1. Praise ye the Lord. Hallelujah. Praise Jah. This song is for the assembled
people, and they are all exhorted to join in praise to Jehovah. It is not meet
for a few to praise and the rest to be silent, but all should join. If David
were present in churches where quartets and choirs carry on all the singing, he
would turn to the congregation and say, Praise ye the Lord. Our meditation dwells upon
human sin; but on all occasions and in all occupations it is seasonable and
profitable to praise the Lord. O give thanks unto the Lord; for he is good. To us needy
creatures the goodness of God is the first attribute which excites praise, and
that praise takes the form of gratitude. For his mercy endureth for ever.
Goodness towards sinners assumes the form of mercy; mercy should therefore be a
leading note in our song. Since people cease not to be sinful, it is a great
blessing that Jehovah ceases not to be merciful. From age to age the Lord deals
graciously with his church, and to every individual in it is he is constant and
faithful in his grace forevermore. In a short space we have here two arguments
for praise, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever. These two
arguments are themselves praises. The very best language of adoration is that
which adoringly in the plainest words sets forth the simple truth with regard
to our great Lord. No rhetorical flourishes or poetical hyperboles are needed;
the bare facts are sublime poetry, and the narration of them with reverence is
the sense of adoration. This first verse is the text of all that which follows;
we are now to see how from generation to generation the mercy of God endured to
his chosen people.
2. Who can utter the mighty acts of the Lord?
What human or angelic tongue can duly describe the great displays of divine
power? Who can show forth all his praise? To declare his works is the
same things as to praise him, for his own doings are his best commendation.
3. Since the
Lord is so good and so worthy to be praised, it must be for our happiness to
obey him. Blessed are they that keep judgment. and he that doeth
righteousness at all times. Multiplied are the blessednesses which must
descend upon that one rare person who at all times follows that which is right.
Holiness is happiness. The way of right is the way of peace. Hence the story
which follows is in sad contrast with the happiness here depicted, because the
way of Israel was not that of judgment and righteousness, but that of folly and
iniquity.
4. Remember me, O Lord,
with the favor which thou bearest unto thy people. Insignificant as I am, do not forget me. Think of me with
kindness, just as thou thinkest of thine own elect. I cannot ask more, nor
would I seek less. Treat me as the least of thy saints are treated and I am
content. The sentence before us is a sweet prayer, at once humble and aspiring,
submissive and expansive; it might be used by a dying thief or a living
apostle; let us use it now.
O visit me with thy salvation. Bring it home to me. Come to my house and to my heart, and
give me the salvation which thou hast prepared, and art alone able to bestow.
We sometimes hear of someone dying by the visitation of God, but here is one
who knows that he can only live by the visitation of God. Jesus said of
Zacchaeus, “This day is salvation come to this house,” and that was the case,
because he himself had come there. There is no salvation apart from the Lord,
and he must visit us with it or we shall never obtain it.
5. That I may see the good of thy chosen. His desire for the divine favor was excited by the hope
that he might participate in all the good things which flow to the people of
God through their election. The Father has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in Christ Jesus, according as he has chosen us in him, and in these
precious gifts we desire to share through the saving visitation of the Lord. No
other good do we wish to see, perceive, and apprehend, but that which is the
peculiar treasure of the saints. That I may rejoice in the gladness of thy
nation. The psalmist, having sought his portion in the good of the chosen,
now also begs to be a partaker in their joy: for of all the nations under
heaven the Lord’s true people are the happiest. That I may glory with thine
inheritance. He would have a part and lot in their honor as well as their
joy. He was willing to find glory where saints find it, namely, in being
reproached for truth’s sake. To serve the Lord and endure shame for his sake is
the glory of the saints below: Lord, let me rejoice to bear my part.
These introductory thanksgivings and supplications, though
they occur first in the psalm, are doubtless the result of the contemplations
which succeed them, and may be viewed not only as the preface, but also as the
moral of the whole sacred song.
6. We have sinned with our fathers. Here begins a long and particular confession. Confession of
sin is the readiest way to secure an answer to the prayer of verse 4; God
visits with his salvation the soul which acknowledges its need of a Saviour.
People may be said to have sinned with their fathers when they imitate them,
when they follow the same objects, and make their own lives to be mere
continuations of the follies of their sires. Moreover, Israel was but one
nation in all time, and the confession which follows sets forth the national
rather than the personal sin of the Lord’s people. They enjoyed national
privileges, and therefore they shared in national guilt. We have committed
iniquity, we have done wickedly. Thus is the confession repeated three
times, in token of the sincerity and heartiness of it. Sins of omission,
commission, and rebellion we ought to acknowledge under distinct heads, that we
may show a due sense of the number and heinousness of our offenses.
