you'd have to watch it. But at some point his band, Mouse Rat, writes a song about it called The Pit. It goes: Pit. I was in the pit. You were in the pit. We all were in the pit.
Andy was a psalmist.
And I mean that seriously. He fell in the pit, and in doing so, he brought everyone else into the pit with him. I fell in, you fell in, we all fell in the pit. That's the spirit of the Psalms. And I think it's the spirit of the early church. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12: God has put the body together, giving greater honour to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honoured, every part rejoices with it.
I've never seen someone literally swallowed by the earth. I hope I never do. But I have seen people swallowed up by greed, resentment, comparison, selfishness, obsession with performance, the endless pressure to measure themselves by productivity and status and accumulation. And of course it happens in the church too. It's possible to be swallowed whole by the pit of the American dream.
Closing
I believe God loves Elon Musk, and has no regard for his money at all.
It's hard for the wealthy to resist the temptation to seize control — to manage every possible outcome. Elon said on that podcast: I've long thought that longevity, or semi-immortality, is an extremely solvable problem.
I think Jesus agrees it's a problem. But I think they have very different ideas about the solution.
Psalm 49 says: people, despite their wealth, do not endure. They are like the beasts that perish. Or as Elon put it: you are programmed to die. In one sense, he's right. Psalm 49 agrees.
But Psalm 49 also points beyond death. But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead. He will surely take me to himself.
The Christian hope is not that we become rich enough, powerful enough, or technologically advanced enough to escape death — to escape ourselves. We aren't fooled by the world's empty promises of more. Our hope is that Jesus entered death itself and came out the other side. He isn't focused on longevity alone. He is trying to give us a life worth living — even now. And by his Spirit, I believe he is making us new.
