I read Psalms 49 a couple days ago and these select verses lept off the page to me:
Ps 49:7-8 - No man can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for him — the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough —
Ps 49:15 - But God will redeem my life from the grave; he will surely take me to himself.
These verses scarcely need any commentary, but of course I can't resist. ;-} What no man can possibly do, for himself or for another, God assuredly does so. We do not possess what is necessary to pay for the ransoming of even one life that is lost to sin, but God has what is needed to redeem all mankind. And elsewhere in Scripture we see that he was pleased to do so and did this out of His love for us. Nothing we did provoked this loving response to our condition, God did this simply because He loves!
Verse 9 adds the point of this need for ransom - "... that he should live on forever and not see decay." The continuation of the thought in v.7-8 is that we can't pay enough to have life eternal. But v.15 says God will redeem us from the fate of eternal death and bring us to Himself.
All I can say is Praise God for how much you love me, how much you love all of us!