7. Our fathers understood not thy wonders in Egypt. The Israelites saw the miraculous plagues and ignorantly
wondered at them: their designs of love, their deep moral and spiritual
lessons, and their revelation of the divine power and justice they were unable
to perceive. A long sojourn among idolaters had blunted the perceptions of the
chosen family, and cruel slavery had ground them down into mental sluggishness.
They remembered not the multitude of thy mercies. The sin of the
understanding leads on to the sin of the memory. What is not understood will
soon be forgotten. People feel little interest in preserving husks; if they
knew nothing of the inner kernel they will take no care of the shells. But
provoked him at the sea, even at the Red sea. To fall out at starting was a
bad sign. Those who did not begin well can hardly be expected to end well.
Israel is not quite out of Egypt, and yet she begins to provoke the Lord by
doubting his power to deliver, and questioning his faithfulness to his promise.
8. When he
could find no other reason for his mercy he found it in his own glory, and
seized the opportunity to display his power. This respect unto his own honor
ever leads him to deeds of mercy, and hence we may well rejoice that he is a
jealous God.
9. He rebuked the Red sea also, and it was dried up. A word did it. The sea heard his voice and obeyed. How many
rebukes of God are lost upon us! So he led them through the depths, as
through the wilderness. As if it had been the dry floor of the desert the
tribes passed over the bottom of the gulf; nor was their passage venturesome,
for he bade them go; nor dangerous, for he led them. We also have under divine
protection passed through many trials and afflictions, and with the Lord as our
guide we have experienced no fear and endured no perils.
10. And he saved them from the hand of them that hated them. Pharaoh was drowned, and the power of Egypt so crippled
that throughout the forty years’ wanderings of Israel they were never
threatened by their old masters. And redeemed them from the hand of the
enemy. This was a redemption by power, and one of the most instructive
types of the redemption of the Lord’s people from sin and hell by the power
which works in them.
11. What he
begins he carries through to the end. This, again, made Israel’s sin the
greater, because they saw the thoroughness of the divine justice, and the
perfection of the divine faithfulness. In the covering of their enemies we have
a type of the pardon of our sins; they are sunk as in the sea, never to rise
again; and, blessed be the Lord, there is “not one of them left.”
12. Then believed they his words. That is to say, they believed the promise when they saw it
fulfilled, but not till then. This is mentioned, not to their credit, but to
their shame. Those who do not believe the Lord’s word till they see it
performed are not believers at all. Who would not believe when the fact stares
them in the face? The Egyptians would have done as much as this. They sang
his praise. How could they do otherwise? Their song was very excellent, and
is the type of the song of heaven: but sweet as it was, it was quite as short,
and when it was ended they fell to grumbling. Between Israel singing and Israel
sinning there was scarce a step. Their song was good while it lasted, but it
was no sooner begun than over.
13. They soon forget his works. They seemed in a hurry to get the Lord’s mercies out of
their memories; they hasted to be ungrateful. They waited not for his
counsel, neither waiting for the word of command or promise; eager to have
their own way, and prone to trust in themselves. This is a common fault in the
Lord’s family to this day; we are long in learning to wait for the Lord,
and upon the Lord. With him is counsel and strength, but we are vain
enough to look for these to ourselves, and therefore we grievously err.
14. But lusted exceedingly in the wilderness. Though they would not wait for God’s will, they are hot to
have their own. When the most suitable and pleasant food was found in
abundance, it did not please them long, but they grew dainty and sniffed at
angel’s food, and must needs have flesh to eat, which was unhealthy diet for
that warm climate, and for their easy life. This desire of theirs they dwelt
upon till it became a mania with them, and, like a wild horse, carried away its
rider. For a meal of meat they were ready to curse their God and renounce the
land which floweth with milk and honey. What a wonder that the Lord did not
take them at their word! It is plain that they vexed him greatly—And tempted
God in the desert. In the place where they were absolutely dependent upon
him and were every day fed by his direct provision, they had the presumption to
provoke their God.
