The Ends of the Earth Turn to the Lord

Psalm 22 moves from utterance of trial to prophetic anticipation of Christ's triumph. When believers emerge from great temptation and trouble—their faith tested and drawn thin—deliverance brings more than relief from that particular circumstance. In the hour of enlargement, the soul discovers something deeper: a fresh impression of God's mercy operating not merely for personal rescue but as an expression of eternal love.

This is what Exell calls "holding converse with the mercy of God under pressure." God forces the believer to learn afresh what blessedness means—to possess this God forever and ever. Such intimate knowledge of Divine compassion naturally births the great expectation: "All the ends of the world shall remember, and turn unto the Lord."

Read prophetically, the text expresses Christ's own consciousness from the Cross. The life of perfect holiness crowned by atoning death contained within it exceeding glory to God and good to man. From Golgotha's perspective, Christ saw what must come: the nations remembering, their hearts melted within them by truth long forgotten yet suddenly recalled.

"They shall remember"—as though something ancient awakened. The Gospel is not entirely new; it echoes older impressions, vague convictions scattered throughout human conscience. Yet in Christ, these fragmented glimpses crystallize into redemptive reality. The believer who has tasted God's deliverance becomes a witness to this turning of the world toward the Lord.