John Calvin Commentary Psalms 47:4

"He chooseth our inheritance for us, The glory of Jacob whom he loved. Selah" — Psalms 47:4 (ASV)

He hath chosen our inheritance for us. The inspired poet here celebrates more distinctly the special grace that God, in his goodness, had conferred on the chosen and holy seed of Abraham. As he passed by all the rest of the world and adopted as his own a people who were few in number and insignificant, so it was fitting that such a clear pledge of his fatherly love should be distinguished from his general goodness, which is extended to all humanity without distinction.

The word chosen is therefore particularly emphatic, implying that God had not dealt with the children of Abraham as he had customarily dealt with other nations without distinction; but that he had conferred on them, so to speak, by hereditary right, a special dignity by which they surpassed all others.

The same thing is expressed immediately afterward by the word glory. Thus the prophet calls for thanksgiving to God for having exalted, in Jacob, his chosen people to the highest degree of honor, so that they might boast that their condition was distinct from that of all other nations.

He shows, at the same time, that this was entirely due to the free and unmerited favor of God. The relative pronoun whom is used instead of a causal conjunction like for or because, as if the Psalmist attributed to God himself the cause of this privilege by which they were distinguished.

Whenever God's favor toward the Jews is praised because he loved their fathers, this principle should always be remembered: that by this, all human merits are nullified. If all the excellence or glory of the holy patriarch depended purely and simply on God's good pleasure, who then can dare to claim anything for himself as uniquely his own?

If God then has given us anything more than others, and so to speak, by special privilege, let us learn to attribute the whole to the fatherly love that he has for us, since he has chosen us to be his flock. We also learn from this passage that the grace that God shows to his chosen is not extended to all people equally, but is a privilege by which he distinguishes a few from the great mass of humanity.