15. And he gave them their request. Prayer may be answered in anger and denied in love. That
God gives a man his desire is no proof that he is the object of divine favor;
everything depends upon what that desire is. But sent leanness into their
soul. Ah, that but! It embittered all. The meat was poison to them
when it came without a blessing; whatever it might do in fattening the body, it
was poor stuff when it made the soul lean. If we must know scantiness, may God
grant it may not be scantiness of soul: yet this is a common attendant upon
worldly prosperity.
16. They envied Moses also in the camp. Though to him as the Lord’s chosen instrument they owed
everything they grudged him the authority which it was needful that he should
exercise for their good. Some were more openly rebellious than others, and
became leaders of the mutiny, but a spirit of dissatisfaction was general, and
therefore the whole nation is charged with it. Who can hope to escape envy when
the meekest of men was subject to it? And Aaron the saint of the Lord. By divine choice Aaron was set
apart to be holiness unto the Lord, and instead of thanking God that he had
favored them with a high priest by whose intercession their prayers would be
presented, they railed at the divine election, and quarreled with the man who
was to offer sacrifice for them. Thus neither church nor state was ordered
aright for them; they would snatch from Moses his scepter, and from Aaron his
miter. It is the mark of bad men that they are envious of the good, and
spiteful against their best benefactors.
17. Korah is
not mentioned, for mercy was extended to his household, though he himself
perished. The earth could no longer bear up under the weight of these rebels
and ingrates: God’s patience was exhausted when they began to assail his
servants, for his children are very dear to him. Moses had opened the sea for
their deliverance, and now that they provoke him, the earth opens for their
destruction.
18. The
Levites who were with Korah perished by fire, which was a most fitting death
for those who intruded into the priesthood, and so offered strange fire. God
has more than one arrow in his quiver; the fire can consume those whom the
earthquake spares. These terrible things in righteousness are mentioned here to
show the obstinacy of the people in continuing to rebel against the Lord.
Terrors were as much lost upon them as mercies had been; they could neither be
drawn nor driven.
19. They made a calf in Horeb. In the very place where they had solemnly pledged
themselves to obey the Lord they broke the second, if not the first, of his
commandments, and set up the Egyptian symbol of the ox, and bowed before it.
The ox image is here sarcastically called a calf; idols are worthy of no
respect, scorn is never more legitimately used than when it is poured upon all
attempts to set forth the Invisible God. The Israelites were foolish indeed
when they thought they saw the slightest divine glory in a bull, indeed in the
mere image of a bull. To believe that the image of a bull could be the image of
God must need great credulity. And worshiped the molten image. Before it
they paid divine honors, and said, “These be thy gods, O Israel.” This was
sheer madness. After the same fashion the Ritualists must set up their symbols
and multiply them exceedingly. Spiritual worship they seem unable to apprehend;
their worship is sensuous to the highest degree, and appeals to eye, and ear,
and nose.
20. They said
that they only meant to worship the one God under a fitting and suggestive
similitude by which his great power would be set forth to the multitude; but in
very deed they had given up the true God, whom it had been their glory to
adore, and had set up a rival to him, not a representation of him; for how
should he be likened to a bullock? The psalmist is very contemptuous, and
justly so: irreverence towards idols is an indirect reverence to God. False
gods, attempts to represent the true God, and indeed all material things which are
worshiped are so much filth upon the face of the earth. God abhors them, and so
should we.
21–22. They forgat God their saviour. Remembering the calf involved forgetting God. He had
commanded them to make no image, and in daring to disobey they forgot his
commands. Which had done great things in Egypt. God in Egypt had
overcome all the idols, and yet they so far forgot him as to liken him to them.
Could an ox work miracles? Could a golden calf cast plagues upon Israel’s
enemies? They were brutish to set up such a wretched mockery of deity, after
having seen what the true God could really achieve. Wondrous works in the
land of Ham, and terrible things by the Red sea. They saw several ranges of
miracles, the Lord did not stint them as to the evidence of his eternal power
and Godhead, and yet they could not rest content with worshiping him in his
appointed way, but must have an elaborate ritual after the old Egyptian
fashion, and a manifest object of worship to assist them in adoring Jehovah.
23. Therefore he said that he would destroy them. The threatening of destruction came at last. For the first
wilderness sin he chastened them, sending leanness into their soul; for the
second he weeded out the offenders, the flame burned up the wicked; for the
third he threatened to destroy them; for the fourth he lifted up his hand and
almost came to blows (verse 26); for the fifth he actually smote them, “and
the plague brake in upon them”; and so the punishment increased with their
perseverance in sin. This is worth noting, and it should serve as a warning to
the man who goeth on in his iniquities. God tries words before he comes to
blows—he said that he would destroy them—but his
words are not to be trifled with, for he means them, and has power to make them
good. Had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach. Like a
bold warrior who defends the wall when there is an opening for the adversary
and destruction is rushing upon the city, Moses stopped the way of avenging
justice with his prayers. Moses had great power with God. He was an eminent
type of our Lord, who is called, as Moses here is styled, “mine elect,
in whom my soul delighteth.” As the Elect Redeemer interposed between the Lord
and a sinful world, so did Moses stand between the Lord and his offending
people. The story as told by Moses himself is full of interest and instruction,
and tends greatly to magnify the goodness of the Lord, who thus suffered himself
to be turned from the fierceness of his anger.
With disinterested affection, and generous renunciation of
privileges, the great lawgiver interceded with the Lord to turn away his
wrath, lest he should destroy them. Behold the power of a righteous man’s
intercession. Mighty as was the sin of Israel to provoke vengeance, prayer was
mightier in turning it away. How diligently ought we to plead with the Lord for
this guilty world, and especially for his own backsliding people!
24. Yea, they despised the pleasant land. They spoke lightly of it, though it was the joy of all
lands: they did not think it worth the trouble of seeking and conquering; they
even spoke of Egypt, the land of their iron bondage, as though they preferred
it to Canaan, the land which floweth with milk and honey. It is an ill sign
with a Christian when he begins to think lightly of heaven and heavenly things;
it indicates a perverted mind, and it is, moreover, a high offense to the Lord
to despise that which he esteems so highly that he in infinite love reserves it
for his own chosen. They believed not his word. This is the root of sin.
If we do not believe the Lord’s word, we shall think lightly of his promised
gifts.
25. But murmured in their tents. From unbelief to murmuring is a short and natural step;
they even fell to weeping when they had the best ground for rejoicing.
Grumbling is a great sin and not a mere weakness; it contains within itself
unbelief, pride, rebellion, and a whole host of sins. It is a home sin, and is
generally practiced by complainers in their tents; but it is just as
evil there as in the streets, and will be quite as grievous to the Lord. And
hearkened not unto the voice of the Lord.
Making a din with their own voices, they refused attention to their best Friend.
Murmurers are bad hearers.
26–27. Therefore he lifted up his hand against them, to
overthrow them in the wilderness.
He swore in his wrath that they should not enter into his rest; he commenced
his work of judgment upon them, and they began to die. Only let God lift his
hand against a man and his day has come; he galls terribly whom Jehovah
overthrows. To overthrow their seed also among the nations, and to scatter
them in the lands. Foreseeing that their descendants would reproduce their
sins, he solemnly declared that he would give them over to captivity and the
sword.
28. They joined themselves also unto Baal-peor. Ritualism led on to the adoration of false gods. If we
choose a false way of worship we shall, ere long, choose to worship a false
god. This abomination of the Moabites was an idol in whose worship women gave
up their bodies to the most shameless lust. Think of the people of a holy God
coming down to this. And ate the sacrifices of the dead. In the orgies
with which the Baalites celebrated their detestable worship Israel joined,
partaking even in their sacrifices as earnest inner-court worshipers, though
the gods were but dead idols.
29. Open
licentiousness and avowed idolatry were too gross to be winked at. This time
the offenses clamored for judgment, and the judgment came at once. Twenty-four
thousand people fell before a sudden and deadly disease which threatened to run
through the whole camp. Their new sins brought on them a disease new to their
tribes. Their vices were a moral pest, and they were visited with a bodily
pest: so the Lord meets like with like.
30. God has
his champions left in the worst times, and they will stand up when the time
comes for them to come forth to battle. His righteous indignation moved him to
a quick execution of two open offenders. His honest spirit could not endure
that lewdness should be publicly practiced at a time when a fast had been
proclaimed. Such daring defiance of God and of all law he could not brook, and
so with his sharp javelin he transfixed the two guilty ones in the very act. It
was a holy passion which inflamed him, and no enmity to either of the persons
whom he slew.
31. Down to
the moment when this psalm was penned the house of Phinehas was honored in
Israel. His faith had performed a valorous deed, and his righteousness was
testified of the Lord, and honored by the continuance of his family in the
priesthood. He was impelled by motives so pure that what would otherwise have
been a deed of blood was justified in the sight of God; indeed, thus was made the
evidence that Phinehas was righteous. No personal ambition, or private revenge,
or selfish passion, or even fanatical bigotry, inspired the man of God; but
zeal for God, indignation at open filthiness, and true patriotism urged him on.
Once again we have cause to note the mercy of God that even
when his warrant was out, and actual execution was proceeding, he stayed his
hand at the suit of one man, finding, as it were, an apology for his grace when
justice seemed to demand immediate vengeance.
32. They angered him also at the waters of strife. Will they never have done? The scene changes, but the sin
continues. Aforetime they had mutinied about water when prayer would soon have
turned the desert into a standing pool, but now they do it again after their
former experience of the divine goodness. This made the sin a double, indeed a
sevenfold offense, and caused the anger of the Lord to be the more intense. So
that it went ill with Moses for their sakes. Moses was at last wearied out,
and began to grow angry with them, and utterly hopeless of their ever
improving; can we wonder at it, for he was man and not God? After forty years
bearing with them the meek man’s temper gave way, and he called them rebels,
and showed unhallowed anger; and therefore he was not permitted to enter the
land which he desired to inherit. Truly, he had a sight of the goodly country
from the top of Pisgah, but entrance was denied him, and thus it went ill with
him. It was their sin which angered him, but he had to bear the
consequences; however clear it may be that others are more guilty than
ourselves, we should always remember that this will not screen us, but
every man must bear his own burden.
33. It seems
a small sin compared with that of others, but then it was the sin of Moses, the
Lord’s chosen servant, who had seen and known so much of the Lord, and
therefore it could not be passed by. He did not speak blasphemously, or
falsely, but only hastily and without care; but this is a serious fault in a
lawgiver, and especially in one who speaks for God. This passage is to our mind
one of the most terrible in the Bible. Truly we serve a jealous God. Yet he is
not a hard master, or austere; we must not think so, but we must the rather be
jealous of ourselves, and watch that we live the more carefully, and speak the
more advisedly, because we serve such a Lord. We ought also to be very careful
how we treat the ministers of the Gospel, lest by provoking their spirit we
should drive them into any unseemly behavior which should bring upon them the
chastisement of the Lord. Little do a grumbling, quarrelsome people dream of
the perils in which they involve their pastors by their untoward behavior.
34. They were
commissioned to act as executioners upon races condemned for their unnatural
crimes, and through sloth, cowardice, or sinful complacency they sheathed the
sword too soon, very much to their own danger and disquietude. It is a great
evil with believers that they are not zealous for the total destruction of all
sin within and without. The measure of our destruction of sin is not to be our
inclination, or the habit of others, but the Lord’s command. We have no warrant
for dealing leniently with any sin.
35. It was
not the wilderness which caused Israel’s sins; they were just as disobedient
when settled in the land of promise. They found evil company, and delighted in
it. Those whom they should have destroyed they made their friends. Having
enough faults of their own, they were yet ready to go to school to the filthy
Canaanites, and educate themselves still more in iniquity. None can tell what
evil has come of the folly of worldly conformity.
36. And they served their idols: which were a snare unto
them. They were fascinated by the charms
of idolatry, though it brings misery upon its votaries. A man cannot serve sin
without being ensnared by it.
37–38. Yea, they sacrificed their sons and daughters unto
devils. This was being snared indeed; they
were spell-bound by the cruel superstition, and were carried so far as even to
become murderers of their own children, in honor of the most detestable
deities, which were rather devils than gods. And shed innocent blood.
The poor little ones whom they put to death in sacrifice had not been partakers
of their sin, and God looked with the utmost indignation upon the murder of the
innocent. Even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they
sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan. Who knows how far evil will go? It
drove men to be unnatural as well as ungodly. Had they but thought for a
moment, they must have seen that a deity who could be pleased with the blood of
babes split by their own parents could not be a deity at all, but must be a
demon, worthy to be detested and not adored. How could they prefer such service
to that of Jehovah? And the land was polluted with blood. The promised
land, the holy land, which was the glory of all lands, for God was there, was
defiled with the reeking gore of innocent babes, and by the blood-red hands of
their parents, who slew them in order to pay homage to devils.
39. Not only
the land but the inhabitants of it were polluted. They broke the marriage bond
between them and the Lord, and fell into spiritual adultery. The language is
strong, but the offense could not be fitly described in less forcible words.
40–41. Therefore was the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people,
insomuch that he abhorred his own inheritance. Not that even then he broke his covenant or utterly cast
off his offending people, but he felt the deepest indignation, and even looked
upon them with abhorrence. How far the divine wrath can burn against those whom
he yet loves in his heart it is hard to say, but certainly Israel pushed the
experiment to the extreme. And he gave them into the hand of the heathen.
This was the manifestation of his abhorrence. He gave them a taste of the
result of sin; they spared the heathen, mixed with them and imitated them, and
soon they had to smart from them, for hordes of invaders were let loose upon
them to spoil them at their pleasure. People make rods for their own backs. And
they that hated them ruled over them. And who could wonder? Sin never
creates true love. They joined the heathen in their wickedness, and they did
not win their hearts, but rather provoked their contempt. If we mix with people
of the world they will soon become our masters and our tyrants, and we cannot
want worse.
42. Their enemies also oppressed them. This was according to their nature; an Israelite always
fares ill at the hands of the heathen. Leniency to Canaan turned out to be
cruelty to themselves. And they were into subjection under their hand.
They were bowed down by laborious bondage, and made to lie low under tyranny.
God can make our enemies to be rods in his hands to flog us back to our best
Friend.
43. Many times did he deliver them. By reading the book of Judges we shall see how truthful is
this sentence: again and again their foes were routed, and they were set free
again, only to return with vigor to their former evil ways. But they
provoked him with their counsel. With deliberation they agreed to
transgress anew; self-will was their counselor, and they followed it to their
own destruction. And were brought low for their iniquity. Worse and
worse were the evils brought upon them, lower and lower they fell in sin, and
consequently in sorrow. In dens and caves of the earth they hid themselves;
they were deprived of all warlike weapons, and were utterly despised by their
conquerors; they were rather a race of serfs than of free men until the Lord in
mercy raised them up again.
The lesson to ourselves, as God’s people, is to walk humbly
and carefully before the Lord, and above all to keep ourselves from idols. May
grace be given to us to keep the separated path, and remain undefiled.
44.
Notwithstanding all these provoking rebellions and detestable enormities the
Lord still heard their prayer and pitied them. This is very wonderful, very
Godlike. One would have thought that the Lord would have shut out their prayer,
seeing they had shut their ears against his admonitions; but no, he had a
father’s heart, and a sight of their sorrows touched his soul, the sound of
their cries overcame his heart, and he looked upon them with compassion.
45. And he remembered for them his covenant. The covenant is the sure foundation of mercy, and when the
whole fabric of outward grace manifested in the saints lies in ruins we see the
fundamental basis of love which is never moved, and upon it the Lord proceeds
to build again a new structure of grace. Covenant mercy is sure as the throne
of God. And repented according to the multitude of his mercies. He did
not carry out the destruction which he had commenced. Speaking after the manner
of men he changed his mind, and did not leave them to their enemies to be
utterly cut off, because he saw that his covenant would in such a case have
been broken.
46. Having
the hearts of all men in his hands he produced compassion even in heathen
hearts.
47. This is
the closing prayer, arranged by prophecy for those who would in future time be
captives, and suitable for all who before David’s days had been driven from
home by the tyranny of Saul, or who had remained in exile after the various
scatterings by famine and distress which had happened in the iron age of the
judges. Save us, O Lord our
God. The mention of the covenant encouraged the afflicted to intreat him to
interpose on their behalf and rescue them. And gather us from among the
heathen. Weary now of the ungodly and their ways, they long to be brought
into their own separated country, where they might again enjoy the means of
grace, enter into holy fellowship with their brethren, escape from
contaminating examples, and be free to wait upon the Lord. How often do true
believers nowadays long to be removed from ungodly households, where their
souls are vexed with the conversation of the wicked. To give thanks unto thy
holy name, and to triumph in thy praise. Weaned from idols, they desire to
make mention of Jehovah’s name alone, and to ascribe their mercies to his
ever-abiding faithfulness and love. The Lord had often saved them for his holy
name’s sake, and therefore they feel that when again restored they would render
all their gratitude to that saving name; it would be their glory to praise
Jehovah and none else.
48. Blessed be the Lord
God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting. Has not his mercy endured forever, and should not his
praise be of like duration? And let all the people say, Amen. They have
all been spared by his grace; let them all join in the adoration with loud
unanimous voice. Yet should a nation thus magnify him, indeed should all the
nations past and present unite in the solemn acclaim, it would fall far short
of his deserts. O for the happy day when all flesh will see the glory of God,
and proclaim his praise. Praise ye the Lord.
Excerpt from:
The Treasury of David
By Charles H Spurgeon
